YouTube Partners are users who have applied for, and have been accepted into, the YouTube Partner Program. YouTube Partners receive a portion of ad revenue for their videos. This money is paid by advertisers to YouTube so that the site can run ads on Partner videos. YouTube then splits this money with the Partner. Currently, 45 percent goes to YouTube, and 55 percent goes to you—the YouTube Partner and content creator.
Why doesn't YouTube run ads on everyone's videos to make more money? Well, more than 10 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute, making it nearly impossible for YouTube to screen it all. Some of that content is copyrighted, and if YouTube were to run an ad next to a video containing someone else's copyrighted material and profit from streaming the copyright owner's works, YouTube could easily be sued by the original copyright owners. By not running ads on infringing material and by agreeing to remove any infringing material at an owner's request, it is much less likely that the original copyright owner would file a lawsuit against YouTube.
But YouTube still needs to make money; after all, it is a business, with employees and electricity bills and office rent to pay. And it has to maintain those mighty banks of server computers powered by genetically modified superhamsters on precision-bearing exercise wheels in that secret underground lair. (Just kidding. There probably aren't any superhamsters.) So by creating the Partner Program, YouTube, for the most part, protects itself from advertising on infringing material and still brings in some revenue to cover its costs. In return for you promising never to upload copyrighted material, you are given a few perks: some additional channel design features, branding options, and, oh yeah, the baby lion's share of the ad revenue split.
Any user can apply to be a YouTube Partner, provided the program is available in your country. But YouTube insists you meet some basic requirements to be a Partner. Read on to see whether your channel might qualify and, if it does, how to apply.