Marble Machine

[AB Editor]

Good to have a hobby isn't it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q

[Lie-in King]

Well, my mind's suitably boggled - made my day, ta Ed! :-))

[Mamyalynne]

Mesmerising, want one.

[Cloverjo]

Thanks, Ed. That was brilliant. Anyone know who the guy is? Am I showing my age by not knowing?

[Lie-in King]

CloverJo - some more info here -

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2016-03/02/marble-machine-video

[Cloverjo]

Thanks, Lie-In king. What a talent he is.

[Chipchopper]

Very ingenious and Heath Robinson but I couldn't help wondering, if he lost some of those marbles.

[Cloverjo]

Haha, lost his marbles? He's amazing.

[jim360]

Only plays one tune? Meh.

[Gromit]

12 million hits on YouTube in 8 days.

He's made about £30K in little over a week.

It is brilliant though.

[RATTER15]

Ok, so I need some ply wood and a few nails etc. I'll be rich by the end of the month!!

Cant be that difficult!

[Gromit]

// Only plays one tune? Meh. //

It can be programmed to play other tunes. The machine has removable pegs on a rotating belt. Put the pegs in a different order, and you get different notes.

[AB Editor]

How are you coming to that figure Gromit?

[Gromit]

ABEd
That should actually be $ not £.

The usual metric for YouTube is $3000 per million hits. Google do not reveal a fixed figure and has an unfathomable algorythm that works out advertising monies. But the consensus from YouTubers seems yo be near the figure above.

Have you ever listened to the "Hello Internet" podcast? It is a couple of professional YouTubers, CPG Grey and Brady Haran. A good listen.

http://www.hellointernet.fm available on iTunes for free.

[Canary42]

I noticed that the machine did really lose some marbles, they can be spotted on the floor at the end of the video.

A marvelous device nevertheless.

[AB Editor]

Looking around, the average cpm for YT videos seems to be $1.50 and using this:

http://youtubemoney.co/

We come out to about $18k. The $1.50 cpm is taken from a few threads online, so completely anecdotal.

It's possible the CPM goes up with videos becoming more popular (as networks can buy more usefully in bulk)? So maybe that's where the $3k per million figure you were using comes from.

I've not listened to Hello Internet - but I'll give it a bash.

I love the idea of "I just need some plywood then? Easy money right?" - which I think is a real reaction some people have automatically to this stuff.

[Gromit]

ABEd,

It did take him 14 months to build, so it might be more profttable selling 'The Big Issue'.

[AB Editor]

Yes, exactly!

[RATTER15]

I got a jig saw as well so mass production soon!!

Anyone know a cheap source of marbles?

[Gromit]

Your sink says payment is in the range of $2 a $5 per '0000 impressions, so that seems to confirm my figure (of $3).

I would guess the rate varies by how quickly the views were made. Advertisers would be more interested (and willing to pay more) for 12 million views in a week, than they would for 12 million views over a couple of years.

So he could be earning nearer to the $5 than the average $3. Time to set work on my Marble Powered Micro Brewery...

[jim360]

Yeah I did think it could probably be reprogrammed, seemed like the machine ought to be flexible enough to allow that -- a variation on steam organs or pianolas with that wheel running at the back of the machine.