That alternatives to YouTube have come to naught feels unfortunately like a de facto monopoly.
Certainly it's because the content creators stay on YouTube because that's "where the eyeballs are". (Or rather, the money is to be made there on ad revenue ... because that's where the eyeballs are.)
I don't know how you break that. eBay is probably in the same enviable position.
That won't work, Youtube is fundamentally dependent on massive storage, massive compute and massive internet connectivity PLUS a revenue mechanism for creators. A whole lot of infrastructure.
Monopoly laws and taxes are punitive. In other words: they can only ever create a situation where there is fundamentally less available. They cannot create a second Youtube, they can only destroy Youtube. Unless the government builds the infrastructure, which is a nonstarter.
If you cannot use state power and/or resources to create a second and third Youtube, then letting Youtube be a monopoly is probably the best option. The big difference between competitors and a monopoly is that a monopolist can only improve outcomes by growing the market ... which is exactly what we want.
Unfortunately it is very much not what the government wants. Well, it is not what governments (plural) want. Governments think they're god, and of course like two people in a madhouse that both think they're god, there is a rather fundamental disagreement here. They will realize, eventually, just how stupid it would be for god to let other gods (anyone but themselves, other governments, but also private people) control mass media. This means we will get closer and closer to the situation that Youtube cannot satisfy multiple governments. This could even apply to multiple parties within one state structure. You would hope this means they'll build infrastructure, but we all know what will really happen: they'll destroy it. Youtube will end because governments will see it as a threat to them, and they just won't care how much damage they're doing. Just look at the current government.
There are a LOT of economy texts, some quite old that warn about the dangers of letting private interests control the only market for anything. They suggest the government should make sure they own or at least control the market itself, but that includes paying for infrastructure. This has it's own problems (like censorship), but there is really no alternative. Either you do that or eventually the monopolists will BE the government.
It’s even worse than you think, because by all accounts YouTube is absurdly expensive to operate. Some even claim to that this day it has still never turned a profit for Google. And if Google can’t make it work— with their own ad network, tons of their own fiber, their own operating system, etc.— it’s likely that nobody can. Hosting unlimited video for free is just stupefyingly expensive.
It’s also really hard to compete with YouTube simply due to the cost of compute and storage associated with serving video. The costs are way higher than most any other type of website. You have to do transcoding and also store multiple versions of videos at different resolutions.
There are few companies with the resources to create a real competitor.
TV channels have been forced to produce TV shows that will draw the biggest audiences. they've not innovated online either.
Streaming services make great shows then stop them after one season or force one episode a week. they also drop then pick back up shows constantly.
YouTube let's people watch the kinds of shows they want to watch and let's people create the kind of shows they want to create. everyone wins, including YouTube! plus they do music, smaller artists, bigger artists and mashups in between. it's all just there fairly reliably and it works on every platform.
I feel like this is the result of the major streaming services cutting back on original content due to production costs, the 2023 strikes, and winning the broadcast fight.
Initially, streaming had to compete with broadcasting's long seasons by producing the equivalent amount of content, spread between more shows, with higher-quality production but much shorter seasons. Now streamers are providing fewer shows and only semi-annual seasons. It ends up leaving a lot of open viewing time with nothing fresh to watch.
YouTube also has the advantage of people making highlight reels of the most popular movies and series. We get out-takes, behind the scenes, bloopers, best quotes etc. Streaming services haven't figured this out (yet). I've never watched The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on TV, but I watched almost every monologue on YouTube.
Non Youtube contents such as TV broadcast needs to get streaming done right. And they haven't done it. Apple or Google could have helped here. Where All Broadcast TV are in one place / App just like a normal TV. And the content will be streamed in decent quality. But neither are they interested as Youtube belongs to Google and Apple is going with Apple TV+ direction and wants to own TV itself.
It is such a sad state of things since Steve Jobs passed away both Apple and Google have a complete lack of taste and product sensibility to deliver something truly helps the customers. Instead every product and features are marketing or sales driven.
