Competitors would have to make the content creators want to move their communities, knowing a large part of their community will not follow.
Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
11–20 of 226 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#12Vimeo is the only thing that comes close. All the open source offerings lack the dedicated apps for dedicated media players.
To be a serious alternative you’d need apps for Apple TV, Android TV, Roku plus iOS and Android and a solid desktop browser.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#13Rumble Odysee WTV Bitchute Daily Motion Peer Tube ..ad infinitum There's literally hundreds out there, not everything needs to be 'Facebook scale' to be successful. edit: formatting
Daily Motion was a strong alternative for a time in France, but it isn't used much now. Most long video content creators are on Youtube now. (DailyMotion is french)
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#14> Apart from network effect, and Google's Ad Monopoly
This is like asking "why don't we live on the moon except that there is no atmosphere there and it's pretty far away?". Those two reasons are the main reasons Youtube is the clear winner in its field, saying "apart from that" does not make a lot of sense. If you'd want to start a competitor to take on Youtube, you either need to focus on a tiny niche not well served by Youtube (extreme far right or far left personalities perhaps, or porn) or you would need to find a way to match Google money (maybe partner up with FB/Microsoft/Amazon/etc) so you can buy popular creators away from Youtube.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#15Network effect, and Google's Ad Monopoly account for 99.9% of the dominance of YouTube. Only Facebook could launch a competing product (maybe Twitter). It would take millions (or Billions) to build a platform just to end up like one of the many competitors (Vimeo). There will be something that kills YouTube, but it will look different (or work differently).
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#16How much does YouTube traffic cost? And for those of us who are not Google?
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#17There is a new "free speech" alternative called Rumble emerging. Rumble for now promises Not to become a censorship platform like YouTube is now currently. https://rumble.com/ Even though some high profile civil libertarian and free speech advocates like Glenn Greenwald and Zaid Jilani have chosen Rumble as home, YouTube is still lights years ahead. But if they continue to censor, alternative free speech platform wil…
The problem with media platforms that market themselves as pro-free-speech is that they attract alt-right content - and their hyper-toxic followers - like a warm pile of shit attracts flies, even if that's not the intent of the platform operators.
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#18The competition is paid/subscription niche video sites. Outside of adult content I think they are very, very small compared to Youtube. But some do thrive.
To wit: https://www.offcenterharbor.com
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#19CEO of vimeo will cry themself to sleep after reading this post
I remember a day where I preferred vimeo because of its support for higher resolutions...
Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?
#20It does have competitors. IMO, Odysee/LBRY is the most viable one but only time will tell because all the competitors lack some things and have been slow to develop.
The competitors have a hard time gaining traction because in the way many of us would expect because we live in a different world from when YouTube first became a thing.
YouTube in 2005 was way different. You could find just about anything on there. Pranks, home videos, entire TV shows, bumfights, skits, you name it. Mostly young people used it, and back then the youth were a little more "based" than my impression of Gen Z today. I remember older folks like my parents almost universally dismissing YouTube as "a bunch of crap" and how wrong I felt they were. Guess who turned out to be right about the future of information and entertainment!
Today, I'd wager everyone's interacted with YouTube at least once. There is nothing edgy or fringe about YouTube anymore. It's a mainstream media platform saddled with its past that it just can't shake. Without big advertisers and big audiences, it wouldn't be sustainable, thus it has developed to not offend the normies or their political allies.
Many have moved over to other platforms, but they are essentially the same kind of audience and creators that were on YouTube back in the old days. The so-called normies who didn't take YouTube seriously back then are now easily frightened of the dangerous content found on alt-tech. They are unlikely to ever move away from the warm fuzzy feeling only provided by the MSM and Silicon Valley.
Although I desire people be a little less allergic to supposedly dangerous content, can we really blame people for being disinterested or avoidant to YouTube competitors?
Maybe this is the way it should be. Average Joes/Janes/Jaydens will be happy on YouTube and TikTok, and the ends of the bell curve will find their place on smaller platforms that aren't interested in pleasing everyone.