Feature
Video platform YouTube graceful to bring in big for Google in coming years
New Delhi: With nearly two billion monthly logged-in users, video-streaming platform YouTube is poised to bring in big moolah for Google in the coming years, the company’s CEO Sundar Pichai hinted in an earnings call with analysts on Monday.
Google’s advertising business accounted for $32.6 billion of its parent company Alphabet’s overall revenue of $39.3 billion for the fourth quarter of 2018 — an increase of 22 per cent from the same period a year ago.
Google-owned YouTube played a key role in the rise of the company’s revenue, Pichai acknowledged, while desisting from giving actual numbers on the platform’s contribution.
“We are seeing great traction in some of our newer experiences on YouTube,” Pichai said in response to a question.
His remarks came when Google is pushing its subscription services, especially YouTube Music and YouTube Premium.
The YouTube Premium service allows users to view videos without ads. For those who want to watch the videos later offline, the service also allows them to download the videos.
YouTube music and YouTube Premium are now available in nearly 30 countries, up from five countries at the start of 2018.
Besides these services, there is also YouTube TV which is currently limited to the US.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai bets big on YouTube for future growth in coming year:
In January, YouTube TV announced that it was expanding to cover 98 per cent of US households with the rest to follow shortly.
“YouTube continues to invest in its thriving community of creators and build great features for its nearly two billion monthly log in users,” Pichai said.
“We are driving revenue to the YouTube creator community from established channels to newly emerging ones,” Pichai said, ading that the number of YouTube channels with more than one million subscribers nearly doubled in the last year, and the number of creators earning five or six figures grew by more than 40 per cent year-over-year.
The Google CEO who lost some of his shine among the company’s employees in recent times according to the company’s latest annual survey on employee satisfaction also addressed YouTube challenges of controlling misinformation.
“A big priority for YouTube in 2019 is to continue our work to quickly find and remove content that violates YouTube’s content guidelines,” Pichai said.
“It’s an important challenge and with advanced machine learning and investments in human reviewers, we are making continued progress,” he added.
In late 2018, about three in four (74 per cent) Google employees said they were “positive,” as opposed to “neutral” or “negative”, about Pichai’s ability to effectively lead the company, down from 92 per cent “positive” the year before, according to Google’s latest annual survey on employee satisfaction.
The State Scores Extra High on Gaming-Friendly Industry Index
Meghalaya scored 92.85 out of 100 possible points in a Gaming Industry Index and proved to be India’s most gaming-friendly state following its recent profound legislation changes over the field allowing land-based and online gaming, including games of chance, under a licensing regime.
The index by the UK India Business Council (UKIBC) uses a scale of 0 to 100 to measure the level of legalisation on gambling and betting achieved by a state based on the scores over a set of seven different games – lottery, horse racing, betting on sports, poker, rummy, casino and fantasy sports
Starting from February last year, Meghalaya became the third state in India’s northeast to legalise gambling and betting after Sikkim and Nagaland. After consultations with the UKIBC, the state proceeded with the adoption of the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Act, 2021 and the nullification of the Meghalaya Prevention of Gambling Act, 1970. Subsequently in December, the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021 were notified and came into force.
All for the Tourists
The move to legalise and license various forms of offline and online betting and gambling in Meghalaya is aimed at boosting tourism and creating jobs, and altogether raising taxation revenues for the northeastern state. At the same time, the opportunities to bet and gamble legally will be reserved only for tourists and visitors.
“We came out with a Gaming Act and subsequently framed the Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021. The government will accordingly issue licenses to operate games of skill and chance, both online and offline,” said James P. K. Sangma, Meghalaya State Law and Taxation Minister speaking in the capital city of Shillong. “But the legalized gambling and gaming will only be for tourists and not residents of Meghalaya,” he continued.
To be allowed to play, tourists and people visiting the state for work or business purposes will have to prove their non-resident status by presenting appropriate documents, in a process similar to a bank KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure.
Meghalaya Reaches Out to a Vast Market
With 140 millions of people in India estimated to bet regularly on sports, and a total of 370 million desi bettors around prominent sporting events, as per data from one of the latest reports by Esse N Videri, Meghalaya is set to reach out and take a piece of a vast market.
Estimates on the financial value of India’s sports betting market, combined across all types of offline channels and online sports and cricket predictions and betting platforms, speak about amounts between $130 and $150 billion (roughly between ₹9.7 and ₹11.5 lakh crore).
Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Delhi are shown to deliver the highest number of bettors and Meghalaya can count on substantial tourists flow from their betting circles. The sports betting communities of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana are also not to be underestimated.
Among the sports, cricket is most popular, registering 68 percent of the total bet count analyzed by Esse N Videri. Football takes second position with 11 percent of the bets, followed by betting on FIFA at 7 percent and on eCricket at 5 percent. The last position in the Top 5 of popular sports for betting in India is taken by tennis with 3 percent of the bet count.
Local Citizens will Still have Their Teer Betting
Meghalaya residents will still be permitted to participate in teer betting over arrow-shooting results. Teer is a traditional method of gambling, somewhat similar to a lottery draw, and held under the rules of the Meghalaya Regulation of the Game of Arrow Shooting and the Sale of Teer Tickets Act, 2018.
Teer includes bettors wagering on the number of arrows that reach the target which is placed about 50 meters away from a team of 20 archers positioned in a semicircle.
The archers shoot volleys of arrows at the target for ten minutes, and players place their bets choosing a number between 0 and 99 trying to guess the last two digits of the number of arrows that successfully pierce the target.
If, for example, the number of hits is 256, anyone who has bet on 56 wins an amount eight times bigger than their wager.
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