Could Amazon compete with Youtube?

Quartz · 1 Mar 2021 at 23:56

Currently there's no real competitor to Youtube is there? Patreon and Floatplane have the problem of being subscription-only and lack of name recognition. And Floatplane is minuscule in comparison with Youtube anyway. So who can compete? I think only the major cloud suppliers could compete and Microsoft have too far to go. So please step forth, Amazon.

Amazon already have their Prime video service, so they have the infrastructure. They just need a YT-like web interface on ther front, and a moderation team and whatnot on the back end.

I'm under no illusion that they'll be much better than Youtube but at least they'll be good competition.

So please, Amazon, step forth.

Rroff · 2 Mar 2021 at 00:04

Unlikely to happen - in a situation like this an established/first mover presence is close to impossible to shift unless they either do something that alienated their audience or someone managed to do something that was truly innovative and an advancement on what YT offers (many have tried but failed). Just trying to copy YT even with a few gimmicks thrown in isn't enough.

Merlin5 · 2 Mar 2021 at 01:53

I can't see any reason why youtube would ever not be relevant, it's pretty perfect as it is. If you want to find something almost no matter how obscure, it's there. The closest competitor I can think of might be tiktok, but they're only very short videos. But who knows, they might evolve into more serious competition.

chaparral · 2 Mar 2021 at 02:07

Rroff said:
Unlikely to happen - in a situation like this an established/first mover presence is close to impossible to shift unless they either do something that alienated their audience or someone managed to do something that was truly innovative and an advancement on what YT offers

Guess the same could be said for Steam, Netflix, Amazon Prime & even windows software it would be very hard for anything to come in and take over any of them

wez130 · 2 Mar 2021 at 02:16

Merlin5 said:
I can't see any reason why youtube would ever not be relevant, it's pretty perfect as it is. If you want to find something almost no matter how obscure, it's there. The closest competitor I can think of might be tiktok, but they're only very short videos. But who knows, they might evolve into more serious competition.

Vimeo i'd say was a closer competitor, though still nowhere near as big!

The_Arbiter · 2 Mar 2021 at 08:19

I think not with how competitor's attempts turn out for other platforms. See Stadia as example.

Twitch is quite poor imo and yet still biggest. Vimeo has got worse UI now. Netflix and YT are a few of the sites i actually can praise.

adolf hamster · 2 Mar 2021 at 08:53

yt had its flaws, but it's so massive there isn't really competition.

for some types of content that don't necessarily fit the google ethos (read: anything to do with firearms) channels have a pretty rocky time of it when historical interest channels get lumped into the same category as "guvment gon' tek r gunz" channels.

Granted things seem stable ish at the moment, maybe they've reversed some decisions/made concessions with regards to monetisation etc.

BUDFORCE · 2 Mar 2021 at 08:53

I find YouTube is really hammering the adverts recently, far more than it ever has been last month or so.

Tempted to get premium, but almost feels like giving in to them.

M1k3H · 2 Mar 2021 at 10:42

Use adblock for youtube so dont get ads. Twitch is owned by Amazon and is somewhat of a competitor, in the live stream segment anyway.

Desmo · 2 Mar 2021 at 15:21

BUDFORCE said:
Tempted to get premium, but almost feels like giving in to them.

Subscribe via India on VPN....£1.32 a month

Somnambulist · 2 Mar 2021 at 16:44

YouTube has 'Big Video' locked up until such time as technology provides a different means of consumption that people will migrate to. There's a few alternatives these days like Twitch for live-streaming, BitChute, Odysee, etc which are better for smaller content creators (as YouTube is so corporate and seems to treat smaller content creators with contempt), but nothing has or likely will reach the kind of critical niche mass to upset the apple cart - it's not good enough that something is similar to YouTube, it needs to offer something new with the experience of watching video.

adolf hamster · 2 Mar 2021 at 16:47

Somnambulist said:
it needs to offer something new with the experience of watching video.

the question is what could be added?

i can't think of any useful (read: not pointlessly gimmicky) features that youtube doesn't already offer.

Somnambulist · 2 Mar 2021 at 17:14

adolf hamster said:
the question is what could be added?

i can't think of any useful (read: not pointlessly gimmicky) features that youtube doesn't already offer.

