Where Does YouTube Go From Here?

The big get bigger and the rich get richer. That's why McDonald's (NYSE: MCD  ) slogan "Billions and billions served" is so memorable -- you feel like you're part of a worldwide movement every time you have a Big Mac.

And for much the same reason, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG  ) has adorned video-sharing site YouTube with a fresh logo, just in time for the third anniversary of its acquisition. The new header: "YouTube 1Bn -- 1 billion views per day!" The image file itself bears a cheeky name, too: "logo_holy_crap_1bn_a_day."

According to Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN  ) Web traffic tracker Alexa, only three sites can top YouTube's traffic today: Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO  ) , Facebook, and Google's own search service. And the fact that Google is employing tried-and-true marketing techniques like this twist on the "billions and billions" tagline means that YouTube still wants more eyeballs.

In a blog post, YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley calls this milestone "a great moment in our short history" and pledges to help users (a.k.a. content providers) turn their "hobby into a real business." There's no word on exactly how Hurley intends to help us monetize our hip-hop wedding videos better than today, but the company keeps dropping little nuggets of money-making power like Gretel dropped bread. This time, the marked path leads to real money.

Many people assume that YouTube is losing money, but I am convinced that the site is a money-maker for Google today. And when YouTube adds more members, more content, more viewers, economies of scale should kick in and make the site more profitable as it gets even bigger. There are revenue-sharing deals with media giants like Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS  ) and CBS (NYSE: CBS  ) , and YouTube has a plethora of cash-conversion tools for media-sharing individuals like you and me.

Google's advertising chutzpah makes the company a better partner for YouTube than Yahoo! or Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT  ) could ever hope to be. In the long run, this investment will pay Google back in spades. It'll just take a few years to cover that $1 billion buyout premium. Are you with me so far, or am I crazy? My psychoanalyst wants to know -- tell him in the comments below.