YouTube No Longer Counting Autoplays? - Bandaids fallout

[catatoniaone]

YouTube No Longer Counting Autoplays?

Based on anecdotal evidence from several top YouTube video producers, we have reason to believe the site has stopped counting views from videos set to play automatically on pages around the web.
We first took notice of the issue when popular producers contacted us saying they’d seen a dramatic drop-off in the number of views they receive for new videos. It’s possible that YouTube has adjusted more than one aspect of its view count methods, and it’s also possible that the view count methods are just malfunctioning. But enough people are mentioning the autoplay issue that we think there’s a good chance that’s the issue.
We asked YouTube to comment, but haven’t been back. We will update this post when we do.

While YouTube videos automatically start playing on its own pages, when they are embedded on other web pages they are set by default to wait for a user to click the play button. However, it’s possible to tweak the embed code so a video plays automatically each time someone visits a page.
YouTube has reason to fight back against gaming of its view counts to maintain the integrity of its service as well as its relationships with partners and advertisers. In a prominent recent example, Avril Lavigne fans had created a page that autoplayed and auto-refreshed the video for her single “Girlfriend” in an attempt to make it the most popular YouTube video of all time and knock off the long-reigning champion, “Evolution of Dance.” (”Evolution” is still ahead, due in part to anti-Avril backlash; it currently has 91.2 million views while “Girlfriend” has 90.8 million.) In another case, a fan-produced video for a Brazilian pop song was removed from YouTube after it rose to the top of the leaderboard through unclear methods.
Even if YouTube revenue share doesn’t quite provide a living for many of its popular user partners, their popularity on the service is hugely important to them. One prominent YouTube producer complains,

“This COMPLETELY screws up our business, and we’re getting frustrated that nothing’s happening. The one big metric we tell our funders about is the # of views, and now we have no idea what they are! Our entire distribution strategy is based around driving views up on youtube with our pretty sizable audience, and then encouraging them to spread it to social sites like digg and elsewhere.”

YouTube No Longer Counting Autoplays? « NewTeeVee

[Sharifa]

If they do discount auto-play views from embedded videos, this will only help Avril as she got to #2 with embedded views turned off. This takes away the advantage of other videos whose authors have allowed embedding to remain on.

xx

[futurechildstar]

That's true Sharifa. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

[Banana Pancakes]

The problem with this entire thing, is that people dont know that it was all a hoax, and people honestly believe that we cheated.

I think we've ruined our image.

[Lewymocha Original]

Woo! Go Avril! Last week she was 700,000 view behind, now she is only 400,000 views behind. Avril's video is getting more views obviously.

[Lewymocha Original]

Originally Posted by Pink Lemonade

The problem with this entire thing, is that people dont know that it was all a hoax, and people honestly believe that we cheated.

I think we've ruined our image.

I think we have done the exact opposite. I think this whole situation has created hype around Bandaids.

[futurechildstar]

Just goes to show how powerful we are

[Sharifa]

Originally Posted by Pink Lemonade

The problem with this entire thing, is that people dont know that it was all a hoax, and people honestly believe that we cheated.

I think we've ruined our image.

the only people who have ruined their image is youtube because advertisers now question whether they can put faith in their view metrics.

xx

[HotRunaway]

Come on, Lavigne-iacs! This is something Team Britney would do! Don’t sink to their level.