i just got a strange email from my youtube vlog, which i haven't even uploaded a video to in years.

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Hi jessica,

This email is to notify you that you’ll need to accept YPP terms again once your channel is eligible for the program. The YPP application process, your channel watchtime, and subscriber count are not impacted.

At some point, you signed contract terms with YouTube regarding the YouTube Partner Program (YPP). Previously, we allowed creators to pre-sign YPP terms before reaching the minimum eligibility thresholds. We have since re-designed this process. Our records show that your channel hasn’t yet met the existing thresholds for program eligibility. In 30 days, if your channel is still not eligible for YPP, we will invalidate your contract.

Not to worry, though. When you do reach the thresholds needed for YPP, it’s just a few easy clicks to apply using our standard process. (Note you can always check your progress on the monetization tab in YouTube Studio.)

What this means for your channel

In short, nothing is changing for your channel. The only change is that you will need to accept YPP terms again when you become eligible. The way you use or experience YouTube stays the same. You still have access to all your creator features that enable you to grow your audience, build your community, and manage your videos. You can:
Upload, edit, or delete your videos
Read, respond to, or moderate your comments
Analyze your channel performance in YouTube Analytics
Get best practices and strategic advice from Creator Academy
Connect to other Creators in the YouTube Help Forum

Thank you for being part of the YouTube Community! We look forward to your application in the future.

Sincerely,
The YouTube Team

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i've purposefully left my subscriber count unknown, but it's not anywhere close to 1000 subscribers, on either account. the former deathtokoalas and current koala central command account hit a max of about 500 before slowly falling due to disuse; the vlog account hit a max that was considerably less then 100. i think it was 93, iirc. i'd have to log into the other account to check and don't want to.

my google plus page had thousands and thousands of hits, and some of my comments had thousand of likes before they were removed by some shady governing structure that i only vaguely understand, but my subscriber count was never very high, and i never had anything at the music site with more than a few hundred hits.

excluding the cover video, and some concert footage that i've left unmonetized for ethical reasons, the most popular video on the vlog site has 159 views. while the vlog has been monetized for years, the other site has never been and never will be (i don't want ads on my music. gross.), and the reality is that i've never made a single cashable cent from youtube royalties. i think the total uncashed amount was about $3.50, at it's max.

the reason that i've left these numbers unpublished is the same reason that i don't allow "likes" to appear on the page - i don't think that how many subscribers i have, or the watch count, or the number of likes should be presented as a way to validate or invalidate the content. that is, i want people to react to the content without being coerced by popularity metrics. i really don't like social media or how it tries to shape popular opinion with herd mentality.

i will eventually update that vlog. i mean, i'm still vlogging, i'm just years behind on the updates. it could be sitting there for five or ten years before i get around to it.

but, i don't expect that i'll ever get that many subscribers, and i don't expect i'll ever remonetize. so, what youtube is essentially telling me is that it wants to give me server space for free. which is fine, but what's in it for them, then? are they going to start closing down unpopular or unmonetizable sites? there's a bit of a speech issue there, if they do - if they decide that you're only allowed a platform if you can generate an audience.

i have all of the files in a safe space and intend to put them up for sale at bandcamp in the form of isos and dvds, eventually. maybe they'll end up at vimeo or somewhere else, in the long run. it would be very frustrating to have to update all of the links, though.

the purpose of the vlog was to act as a marketing portal to the bandcamp site, not to make money on it's own. i didn't want ads on my music, but i wondered if i might be missing out on the possibility of a viral video; it never happened, and it was probably never very likely that it ever would. but, what i was hoping was that i could string an audience along with a vlog for long enough to sell them a couple of mp3s, and it didn't work out in the end, so i abandoned it.

given that it didn't work out as hoped, i probably should have removed the ads from the site quite some time ago, and am, at this point, sort of glad that youtube has done it for me. it sort of removes the issue for me - i don't have to wonder about whether i should compromise myself by allowing myself to be monetized, because i can't be monetized anyways. that's a weight lifted off of my shoulders, in the end.

if you'd like to support me, please either go to the bandcamp site and buy some tunes or send me something directly at death.to.koalas@gmail.com. small scale artists like myself cannot make money from advertising, even if we want to - and, generally, we don't want to.