I don't think anything can dethrone YouTube if the goal is solely 'watch free videos that have been uploaded'. The algorithm for related videos is good but the comments system is a bit rubbish, so the 'social' aspect of YT is lacking, so there is that. Their idea to tackle this is the 'Premieres' function where you can see a video will be released in advanced so you know when to turn up, and when it debuts the creator is usually present in the live chat to interact with the viewers. I still think this is a bit of a fudge though as it basically ends up being like scheduled TV all over again.

Live-streamers seem to prefer Twitch because it's built for that specifically so the streamer/user experience is better. People who want to have video content behind a paywall have lots of options (from Vimeo to OnlyFans), people big on Instagram just use IGTV/Reels because they don't have to faff about running another platform...

I suppose the next big thing would follow the rule that the type of content itself will determine the kind of platform people watch it on, so while we still watch 2D video, YouTube won't be usurped for viewing the popular things that people are watching on it.

Pawnless Endgame · 2 Mar 2021 at 17:44

Before YouTube was around, you had break.com, Compfused, Newgrounds, College Humor etc. By 2007, YouTube has been around for 2 or 3 years and it was now the go-to place to watch funny cats, wedding fights, game show fails, crazy science experiments gone wrong and of course, your obligatory boss tactics from World of Warcraft. So it was just a matter of who got there first, and that title went to YouTube.

As @Somnambulist said above, Amazon's Twitch is a different kettle of fish as it's geared towards streamers. So on the topic of World of Warcraft, instead of showing boss tactics in hindsight for other players to try and master, Twitch streamers will live-stream the Warcraft content for viewers to sit back and enjoy watching. Some of these Twitch viewers may not even be current Warcraft players.

Psycho Sonny · 2 Mar 2021 at 18:19

Quartz said:
Currently there's no real competitor to Youtube is there? Patreon and Floatplane have the problem of being subscription-only and lack of name recognition. And Floatplane is minuscule in comparison with Youtube anyway. So who can compete? I think only the major cloud suppliers could compete and Microsoft have too far to go. So please step forth, Amazon.

Amazon already have their Prime video service, so they have the infrastructure. They just need a YT-like web interface on ther front, and a moderation team and whatnot on the back end.

I'm under no illusion that they'll be much better than Youtube but at least they'll be good competition.

So please, Amazon, step forth.

So you want one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world to become even bigger and more powerful?

Why? I can only see this being extremely bad for everyone apart from Amazon.

I think Amazon should be getting split up not encouraged to grow bigger.

It's already single handedly pretty much killed hundreds of thousands of businesses.

Psycho Sonny · 2 Mar 2021 at 18:21

M1k3H said:
Use adblock for youtube so dont get ads. Twitch is owned by Amazon and is somewhat of a competitor, in the live stream segment anyway.

I've never seen a successful ad blocker for YouTube. Not on chrome anyway. Pihole doesn't work either.

They host the ads on the same server as their videos now so it's not as simple as a host or address block.

Quartz · 2 Mar 2021 at 18:52

Psycho Sonny said:
So you want one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world to become even bigger and more powerful?

I want competition.

Psycho Sonny · 2 Mar 2021 at 19:23

Quartz said:
I want competition.

So why not suggest a smaller company that isn't as powerful take them on?

Spotify
Tidal
Vimeo

Or a new company.

Suggesting Amazon is literally the worst scenario possible. If they take over that market we would all be screwed.

Pho · 2 Mar 2021 at 19:31

Psycho Sonny said:
I've never seen a successful ad blocker for YouTube. Not on chrome anyway. Pihole doesn't work either.

They host the ads on the same server as their videos now so it's not as simple as a host or address block.

uBlock Origin kills all of them from what I can remember for me:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ublock-origin/cjpalhdlnbpafiamejdnhcphjbkeiagm?hl=en

Delvis · 2 Mar 2021 at 19:43

Rroff said:
Unlikely to happen - in a situation like this an established/first mover presence is close to impossible to shift unless they either do something that alienated their audience or someone managed to do something that was truly innovative and an advancement on what YT offers (many have tried but failed). Just trying to copy YT even with a few gimmicks thrown in isn't enough.

No adverts would sort that out