I wonder what it's like in various countries. I was surprised that Japan came up with that, TVer which basically all broadcast shows end up on for at least one week, shown with ads. AFAIK it's driven by a coalition of broadcasters with nothing to do with the big platforms - where there's a will there's a way I guess.
This could easily have happened. Apple especially lets anyone fit their catalog into the TV app. It's the non-Apple and non-Google part of the equation that chose the current system.
There are additional requirements involved with getting the catalog in TV App. And Apple obviously are not willing to share accurate user count numbers as well as a lot of other data. Once they said they are Apple's customer and not those TV / Broadcasting customers that was the end of the conversation.
personally i havent watched tv or listened to the radio on my own accord in many years because there are too many ads. i like the idea of not being able to choose the content im engaging in but it feels like 70% ads and 30% content
Went to a wedding, 10 years ago even, and the "kids" DJ-ing the wedding party were pulling up music on YouTube.
(To be sure, this was very much a low-key affair, teens there with their parents were "DJ-ing" — but I was still surprised that is was YT. Just vanilla YT, pulling up "videos" and hitting "play".)
YouTube is pretty common for in-person, social music sharing because it's the least friction. It's hard to share between Spotify, Apple Music, Soundcloud, and personal collections from the same device. YT search will usually find pretty much everything.
I have YT Premium, so I automatically get YT Music. I would much rather pay less and drop the Music app. I almost never use it and don’t like it. I can’t justify buying for another service on top of this, so I went back to managing a local library and manually syncing all my music to my phone like it’s 2007.
A side effect of YouTube treating music special is that I can’t read comments on the TV for videos that it thinks are music. I find this very annoying. The same video will have comment on mobile or the computer.
My gripe is that when you try to sync over a library from, say, Spotify, you’ll end up subscribed to hundreds of artist’s YouTube channels in your main TV app, and playlists are basically shared too. Which I do not want at all
Yep. This is one of the reasons I don’t really use YT Music. The shared playlists are a nightmare. If someone tells me to check out a song, I might go there to listen to it as a one-off, but that’s about it. It’s so poorly done for anyone who also uses YouTube, which I assume is everyone.
so did I until I found myself using YouTube music over Spotify more and more. it has all the standard music but also includes more remixes and smaller artists. the most important thing is that it doesn't mix podcasts in with music and you can easily view your own playlists!
haven't used Spotify in any meaningful way in a few years now.
I dont believe that is the case, and I cant any reference to it. Nearly all are pointing to Spotify as number one both in terms of revenue and market shares.
The thing I dislike about Youtube Music is how it is basically not a product the team have put any thoughts into it. It is constantly rated one of the worst in Apple Music and Spotify comparison. It has so much potential but it is just very poor done.
I ditched Chromecast recently. They made YouTube too heavyweight for the Chromecast Ultra, to the point it regularly crashed. The new "Chromecast With Android TV" is barely more specs and has broken the interface by being... Android TV. Rather than take a well deserved second place, they chased Apple's design and ruined their niche.
Worse still, the best replacement I could find... Was Apple TV. So now I'm on that ecosystem.
Does it use a different app on the Ultra? I'm still using my second generation and (aside from some nonsense earlier this year about expired certificates) still going strong - can't ever remember it "Crashing".
Perhaps it's not "app weight" but more specific to the 4k video or SoC implementation?
YT has solid channels, from DIY to black hole talks and most importantly, uncensored news.
TV is just ADs and more ADs, garbage content after garbage content.
Not everything is pretty tho, YT has a complete monopoly and there is nothing anybody can do about it, the alternatives suck with some silly subscription when there is no even content.
I do pay for Youtube Premium since Youtube Music is hands down better than Spotify.
I would pay for alternative services to help them out IF they were worth it. YT Premium is the only subscription I pay and happy to do so, I see value.
That alternatives to YouTube have come to naught feels unfortunately like a de facto monopoly.
Certainly it's because the content creators stay on YouTube because that's "where the eyeballs are". (Or rather, the money is to be made there on ad revenue ... because that's where the eyeballs are.)
