YouTube: Can Something That Big Be a Rotten Business?

Kevin Maney natters: There is a growing, burbling conversation in tech that Google just can't find a way to make money on YouTube, despite YouTube's 130 million visitors a month. CEO Eric Schmidt has all but admitted as much in interviews.

On his blog, Mark Cuban rips YouTube and compares it to Hulu, which in its short life has found a way to make money on Web video. Actually, Mark's rant seems drenched in irony. Cuban is a billionaire sports owner because he sold Broadcast.com to Yahoo for $5.7 billion in 1999 -- an investment that never paid off for Yahoo. YouTube may be Google's Broadcast.com.

In another rant, CNET says Google might just want to kill YouTube outright. It costs too much to operate and has become a copyright lawsuit magnet. If there's no way to monetize the site, it will suck money out of Google for years.

Still, I will be amazed if Google can't figure out any way to make money off YouTube. So many smart people with so much innovative mojo, not to mention all the money in the world to spend on a solution. There's gotta be something someone will come up with. You think?

Photo credit: Tony Avelar/AP Photo