I've used YouTube vids as references for repairing my clothes washer and drier, a countertop oven, and installing new rotors and brake pads on my vehicle. I also routinely use YouTube vids as a reference for Adobe Creative Cloud apps and for the video/audio production gear I use at work.
That depends on who are the other players and whether they are any bigger. The market contraction applies to everyone, manufacturers too. Their survival depends on addressing niche markets and feeding the channels available in the routes. So, the question is, whether we reach a size that they think is worth giving priority, and that depends on what we do.
Certainly. I think there's not a shortage of people offering that kind of review, and his seems to be more approachable than many. What there is a shortage of is people offering more rigorous reviews with which one can make useful comparisons between options, or providing neutral data that you can use as you wish to inform decisions. There's room for multiple approaches, it's just with the recent closures the systematic market has thinned out somewhat.
These days "influencers" seem to be trumping traditional review outlets for traffic and reach a lot of the time. Of course, we don't know if any of these "influencers" are on some kind of undisclosed sweetener from their pet brands. I couldn't possibly say ;-)
But it's wise to consider such things in a shrinking market with changing consumption trends.
Nice to see you back. It's certainly an option, though having affiliates would open the door to the vendor based conspiracy theory that gets directed at DPReview.
I find You Tube videos that I watch have a lot of "padding" Maybe the people that put them out feel that more run time equates to a more relevant video. I find it's just more annoying "fluff"
Remember that many You Tubers on their channel are trying to make a living...'that' is their job. So the more entertainment they can make their channel, the better. They need subscribers to pay the bills.
When the headlight burned out in my 2011 Buick Regal, I went to YouTube to see how much work it would be. There was one very long video where the untrained gent had half the front clip apart, looking at something like 6 hours of labor at the minimum to finish the task. Then there was another video that was only 45 seconds long. Expecting some satire like the guy removing the bulb from the front with a hammer, what I got was a GM technician sitting in the car and he hadn't even pulled the hood latch yet. How is he going to get this done in 45 seconds?, I wondered.
He pulls the hood latch, lifts the hood, points to the washer fluid bottle filler neck, pulls upward on it (unbeknownst to most its a two piece removable system) and out it comes . Viola, direct access to the halogen bulb behind it. No tools needed.
Living proof that YouTube is an uncurated minefield. Use at your risk.
In the traditional print publishing business model, the publisher would provide publicity, distribution, content editing (curation these days), desk editing (grammar police), book design, and a platform for you to build an audience. Since that model was established, bookstores that rely on reps and distribution have faded, customers have migrated to Amazon, and the entire model developed holes. Anyone that already has a platform can bypass the system entirely.
You already have a platform, arguably need no curation, no clue on your design or grammar skills, and through Amazon, you have most of what you need to self publish. And you don't even have to go to Amazon, given the platform that you have already created, so no need to share the cut there.
The only downside is for those who sell only digital copies. Print is still 75% of the market.
Yes, but...
Samples are in tight demand, especially for the products that would probably most interest a community like you're trying to build. Unfortunately, as I and a few others have found, it all turns on how many eyeballs you can convince the camera makers you have. You're going against YouTube followers, et.al. My sites total up to over 1m uniques a year, but it's still hard going to get attention.
The way it seemed to start with the camera companies and YouTube/Influencers was that the camera co's all wanted to reach market they weren't reaching, and hired consultants, marketing firms, etc., to give them an alternative. Basically, they were sold "eyeballs." And many of those numbers are irresistible to the camera co's given that magazines, et.al., no longer produce large audiences. The coupling of "lots of eyeballs" with "young market" was basically an easy sell. It continues today.