YouTube alternatives

[PossiblyAxolotl]

I recently found this website https://vanillo.tv/ that I thought looked kinda neat as an alternative to YouTube, as well as this blog post about some: https://sgtcharlynne.neocities.org/writing/videosharing

Now I'm not super actively looking to jump ship, as much as people are unhappy with YouTube right now, but I'm wondering what you all think of platforms like that, and other options listed on the post? I think were I to start using other platforms I would probably cross-post, and point to some sort of ko-fi or other platform for income, but most other platforms are still extremely small and have problems like peertube being self-hosted and federated causing some confusion or Odysee which has weird crypto features and scares me. Idk, just curious of people's thoughts on some of these

[CitricScion]

I saw this guys video about this today! Yes, I think it's good to be thinking about alternatives and I'm fine using them, though convenience has kept me mostly on YouTube.

For self-preservation reasons I think creators should diversity if they're able to. I think most know that, which is way things like Twitch streaming and Nebula exist. However, because many creators have communities who will just click a link to view a video, it doesn't matter where you send them as long as they video is there, meaning that it could work when you can promote from other socials.

Of course there are huge drawbacks and you have to manage your strategy. I figure that when a video goes live, creators want everyone watching that video on YouTube for the algorithm, so there is a conflict right there. That said, if you're willing to make the tradeoff and put in the extra work then you protect yourself and your content by being somewhere else.

One nice thing about something like PeerTube (though it has rough edges) is that it's built on the social web by default with ActivityPub. That means that if you're sharing videos there, anyone will be able to get to the video and you will have grown your audience on an open protocol, meaning that your next potential move should have MUCH less friction than the first because you will be able to retain your audience more easily.

Today this is all theoretical, but in a day and age where Mastodon and Bluesky have shown an interest and competitive feature set to attract people who are increasingly repulsed by the mistreatment by big tech, I think there's potential for everyone to move to an open version of YouTube where a platform can't hold the creators hostage again. But it's gonna take work and maybe an investment from the big youtubers or something.

TL;DR - I am for creators uploading to alternative platforms, and I think PeerTube is a great option that I hope will improve with time.

[Fireye]

Yeah the main technological hurdles are the overhead for storing and streaming video, and algorithms. The former is tough but you can figure out options to get videos to people, but on the algorithms end we're generally cooked. The userbase is located on these platforms and the only way to reach them is to engage on the platform. POSSE (post on own site, syndicate elsewhere) is a good approach for handling this but it gets a lot harder, especially when video is involved.

[Crazyroostereye]

Yeah Video hosting and streaming is just such an expensive thing to do.
I do like the Idea of People Diversifying into different Platforms, but one of the largest Drawbacks besides the Algorithm is Money. For Creators who are Monetized on the Platform and relay on that Money, it is borderline Impossible to switch. As all the other Platforms don't have a Concrete Monetization plan. And those that do, they are usually quite dubious and Unstable.

[Fireye]

I don't think monetization is actually the worst hurdle here, problems with payment processors aside. If you have an audience and a way to reach them, it's just a matter of conversion. You don't need AdSense or any other similar rev share options; even with those, we still see many creators lean on other revenue sources like sponsorships, Kofi or patreon-like services, and commissions, among others.

The problem is that the audience is only on these platforms and only reachable via opaque algorithms. Reaching people is probably the hardest part, especially if you don't live on their platform of choice, most of which are proprietary.

[TeaInTheMorning]

It'll be very hard for a youtube competitor to succeed, but i hope it does happen at some point! Hopefully it's less addictive too!

This sort of buisness model is very hard to make work, sadly (Video hosting is EXPENSIVE)

I'm slowly paring down my youtube consumption to favorite creators and topic relevent content >>

[Mæstro]

The Internet Archive serves, in some capacity, as a YouTube substitute: anybody can upload film there. My own biggest problem is that there is no way to lower the resolution below how it was originally uploaded, which can be awkward if someone has chosen HD, which wastes my bandwidth. Others might be bothered by the inability to subscribe to uploading users or the fact one must seek out for oneself what one wishes to watch, but I see these as benefits.

[CitricScion]

There definitely is an expectation that will need to change among viewers and creators to see a successful alternative I think. I happily subscribe to Nebula and could even use it as a YouTube replacement if I needed to. Paying $60 a year for like 60-80% of the type of content I watch on YouTube so that I can directly support some of my favorite creators is a price I'm willing to stomach. And from the outside it seems like they're profitable. It was risky for them to get off the ground, but I think they and Dropout show that the model works. I guess Floatplane by LTT is also in this bucket.

My guess is that it would have to take a big creator or group of creators coming together to start something and then they could grow it over time. You'd have to plant the seed and take care of diligently, and even then it probably won't get to the scale of YouTube (not that it needs to.)

[CitricScion]

If anyone is looking into PeerTube instances for a place to make an account, here are a few I came across that seem to have decent amount of content. Remember that on the fediverse you can see content from all of these instances from one place, so you don't need to check each one. It's like following channels across different websites from a single client if that makes sense.

• PeerTube.TV
• Spectra Video
• TILvids

[TeaInTheMorning]

If anyone is looking into PeerTube instances for a place to make an account, here are a few I came across that seem to have decent amount of content. Remember that on the fediverse you can see content from all of these instances from one place, so you don't need to check each one. It's like following channels across different websites from a single client if that makes sense.

• PeerTube.TV
• Spectra Video
• TILvids

So you should just choose based on the interface you prefer? (Much like matrix, and most emails)