Starting on Wednesday, YouTube will be allowing fans and creators of their platform to gift each other with paid channel subscriptions. Popular streamers announced the feature's availability on Twitter today, who were excited about the new monetization tool.
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This picture taken in Moscow on March 19, 2022 shows logos of Youtube social media on a smartphone screen.
Gifted subscriptions are a popular feature on Twitch, which happens to be Youtube Gaming's main competition. Streamers benefit from the subs to monetize their content and build their own community.
This has been long requested by Youtubers, and now it has been finally granted to them. Youtube Japan was the first one to test out this feature earlier this year for a select number of channels.
However, in the US and UK, gifted memberships are still in beta and will be available to all Youtube Gaming users in the coming months.
Excited to announce that starting May 11th, memberships Gifting Beta will be enabled for YouTube streams!
Been streaming on YouTube for 2.5 years and just so happy to see the platform continue to focus working on improving the streaming side of it.
Many more changes to come :)— RAE (@Valkyrae) May 10, 2022
Subscribers have to pay $4.99 per month to get channel memberships. This will give them access to user badges, emotes, and other exclusive content created by several creators.
According to The Verge, Youtube Gaming has been notably cloning several Twitch features this year, like Live Redirects that enables streamers to send fans to other streams or premieres.
Twitch still holds the biggest US-based platform for live streaming and Youtube Gaming doesn't have that much of a big audience. However, this could drastically change since many of its popular streamers have left the platform for Youtube Gaming.
It may not also help that Twitch's new monetization model will only give a smaller cut of revenues from subscription to their streamers, which stands at 50 percent from the previous 70 percent, according to Bloomberg's report.
While YouTube Gaming gives a 70% cut of revenues to their streamers. Overtime, their audience could grow bigger with its higher monetization offer.
In fact, YouTube has encouraged huge Twitch names like Sykkuno, DrLupo, TimTheTatman, and Ludwig to stream exclusively on its gaming platform.
Membership Gifting: How to Try the Feature?
YouTube noted that the memberships gifting beta will be accessible to a "small group of creators" and it will be available for everyone in the next several months. Content creators who are interested in testing the feature are required to fill out a Google Form.
To avail gifting, it will only be available for viewers using a desktop browser window. Buying gift memberships on mobile is still unavailable but YouTube plans to make this accessible in the feature's full launch.
"With Memberships Gifting, your channel members can buy a set number of channel memberships [5, 10, 20] in a single purchase, that YouTube will 'gift' out to other viewers in your live stream," YouTube said.
Furthermore, viewers who receive a gift membership will have one month access to the creator's channel membership perks such as "loyalty badges, custom emoji, and more" for free.
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Written by Joaquin Victor Tacla