I don't know how you break that. eBay is probably in the same enviable position.
Ultimately, we need to convince DC to start enforcing monopoly laws again.
That won't work, Youtube is fundamentally dependent on massive storage, massive compute and massive internet connectivity PLUS a revenue mechanism for creators. A whole lot of infrastructure.
Monopoly laws and taxes are punitive. In other words: they can only ever create a situation where there is fundamentally less available. They cannot create a second Youtube, they can only destroy Youtube. Unless the government builds the infrastructure, which is a nonstarter.
If you cannot use state power and/or resources to create a second and third Youtube, then letting Youtube be a monopoly is probably the best option. The big difference between competitors and a monopoly is that a monopolist can only improve outcomes by growing the market ... which is exactly what we want.
Unfortunately it is very much not what the government wants. Well, it is not what governments (plural) want. Governments think they're god, and of course like two people in a madhouse that both think they're god, there is a rather fundamental disagreement here. They will realize, eventually, just how stupid it would be for god to let other gods (anyone but themselves, other governments, but also private people) control mass media. This means we will get closer and closer to the situation that Youtube cannot satisfy multiple governments. This could even apply to multiple parties within one state structure. You would hope this means they'll build infrastructure, but we all know what will really happen: they'll destroy it. Youtube will end because governments will see it as a threat to them, and they just won't care how much damage they're doing. Just look at the current government.
There are a LOT of economy texts, some quite old that warn about the dangers of letting private interests control the only market for anything. They suggest the government should make sure they own or at least control the market itself, but that includes paying for infrastructure. This has it's own problems (like censorship), but there is really no alternative. Either you do that or eventually the monopolists will BE the government.
Ain't happening with the current party at the helm.
Lina Khan for dictator.
It’s even worse than you think, because by all accounts YouTube is absurdly expensive to operate. Some even claim to that this day it has still never turned a profit for Google. And if Google can’t make it work— with their own ad network, tons of their own fiber, their own operating system, etc.— it’s likely that nobody can. Hosting unlimited video for free is just stupefyingly expensive.
It’s also really hard to compete with YouTube simply due to the cost of compute and storage associated with serving video. The costs are way higher than most any other type of website. You have to do transcoding and also store multiple versions of videos at different resolutions.
There are few companies with the resources to create a real competitor.
TV channels have been forced to produce TV shows that will draw the biggest audiences. they've not innovated online either.
Streaming services make great shows then stop them after one season or force one episode a week. they also drop then pick back up shows constantly.
YouTube let's people watch the kinds of shows they want to watch and let's people create the kind of shows they want to create. everyone wins, including YouTube! plus they do music, smaller artists, bigger artists and mashups in between. it's all just there fairly reliably and it works on every platform.
I feel like this is the result of the major streaming services cutting back on original content due to production costs, the 2023 strikes, and winning the broadcast fight.
Initially, streaming had to compete with broadcasting's long seasons by producing the equivalent amount of content, spread between more shows, with higher-quality production but much shorter seasons. Now streamers are providing fewer shows and only semi-annual seasons. It ends up leaving a lot of open viewing time with nothing fresh to watch.
YouTube also has the advantage of people making highlight reels of the most popular movies and series. We get out-takes, behind the scenes, bloopers, best quotes etc. Streaming services haven't figured this out (yet). I've never watched The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on TV, but I watched almost every monologue on YouTube.
Non Youtube contents such as TV broadcast needs to get streaming done right. And they haven't done it. Apple or Google could have helped here. Where All Broadcast TV are in one place / App just like a normal TV. And the content will be streamed in decent quality. But neither are they interested as Youtube belongs to Google and Apple is going with Apple TV+ direction and wants to own TV itself.
It is such a sad state of things since Steve Jobs passed away both Apple and Google have a complete lack of taste and product sensibility to deliver something truly helps the customers. Instead every product and features are marketing or sales driven.
I wonder what it's like in various countries. I was surprised that Japan came up with that, TVer which basically all broadcast shows end up on for at least one week, shown with ads. AFAIK it's driven by a coalition of broadcasters with nothing to do with the big platforms - where there's a will there's a way I guess.
