Exactly. My bet is it's simple greed, and that it shuts enough people (and revenue) out to make Google a pretty penny.
Likely it was a decision based on analytics that Google, and no one else, has.
Imagine we are talking a cable TV platform instead, and your analytics show that most people flip through channels most of the time, as opposed to actually watching something specific. You make a rule to only share revenue with channels if the viewer is engaged longer than 120 seconds. People are still watching TV, you are still monetizing, but the channels aren't getting fully paid and only you know the money involved.
Making people feel they need to earn the right that their earnings be shared with them is just icing on the cake.
> Making people feel they need to earn the right that their earnings be shared with them is just icing on the cake.
That's not even the half of it. Unless your channel is big enough to be considered a "partner", you are basically fucked when it comes to content strikes, DMCA, AI/contractor driven "community standards" issues, random demonetization, etc. There's no real "support".
The demonetizing thing is particularly funny, I know of channels where their videos get demonetized for content guidelines violations, but viewers still see advertisements. Happens a lot with firearms related content.
Likely it was a decision based on analytics that Google, and no one else, has.
Imagine we are talking a cable TV platform instead, and your analytics show that most people flip through channels most of the time, as opposed to actually watching something specific. You make a rule to only share revenue with channels if the viewer is engaged longer than 120 seconds. People are still watching TV, you are still monetizing, but the channels aren't getting fully paid and only you know the money involved.
Making people feel they need to earn the right that their earnings be shared with them is just icing on the cake.