Youku-Tudou Launches ‘Sharing Plan’ to Encourage and Reward Original Content Producers

Most people go to Youku for the TV shows and movies these days, and it’s easy to forget that the site first earned its reputation in part due to the “paike” citizen video journalism that became popular on its platform. But today, Beijing Business Today is reporting that the company has launched a new “sharing plan” that will encourage independent creators of original content on its platform by providing them with funding and other resources to assist in content creation.

The report says that Youku’s program will provide some creators with funding, a featured spot on the site, and access to a detailed analytics platform to help them boost their views and followers. If that sounds familiar, it’s because the initiative seems similar to Youtube’s Youtube Partner program, which provides original content creators whose videos bring in significant traffic with revenue-sharing opportunities and other advantages.

We’ve contacted Youku in the hopes that the company can provide us with more details about the program, and we’ll update this story with any information we hear back. In the meantime, you can check out a few early examples of program participants on its official page, which is here, or just watch this original stop motion video, which is currently one of the front page picks.

Just yesterday we reported that Youku has updated its home page to make it more mobile-friendly as data shows more and more video-watchers are switching to mobile. The company also recently partnered with with Sina Weibo in a collaboration that aims to improve the company’s mobile profile by having its videos promoted on Weibo.

(Beijing Business Today via Sina Tech)