This could easily have happened. Apple especially lets anyone fit their catalog into the TV app. It's the non-Apple and non-Google part of the equation that chose the current system.
There are additional requirements involved with getting the catalog in TV App. And Apple obviously are not willing to share accurate user count numbers as well as a lot of other data. Once they said they are Apple's customer and not those TV / Broadcasting customers that was the end of the conversation.
personally i havent watched tv or listened to the radio on my own accord in many years because there are too many ads. i like the idea of not being able to choose the content im engaging in but it feels like 70% ads and 30% content
YouTube is apparently #1 in music streaming as well, which I found surprising.
Went to a wedding, 10 years ago even, and the "kids" DJ-ing the wedding party were pulling up music on YouTube.
(To be sure, this was very much a low-key affair, teens there with their parents were "DJ-ing" — but I was still surprised that is was YT. Just vanilla YT, pulling up "videos" and hitting "play".)
YouTube is pretty common for in-person, social music sharing because it's the least friction. It's hard to share between Spotify, Apple Music, Soundcloud, and personal collections from the same device. YT search will usually find pretty much everything.
In terms of subscribers or actual use?
I have YT Premium, so I automatically get YT Music. I would much rather pay less and drop the Music app. I almost never use it and don’t like it. I can’t justify buying for another service on top of this, so I went back to managing a local library and manually syncing all my music to my phone like it’s 2007.
A side effect of YouTube treating music special is that I can’t read comments on the TV for videos that it thinks are music. I find this very annoying. The same video will have comment on mobile or the computer.
My gripe is that when you try to sync over a library from, say, Spotify, you’ll end up subscribed to hundreds of artist’s YouTube channels in your main TV app, and playlists are basically shared too. Which I do not want at all
Yep. This is one of the reasons I don’t really use YT Music. The shared playlists are a nightmare. If someone tells me to check out a song, I might go there to listen to it as a one-off, but that’s about it. It’s so poorly done for anyone who also uses YouTube, which I assume is everyone.
IIRC, it was in terms of use.
YT Music is a dollar cheaper than Spotify, and generally better; it's also included in YT Premium, so if you already have that, 'may as well'.
so did I until I found myself using YouTube music over Spotify more and more. it has all the standard music but also includes more remixes and smaller artists. the most important thing is that it doesn't mix podcasts in with music and you can easily view your own playlists!
haven't used Spotify in any meaningful way in a few years now.
I dont believe that is the case, and I cant any reference to it. Nearly all are pointing to Spotify as number one both in terms of revenue and market shares.
The thing I dislike about Youtube Music is how it is basically not a product the team have put any thoughts into it. It is constantly rated one of the worst in Apple Music and Spotify comparison. It has so much potential but it is just very poor done.
I’d say 98% of my YouTube views are on the AppleTV.
I ditched Chromecast recently. They made YouTube too heavyweight for the Chromecast Ultra, to the point it regularly crashed. The new "Chromecast With Android TV" is barely more specs and has broken the interface by being... Android TV. Rather than take a well deserved second place, they chased Apple's design and ruined their niche.
Worse still, the best replacement I could find... Was Apple TV. So now I'm on that ecosystem.
Does it use a different app on the Ultra? I'm still using my second generation and (aside from some nonsense earlier this year about expired certificates) still going strong - can't ever remember it "Crashing".
Perhaps it's not "app weight" but more specific to the 4k video or SoC implementation?
TV is hot garbage now.
YT has solid channels, from DIY to black hole talks and most importantly, uncensored news.
TV is just ADs and more ADs, garbage content after garbage content. Not everything is pretty tho, YT has a complete monopoly and there is nothing anybody can do about it, the alternatives suck with some silly subscription when there is no even content.
I do pay for Youtube Premium since Youtube Music is hands down better than Spotify. I would pay for alternative services to help them out IF they were worth it. YT Premium is the only subscription I pay and happy to do so, I see value.
https://archive.is/Ii9n3