Sep
13
Written by:
bcleveland
9/13/2011 9:37 PM
You’ve produced a video featuring your music, and you plan to promote it on YouTube.
Congratulations—but beware!
There are certain quirks in the way that YouTube registers how often
your video has been played, and at some point the count will very likely
freeze.
I discovered this the hard way.
At first, all will appear well, and every time your video is played, the counter will tick up one. In fact, it will even tick up one when your video is only played partially.
This happy situation will likely continue until your video has been viewed about 300 times—some say 200 or 250—at which point the view counter will no longer register plays.
There have been thousands of complaints about this issue, including dozens in video form posted on YouTube itself. In fact, there were so many complaints that apparently whole threads on a YouTube forum, and a YouTube group founded in response to the problem, have been removed.
But the company has failed to acknowledge that there is a problem, let alone explain what is going on.
I found a single forum post from a few years ago (now vanished) that claimed the freezes were the result of a filter designed to keep people from gaming the system. But if so, why freeze the view count entirely and arbitrarily—sometimes for weeks or even months? Surely there aren’t that many cheaters, and even if there were, so what? So someone gets his or her family, fans, or friends to play a video multiple times? What is the crime, and is it really worth penalizing every user in order to thwart the small percentage that may do so?
Philosophical considerations aside, this issue can impact you very negatively when promoting your video—as it did me.
Just about the time plays for my “Warning” video approached 300, I included a link to it in a newsletter sent to the 800 people on my mailing list, ran an ad for the video on Facebook, and tweeted about it. Around that time I also posted a blog called
How I Made a Music Video For $12.00, detailing the techniques used to make the video. I know from the many responses I received, that
a lot of people viewed that video—yet once it got to 307 plays it froze for two weeks, and all of my promotional efforts were for naught (at least in terms of registering the all-important counter number).
I wrote to YouTube Support. No response. I tried to navigate the maze of contacts on the company’s Contact Us page, but to no avail.
Now, as it so happens, YouTube headquarters is located two blocks from the
Guitar Player offices, so I decided to stop by to see if anyone could explain what was going on. When I reached the locked front door I was instructed by a disembodied voice to pick up a phone located beside the door. I picked up the phone, but the voice began speaking to me from an intercom above the phone. I explained that I was a journalist from down the street, that I was writing a blog about promoting music on YouTube, that I’d had this problem, and that I’d like to include YouTube’s official position in my blog. The voice said I should contact Support. When I explained that I already had, it instructed me to contact someone via the Web site. When I asked whom I should contact, or even which department, the voice refused to tell me. After several more minutes of similar obfuscation, I shrugged and walked away.
Oddly enough, that very evening a message appeared on all YouTube administration pages saying that there had been a problem with registering plays for the past week, but that everything had been fixed, and over the next few days all unregistered plays would be restored (even though the problem had been occurring for years).
Eventually, another 150 or so plays were added to my video’s count, and the meter appeared to be working—though it froze again for several days at various points, and is still behaving erratically.
So, based on what I’ve gleaned, my advice to those who would promote videos on YouTube is:
Don’t play your own video more than a few times at any point or it may be interpreted as gaming the system.
Ask your family, fans, and friends not to “help” you by playing the video repeatedly, especially before the count reaches 300.
And whatever you do, wait until the count exceeds 300 before launching any major promotional campaigns!
These three steps aren’t guaranteed to save you from the YouTube Demon Freezer—but they may at least give you a fighting chance.
Good luck!
BC
barrycleveland.com
P.S. Here’s the video in question:
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3 comment(s) so far...
Re: Barry Cleveland: Beware the YouTube Demon Freezer!
OMG! I knew this. I have only been a youtube user since 2009. In June of 2010, I uploaded my first music video. keep in mind I recently broke my back and i am now on disability, and want to release some old live footage I just so happened to get my hands on, the artist. So I have been slowly over the year promoting a couple songs at a time for .10 cents. I've seen with my own eys how off the count they are. Within the last year a paid over a thousand dollars and you can see the hint counts for yourself. I'm better off hiring someone to run my web page and facebook, than throw my SSI hard earned money(was a field engineer)away to youtube.
Thank you so much for your story blog, and getting the message out. this was the wake-up call I needed this morning!! ;)
~Nikki Spears
By nikki spears on
9/14/2011 11:08 AM
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Re: Barry Cleveland: Beware the YouTube Demon Freezer!
I have experienced this "demon freezer" in full force on many occasions, and had the same frustrations and head-banged-against-the-wall feeling of trying to find out just what it was that was going on as you and I'm sure all the other commenters. I'm not one to go quietly into that dark night, so I finally tracked down and had an opportunity to grill a YouTube employee as to what the deal was with this.
So the big issue is that this freeze is actually YouTube's idea of doing you a favor. How it all plays out is like this:
1) You create and publish your amazing and awesome video.
2) Because so much of what is uploaded to YouTube is crap anyway and will be destine to live in the 30 or so view hell that is the bottom of the barrel, for the first 300 or so views, any time a video is loaded anywhere, it is counted as a view. YouTube doesn't believe it merits their attention at that low of a view count, so, whatever "view" is fine.
3) Once you get enough views to merit being paid attention to, YouTube's metrics engine kicks in and starts tracking who (or what) is viewing your video. This metrics analysis is done retroactively.
4) YouTube has a secret set of criteria for what constitutes an actual view. It is secret because if they told anyone what is not a view, then people could indeed find a workaround and "game the system." In the retroactive counting, anything that is kicked out by the filter is not counted as a view.
5) To be "nice" to you, YouTube will never subtract from your visible view count. This means that out of your initial 300 views, if 150 of them are kicked out then you video has only 150 views, but YouTube will let visitors of your video (and you for that matter) hold on to that bigger number.
6) Views that are legit thru the filter are still counted, but until you make up the difference, they are not added to your view total, this is what gives you the "demon freeze." So if 150 views are kicked out, that means an additional 150 legitimate views have to be garnered by your video before your view count moves a tick.
7) Once you have made up the difference, then every legitimate view is accurately counted and metrically analyzed correctly.
Important things to know about this whole ordeal:
- Repeat viewing does not disqualify a view. So if your mom legitimately views your video 100 times, it is indeed 100 views. It will however only reflect the 1 unique viewer, your mom.
- No one knows outside of YouTube what the criteria actually are for a legitimate view. This is by design since if we knew, we could cheat. Rest assured it has to do with MAC/IP information (proving you are human and not a bot) and length of viewing (preventing constant refreshing) at the very least. Some other things might be in there as well. This actually encourages users to be signed up. So, have everyone log in before watching to make sure the view counts.
- Most importantly, YouTube is not screwing you. If no one is actually watching your video, it isn't going to count. If they only watch three seconds and click away, it isn't going to count. If they jump after ten seconds to the ending, it probably isn't going to count.
If you want views, make better videos. Promote better. Engage your audience better. Because all of the counting is just counting, so if you are not seeing the views as the result are you going to blame the oven, the cook, or the recipe?
Matthew Hendershot
soundstud.io
By Matthew Hendershot on
9/21/2011 1:33 PM
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Re: Barry Cleveland: Beware the YouTube Demon Freezer!
Thanks for your views, Matthew, but to suggest that the counter is working just fine and that lower than expected view counts are simply a matter of a video not being good enough to be viewed more often contradicts the experience of thousands of users.
By bcleveland on
9/21/2011 1:40 PM
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