Rather than key in on the fact that the amount of money in the pool for producers will be increasing by a factor of fourteen, many editorialists are keying in on the fact that ad rates on a CPM are likely to decrease over time.
There was a single sentence that has been used all over the place (I first saw it at Wired today):
Part of the pricing for professional-quality online video is based on scarcity.
Master videographer Nalts weighed in with a few pieces of advice for the people in the various parts of the online video equation (viewers, amateur creators, advertisers, online studios, and heritage media nuts). Almost all of it is indispensible, but most interesting to me is the advice he gives for producers:
It may seem initially upsetting, but of course supply/demand will take care of things. If you attract audiences that marketers want to reach, then you’ll command a decent CPM. If not, then you’ll either have lower CPMs or no ads at all (or worst yet, Google Adwords). And for the love of video, go for non CPM revenue models like sponsorships or custom promotions. There’s a fertile market for advertisers looking to engage without paying hundreds of thousands in ad buys. Again- this has been far more profitable than checks from a YouTube partner program (which are really welcome but I could work at Taco Bell for a better hourly wage).
It's important to note that Nalts is entrenched in the YouTube culture (but not at all ignorant of the rest of the online video world). According to the eMarketer report (and fleshed out by my own experience), there are many online publishers (Mashable included) that are spending a good deal of effort growing their online video offerings because quite simply, you can monetize it at much higher rates than the rest of the content.
The average video CPM amongst the seven Web publishers surveyed by eMarketer were about three times higher than the average display ad's value at $43. The rest of the same publishers' content averaged at about a $15 CPM.