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I have made a post with exactly this title in past.
Last time the consensus was "No preference, variety is good".

Since that time I have received messages telling me to stop using YT and post everything with a hooktube link.
And now I've got another person telling me to stop using Hooktube.

So I'd like to hear from anyone that has an opinion one way or the other.

My take is that YT is the worst thing in existence for online creators. By supporting alternatives, we create potential for a brighter the future without a YT monopoly. So I have been using YT for small creators, but Hook for all else.
I agree that the hook player is inferior to the YT player. But if the choice is between shitty player, or shitty company, I'm willing to take a hit on usability.

What do you think?

I have made a post with exactly this title in past. Last time the consensus was "No preference, variety is good". Since that time I have received messages telling me to stop using YT and post everything with a hooktube link. And now I've got another person telling me to stop using Hooktube. So I'd like to hear from anyone that has an opinion one way or the other. My take is that YT is the worst thing in existence for online creators. By supporting alternatives, we create potential for a brighter the future without a YT monopoly. So I have been using YT for small creators, but Hook for all else. I agree that the hook player is inferior to the YT player. But if the choice is between shitty player, or shitty company, I'm willing to take a hit on usability. What do you think?

23 comments

[–] PMYA 1 points (+2|-1)

I do not share your optimism. There's no way someone is going to create a platform where people are paid for creating videos on the same scale as YouTube. It is a miracle that such a thing even exists, in my opinion. If anyone tried to adopt the YouTube model, they would never be able to make the site keep itself afloat, not even anywhere close.

Twitch?
What do you see as being a barrier against a start-up?

The tec is pretty straight-forward, the hardware is reasonable. I don't see any reason outside of market factors, that it would be especially difficult.
I run a hobby-site that hosts (non-video) content that sends about 300-400gigs of data transfer per month. That is nothing compared to what video hosting rates would be, but coffee is the largest expense involved with running my site.
Coffee.

I don't have any direct experience/knowledge of video hosting, but I don't see where extra and huge costs would come from.
Advertising income would scale up with a site, and should be able to make it a player.
The reason it doesn't happen, I believe, is the entry-fee, and buy-outs. Those can be overcome when there's a clear demand.

[–] PMYA 0 points (+1|-1)

Twitch is a completely different situation, and is also owned by a massive company that could afford to take losses if it came to that. Twitch's financial model would not translate to a video host.

There are a number of things that would prevent another host from replacing YouTube. The first is that nobody making a living from YouTube is going to stop using YouTube unless they find themselves in a situation where they can't make money anymore. That kind of happened a little bit with people moving to twitch over the past year or two.

The initial cost of setting up a video host makes it unlikely that people are going to try setting one up as a project. Companies that do have the resources to do it aren't going to bother, because YouTube is not a money maker.

The only way this ever happens is with some kind of distributed hosting, which nobody is going to give a fuck about because the majority of YouTube users are normies or children.

There is also the issue with content takedowns. If your startup gets an influx with a shit ton of stuff being uploaded, good luck pulling all of the porn and copyrighted content down.

It just seems as though we are not quite ready to have an alternative.

nobody making a living from YouTube is going to stop using YouTube unless they find themselves in a situation where they can't make money anymore. That kind of happened a little bit with people moving to twitch over the past year or two.

You're kinda making my argument for me here. By keeping the status quo, you lock the creators into a bad deal.
By pulling funding, you cause them to start looking elsewhere.

Creators are desperate to leave, many have been trying to find homes in related markets like Twitch, but there is nothing that really fits the role at the moment.
A few of the more successful creators (like Philip Defranco) are already beginning to setup alternative venues for their content.

The initial cost of setting up a video host

Is peanuts.
A small hosting site would be less than your phone bill. Costs will rapidly scale up as the content does. But so would income.
The biggest start-up costs would be marketing and employee wages.

Companies that do have the resources to do it aren't going to bother, because YouTube is not a money maker.

It's a price-point calculation. Right now any profitable services are not profitable enough to avoid being bought up and torpedoed.
Hopefully that balance will shift.

It just seems as though we are not quite ready to have an alternative.

That's more or less how I see it. So I'm gonna rock the boat until we are.