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Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

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Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like PornHub or similar could easily branch into providing a separate service for general videos if they wanted. They already have all this stuff down for the most part.

You're right that Netflix and Pornhub have both been able to replicate this. IMO, it might be wise for Netflix to start their own YouTube-like service. For example, subscribe to Netflix, get access to user-created videos on a separate app. The best part is that users would then generate content for a fraction of what they currently pay to produce content, and they could have basically what YouTube has, but ad-free.

Netflix only provides one very static huge library.

As long as you move a few PB around the globe on your video release date, Netflix is fine.

It's very easy to build a Netflix in comparison to yt.

I would argue that for Netflix going into yt direction would eat up there revenue baseline fast.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#112

YouTube is a huge technical achievement that would require billions of dollars to replicate: 1. It consumes nearly unlimited bandwidth. 2. It consumes nearly unlimited CPU for transcoding and serving media at different bitrates. 3. It consumes massive resources to police, from user moderation to appeasing content owners by building systems and databases like ContentID, etc. 4. It generates endless PR and legal headac…

This is the least informative hyperbole I've read on HN. It's a bunch of smoke and mirrors, everything is unlimited, cannot be replicated, forget about it. Let's accept defeat.

I thought HN was the opposite of this - finding ways to upend fat companies from occupying monopoly positions. "Hacker" news.

More reasons to break up Big Tech from a government regulations perspective - The only democratic politician talking about it is Elizabeth Warren. But many are upending large incumbents without gov reg - Stripe ("Increase the GDP of the internet") and Square in payments/ecommerce space. Tesla taking on Big 4. I would like to see a real competitor for Google search. Perhaps Algolia? Their search is incredible on HN.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like PornHub or similar could easily branch into providing a separate service for general videos if they wanted. They already have all this stuff down for the most part.

You're right that Netflix and Pornhub have both been able to replicate this. IMO, it might be wise for Netflix to start their own YouTube-like service. For example, subscribe to Netflix, get access to user-created videos on a separate app. The best part is that users would then generate content for a fraction of what they currently pay to produce content, and they could have basically what YouTube has, but ad-free.

Netflix doesn't own it's own infrastructure.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#115

YouTube is a huge technical achievement that would require billions of dollars to replicate: 1. It consumes nearly unlimited bandwidth. 2. It consumes nearly unlimited CPU for transcoding and serving media at different bitrates. 3. It consumes massive resources to police, from user moderation to appeasing content owners by building systems and databases like ContentID, etc. 4. It generates endless PR and legal headac…

>YouTube is a huge technical achievement that would require billions of dollars to replicate.

YouTube achieved this in 15 years time with the help of Google's enormous resources. YouTube competitor would need to have some innovation that is hard for YouTube to replicate.

Funny enough TikTok was able to replicate YouTube in a few years time but only for short videos so it shows you don't need all that what you mentioned. Innovation is what you need.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#116

YouTube is a huge technical achievement that would require billions of dollars to replicate: 1. It consumes nearly unlimited bandwidth. 2. It consumes nearly unlimited CPU for transcoding and serving media at different bitrates. 3. It consumes massive resources to police, from user moderation to appeasing content owners by building systems and databases like ContentID, etc. 4. It generates endless PR and legal headac…

All these can easily be solved by web3

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#117
This question is framed to preclude the answer.

The real competitor won't be a video hosting service, it will be a content monetization model competitive to advertising. Even content monetization is a weak way of thinking about it, because by abstracting it from the people who want a certain kind of content, you've pre-defined your solution as just another tech without a clear market (a non-product).

The question of "I have all these videos, how do I sell them?" is completely different from, "How do I sell videos?" or "What will these people really pay for and how does video distribution get it to them?"

The question isn't how to reinvent streaming, it's how to discover something someone will pay for. Youtube's product isn't content, their product is the distribution it provides to people who make it - and a combination of the data and channel it provides to advertisers. That's what they sell.

So, do you really want to make another product for advertisers? Even if you really like advertisers and did, investing in another video streaming platform seems like the least smart way to do that right now.

The next real competitor to youtube will look more like AppleTV than Rumble. Arguably, if I will pay $15.99 for a season of Ancient Aliens, I'll pay $7.99 for all of 3blue1brown. It's a different monetization model, and that's the real competition.

If I wanted to make a video streaming product, I would pop up a level and find a market then determine whether their need was more for produced content, or for distribution, and then solve for the economics of that desire. The quesiton isn't how do I monetize this landfill of content, the real question is, who is this customer and what do they want?

I've thought some of this through, and reach out via my profile if you are with a company that is serious about this.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#118
post #72

It 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. Pran…

> IMO, Odysee/LBRY is the most viable As a competitor? It's not even a bug on their radar... It's like waiting for Mastodon to replace Facebook and co...

or like youtube or netflix to replace cable and TV stations.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#119
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right that Netflix and Pornhub have both been able to replicate this. IMO, it might be wise for Netflix to start their own YouTube-like service. For example, subscribe to Netflix, get access to user-created videos on a separate app. The best part is that users would then generate content for a fraction of what they currently pay to produce content, and they could have basically what YouTube has, but ad-free.

Netflix only provides one very static huge library. As long as you move a few PB around the globe on your video release date, Netflix is fine. It's very easy to build a Netflix in comparison to yt. I would argue that for Netflix going into yt direction would eat up there revenue baseline fast.

Netflix could square the circle by offering "YT for indie filmmakers."

More static content than YT. Better viewer:creator ratio. Fewer content headaches. Content moderation is lower volume and amounts to watching the film. And closer to their existing product fit.

It's actually kind of mind-boggling that Netflix hasn't pivoted into a turnkey solution (standard deal + optional financing support + broadcast platform) for mass-market film-making. Everyone's content starved, it's an obvious weakness that Amazon / Disney / ATT are blind to, and somehow Reed Hastings hasn't pushed in that direction. It's literally what Netflix is famous for doing (twice!): be the platform.

Re: Ask HN: Why doesn't YouTube have a competitor?

#120
post #2

There 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.

Cancel culture is hyper-toxic, and that came from far-left advocates.

It's nice to see that something you disagree with strongly, like alt-right content, can be labeled hyper-toxic and not be downvoted into oblivion. It is encouraging that HN as a platform can tolerate a strong opinion without retaliating.

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