Creators who want to start earning on the platform will need at least 8,000 qualified watch hours over the past year or 20 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days.
In the beginning, YT was more like what you describe. It’s not anymore.
Where you are wrong is that it is Netflix now.
YT sees themselves as a competitor to Netflix. They have said this publicly. And Netflix is trying to compete with YT. They are actively managing it like Netflix without paying anyone for the “shows” that gets added to their streaming service.
In the beginning, YT was more like what you describe. It’s not anymore.
Where you are wrong is that it is Netflix now.
YT sees themselves as a competitor to Netflix. They have said this publicly. And Netflix is trying to compete with YT. They are actively managing it like Netflix without paying anyone for the “shows” that gets added to their streaming service.