A small step in the right direction from YouTube: it has added some of its top user-gen stars such as LisaNova, renetto, HappySlip, and others into its “partners” program, which means that they will begin to participate in the same revenue sharing and promotional opportunities as the professional content creators/companies, according to YouTube’s company blog. For now this is limited to its top members/content creators, and YouTube will sell ads across those channels. Other users can apply to be part of the program, and will have to meet the qualification criterion.

NewTeeVee: While YouTube has said it might populate videos with pre-or-post roll ads as soon as this summer, the monies for the new program will come from the sales of banner ads. Of course others like Revver and Metcafe have been doing this for a while, but none has reach of YouTube. About 20 to 40 star producers would be included in the initial rollout, with more potentially added in the future.