Payments for Facebook Live videos aren?t limited to household names anymore, as creators who have carved niches on YouTube, Vine and elsewhere on the web are in on the action.
Deepa Seetharaman and Steven Perlberg of The Wall Street Journal said that some $2.2 million of the $50 million in payments for Facebook Live content they reported on last month was earmarked for creators on YouTube, Vine, Snapchat and Instagram.
Facebook vice president of global operations and media partnerships Justin Osofsky spoke with Seetharaman and Perlberg, denying that the social network was specifically targeting stars on other platforms, such as Vine and YouTube, and saying the goal is to ?encourage experimentation? with Facebook?s live-streaming feature. Seetharaman and Perlberg reported that the highest-paid creator is this category is Ray William Johnson, best known for YouTube series The Equals Three Show, and Johnson?s YouTube page featured the banner pictured below, which can?t make the Google-owned video site too happy.

Jon Paul Piques, who amassed a large following on Vine, is getting $119,000 for Facebook Live videos, Seetharaman and Perlberg reported, and he told the Journal reporters he was approached by a Facebook executive in April, and that executive stressed the social network?s focus on Facebook Live. Piques said of plans to use Facebook Live to live-stream a standup comedy routine:
I can see my followers? comments right on the screen. Instead of doing it in front o...