Some YouTube stars are making major bucks on the video platform, and now, the Google-owned company wants creators to share the wealth for a good cause.
YouTube introduced — in a blog post on Tuesday — a new feature called "Donation cards," which allows video creators in the U.S. help raise money for charities directly through their videos.
This means that creators will now be able to help make a difference by giving back to the charities they support. Those interested in raising money can enable the donation cards by going into the Video Manager and clicking on the drop-down menu to select "Cards." A window will then pop up that lets the video creator enter any IRS-validated 501(c)3 public nonprofit organization for which they want to raise money.
Viewers will then be able to see the donation card directly underneath the YouTuber's video in the "more info" section, with the ability to click directly on it to donate to that charity. Users can also increase or decrease the amount of money they want to give. The nonprofit will then receive 100 percent of the money donated.
"YouTube has over a billion users. That's almost one-third of all people on the Internet. And everyday those users watch hundreds of millions of hours of video, racking up billions of views — which are now billions of opportunities to do good," YouTube for Good program manager Sherif Hamdy writes in the blog post.
YouTube stars, like John and Hank Green and Madison Beer, have already incorporated donation cards to their videos, with the new feature available on both the desktop and mobile versions of the video platform in the U.S.
YouTube also has plans to expand its charity venture to out countries "so creators across the world can power nonprofits they care about."
Source: YouTube
