After going live on iOS and Android last week, Vine’s successor, Byte, has dropped some more information that “partner program” it’s been teasing since launch, basically its plan to get users paid. None too soon, I’d wager, given the app—a video platform for six-second looping clips—has already become overrun with plenty of users thirsty for those follows.
According to a company blog post Friday, Byte plans to create a “Partner Pool” every 120 days, with pay divvied out in four 30-day installments based on each partner’s viewership during that period. These viewership stats determine their “Viewership Bracket,” and the more popular a partner is, the higher their bracket and payout. For added transparency (and to show Byte isn’t playing favourites), everyone in a bracket will be paid the same amount.
“We hope this model will address issues of incentive and inequality that we see in other models,” Byte wrote.
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These payouts will come from ads—no surprise there—but Byte underlined that users won’t be seeing these before Bytes or mid-feed, and they’re not based on retargeting. All ad revenue will exclusively go to partnered creators throughout Byte’s pilot phase, though that’ll likely change to a more sustainable payment model whenever the program finally goes public. As the company’s blog post states, they’re “exploring multiple ways to help creators get paid,” of which this program is only the first.
Byte’s planning to start its first Partner Pool in the U.S. within the next 60 to 90 days, the company wrote. While it’s invitation-only at the moment, creators can also submit their name for potential consideration. Currently, there’s no end date in sight: “We’ll run the pilot until we’re ready for a wider roll-out, which we anticipate will take some time,” Byte said.
Luring in creators by promising the company’s entire ad revenue is a risky bet for Byte. But it could pay off if the promise of a quick pay-day manages to distract enough eyes from the many other short-form video platforms out there. Byte appears to be keenly aware that, in these first crucial months, they’re advertising their platform as much to potentially lucrative influencers as they are to viewers themselves. And being upfront about dollar values is certainly one way to catch their attention.