Viddling Around™

Tim Arango over at the New York Post had a piece this morning, claiming that the YouTube boys think they’re valued at $1B. That’s right - say it in your best Dr. Evil voice - $1,000,000,000. Now I can’t claim to speak for Chad Hurley or the backers behind YouTube - but for a site - no matter how popular, to have almost no revenue to speak of, and no discernable model, and claim that kind of valuation is total B.S. There’s no public market driving up these numbers, and while YouTube’s VC’s would definitely welcome a big payday, what is anyone paying for here? Dear god… not the old “eyeballs” mantra again.

Basic VC questions arise - what’s to keep the audience from using any of the myriad of clones out there? Chad and the boys best strike while the iron is hot, but a $1B valuation runs the risk of burning us all.

Update: John Batelle’s got an excellent take on this as well, over at his blog.