I figured that this could be of use to those in the hobby (or in general) interested in something similar to Youtube’s format, but in an ad-free, employee-owned model: https://giveo.com
Full disclosure, I know one of the guys behind the site and just want to help share his vision for what content creation and self-expression could be! Check out their about section to find out what it’s all about.
[Mods: if this isn’t allowed, please let me know or move/delete the topic]
I hope what you’re doing here is successful, but as other video providers (like Vimeo and DailyMotion) have discovered, it’s incredibly difficult to break a platform monopoly. You go to YouTube because they already have all the creators, and creators go to YouTube because they already have the audience. Getting the critical mass to overcome that is extremely difficult unless YouTube does something colossally stupid (like Twitter’s been doing, and yet people still use Twitter). Facebook Video tried by lying about viewership and offering massively inflated revenue to video providers for a short time, which caused a gold rush of creators to the platform, but then when Facebook decided it couldn’t bleed money anymore, the whole thing cratered and everybody rushed back to YouTube (though not before a number of video providers and news organizations had been completely ruined by reorienting their operations towards FB).
So good luck! You’re going to need to focus on finding a competitive advantage and niche. The most successful alternative video platforms I’ve seen recently have been stuff like Nebula and Floatplane which focus on subscription models to support creators and start with some high profile creators already providing exclusive content.
Good luck!
1 Like