One of YouTube's biggest stars, who uses the pseudonym PewDiePie, has an interesting theory to offer as to why YouTube launched a $10 per-month subscription service charge which eliminates all adverts.
The Swedish YouTube star, whose real name is Felix Kjellberg, who has more than 40 million subscribers for his gaming videos, believes the video-sharing website has introduced the monthly subscription to cushion a revenue stream which was declining due to the popularity of advertisement blockers, Business Insider reports.
Ad revenues generate income for people who create the ads and videos, but a lot of people are increasingly using ad-blocking software.
"Personally, I am ok with the fact that you (viewers) use ad-blocks to watch videos. Advertisements are annoying, I get it. I am not here to complain about that, but it could be disastrous for the smaller channels" PewDiePie was quoted as saying by Business Insider.
He also shared some statistics after conducting a poll on Twitter. It is believed that 40 percent of people who viewed PewDiePie videos were using ad-blockers, a figure that has risen almost 20 percent in the last five years, TechRadar reported.
YouTube Red is not just about blocking advertisements; the subscription fee allows access to exclusive content as well. There needs to be a system wherein certain acceptable ads cannot be blocked by any system, said Sridar Ramaswamy, Google ads boss in an interview to Business Insider.
The video blogger admits that there are important questions about YouTube Red— "is $10 the right subscription price. It is important to understand the actual problem," PewDiePie said, according to TechRadar.
