There's no denying the success of YouTube... Alexa puts it as the 10th most visited website on the internet. [in case you're wondering, DV Guru is about 13,000]. With all that success, many pundits around the web said YouTube was Web2.0 Napster and would likely see the same fate, but they've come through and proved all the naysayers wrong. Now that they're nearly legit, with only a regulatory hurdle away, the $1.65 Billion company isn't being sued into oblivion, but instead striking content deals with big media companies.

While the site was worth $1.6 Billion to Google, and the big media companies feel like they've got a place to distribute their content online to the masses, what does the deal mean for indies? The impending sale doesn't affect independent content creators as much as it does big media, but there are defininite advantages for the independent content producer. Read on after the break for a breakdown of today's transaction.
YouTube isn't technologically different than a host of other companies offering online video. DVG broke down the differences between ten different online video sharing services earlier this year, and other than popularity, what does YouTube really have going for it? They broke new ground (some reactions are here). Their major differentiating factor plays off of another Web2.0 breakout: MySpace. YouTube allowed users to leech their bandwidth, and syndicate content on MySpace pages, blogs and any form of web site. That alone opened up the distribution channel. Millions of internet users knew the name YouTube and knew it was the place to find free movies on the web. With clips like "Juggernaut, Bitch!" and Ok Go's "Here it goes again" among a smattering of fart jokes, men getting hit in the crotch, and other random home movies, YouTube became the place to go for video on the web.

Google and YouTube is the only scenario that works in YouTube being purchased. If a traditional media company purchased YouTube, their competitors would remove their copyrighted content thereby limiting YouTube's effectiveness. Google, being the internet zen garden for smart internet startups (although some would argue YouTube isn't necessarily a smart startup), had their own solution, Google Video, failing to gain traction. Ultimately, Google is the only company that could be a neutral third-party that traditional content creators could trust to distribute their content.

Now that you're up on the history of the site, let's talk about the future, post-Google buyout. The house that Sergey built says they're planning on leaving YouTube as its own entity, and now that they've got a sugar daddy, YouTube's employees will get paid, no more worrying about astronomical bandwidth charges and Google will be taking the cease and desist letters, as well as the deep pockets for lawsuits.

As for Google, they've essentially taken the lead in online video with this move. $1.6 Billion may seem like a huge amount, but Google just purchased a huge catalog of content that they can slap AdSense on. Since YouTube will stick around, one can safely assume Google Video's destiny lies in the trash heap. The Google Video programmers will likely keep their jobs, and relocate to YouTube, adding great new features. While we'll have to see whether Google scraps Google Video in favor of YouTube.

Independent content creators can (mildly) rejoice, since the leader in syndicated web video will stick around for a while. The most obvious benefits are added stability: videos already uploaded will continue to work in spite of lawsuits. That, and as Jason Calacanis pointed out, Google is the sort of media company that will be unlikely to put pre-roll advertisements in front of other people's video content.

That's the obvious route, but what other benefits might we see as independent producers? A direction I'm certain Google is thinking of would be dynamic ads for video content. Their AdSense for Video program hasn't been incredibly well received, but with the YouTube acquisition, dynamically placed revenue sharing advertisements could be coming to a video near you. Videobloggers have longed for a solution that leverages the power of the web with the ease of drop-in spot advertising. Perhaps the GooTube alliance will see some traction towards monetized videoblogs, and for that matter monetized home videos.

One feature Google video has that YouTube hasn't touched yet is selling videos for download. The new GooTube conglomeration has the potential to offer indpenedent content creators the ability to reach a wide audience, and even make money off of potential direct sales. Time will tell if they end up implementing this with YouTube, but regardless, there's definate potential.

GooTube is really in it's infancy, and we'll have to see where it goes. There's one thing for certain though, YouTube is going to stick around, and we'll all be watching.

[Russell Heimlich contributed to this report.]