Rumble, a video-sharing platform, will not be taking any share of monthly subscriptions from its creators for the remainder of 2023, according to a press release.
In a bid to rival YouTube’s membership program, Rumble has recently introduced channel subscriptions that are available to users for $5 per month. Creators will be receiving 100% of the revenue from the monthly “subscription badges” until the end of next year. By contrast, YouTube shares revenue as follows: “Creators receive 70% of memberships revenue recognized by Google after local sales tax and other fees (depending on country and users’ platform) are deducted. Payment processing fees (including credit card fees) are currently covered by YouTube.”
Rumble reportedly takes up to 40% of video ad revenue, leaving the user with up to 60%. In contrast, YouTube takes a 45% cut from ads displayed or streamed on user videos and a 55% cut from “shorts” posted by the user, which are vertical videos that are less than one minute in length.
According to Rumble’s chairman and CEO, Chris Pavlovski, “The opportunity to take market share away from YouTube and Twitch is today, and we are going to capitalize on it.”
“For the rest of 2023, Rumble will pay creators 100% of the revenue they generate from subscription badges,” said Chris Pavlovski, Rumble’s chairman and CEO, adding that he wants Rumble’s revenue sharing program to be at the top of the list for video-sharing platforms.
“At the end of the day, I want to have a product that generates more revenue for creators than any other platform out there.” stated Pavlovski.
“Plans for the subscription platform, aside from a superficial badge icon, include turning off ads for the videos of the creator in question,” Pavlovski said.
The CEO says that he sees an opportunity with the program to leapfrog Rumble into becoming the leading creator-friendly platform for independent voices.
TechCrunch reported that YouTube experienced a decline in quarterly revenue in October 2022, dropping by 1.9% year over year. Additionally, Alphabet, YouTube’s parent company, fell short of its earnings estimate by approximately one billion dollars.
The video-sharing platform halted all Google and YouTube ads in Russia in March 2022 as a response to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, causing Russian viewers to lose access to monetization features such as Super Chat and Super Stickers. Meanwhile, Rumble’s revenue surged by 430% YoY in Q3 2022, although it remains much smaller in scale compared to YouTube.
