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YouTube Still A Huge Mistake For Google, Says Mark Cuban

Dallas Mavs owner and entrepreneur Mark Cuban was critical of Google’s decision to buy YouTube when it happened back in 2006. Apparently, those sentiments haven’t changed. Appearing on the...
YouTube Still A Huge Mistake For Google, Says Mark Cuban
Written by Josh Wolford
  • Dallas Mavs owner and entrepreneur Mark Cuban was critical of Google’s decision to buy YouTube when it happened back in 2006. Apparently, those sentiments haven’t changed.

    Appearing on the CBS What’s Trending show, he received a question submitted from Twitter about how he feels about the YouTube acquisition, now that we all know how big it has become. The latest figures show that about 1 in 4 Americans watch a video on YouTube every day. And that’s not even considering its impact around the world.

    “I said it was a huge mistake back then, and I still think it’s a huge mistake.” he said.

    He continued:

    On one hand you say “Wow, YouTube has got all these people that come to their site,” but think about what’s really going on at YouTube.

    And I really like Google – they are a good company that’s done a lot of great things. All YouTube is, is Google subsidizing the bandwidth of every individual in the world.

    Check out the video below. He starts talking about YouTube around the 6:30 mark –

    They haven’t really accomplished anything. There’s what – 9 zillion minutes – 9 zillion hours uploaded every minute and the reality is, people just use it to put up their baby videos to show grandma.

    If you look at online video, there’s only one company making money and that’s Netflix.

    There are some things that do well – you can name 100 people who are doing well and then there’s 9 zillion who suck.

    So it seems that Cuban is focusing on the monetization of YouTube. But to say that they haven’t accomplished anything seems to be a stretch and to suggest that Google shouldn’t have acquired the video site? I mean, 3 billion views a day, and 3 billion monetized views per week globally.

    Just think about it this way. What if Google announced tomorrow that it was shutting down YouTube. Can you even imagine the response? I’m sure it would trump the still impressive outcry of the Super Poke Pets shutdown.

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