That Little Girlie She’s a Thousandaire!

I was flipping around Youtube (new habit of mine) and came across something so damn funny I don’t even want to tell you how many times I watched it. A parody of some feel-good kid music video, Friday by Rebecca Black. The parody’s got four million views on it and counting. Using Youtube’s powerful Related videos function I figured I should watch the subject of the parody in case it made the parody funnier when watching the parody more afterward, which it did.

I understand you’re busy and will only click on one or the other so go with the parody:

So four million views on a parody (plus one thanks to you) of something with about fifty million views, the video looks pretty produced, very family and TV-friendly; not knowing anything more than that you’d think this Rebecca kid is making bank. Right? Well Mashable ran the numbers and she’s not. Hell the parody guy may be doing a better job of monetizing this video and the newly-found celebrity of hers than Rebecca Black is actually doing.

Youtube pulls in about a dollar per thousand views of something, then Rebecca and her people (who may still owe other people money), not just Rebecca, get a 68% cut of that dollar. That’s not even forty grand. Friday’s no Thriller but judging by the video I don’t think she’s even breaking even, even with the iTunes money, seventy cents a track adding up to a whopping $26K for the first week, plus a little scratch for some ringtones.

No wonder she’s just giving it all to the Japanese. Maybe they can use it for the postage to send her back a thank you haiku written on top of a softly painted background of some bridge they repaired in two hours.

I guess the point I’m trying to make with this piece is that Youtube may have generated this cutie pie artist more money selling ads than Apple did selling tracks. Think on that. And by the way, who the hell is paying $1.29 for a dumb ringtone? Stop that.

Doug Simmons