Youtube still pays those Creators money for their content, some dedicated enough even do that as their job and live off of that youtube money, some very, very comfortably. If YT (or a similar entity for that matter) didn’t exist and get money trough ads and subscriptions how many of those creators do you think would still make content, let alone live off of it?

Everyone here screams how bad and greedy YT/Google is, but when it comes down to giving the creators they watch money trough other means (patreon etc.) who actually would do that? yeah…no one.