Why do people use Youtube?

[MIU]

None of the users of the site like it, none of the creators on the site like it, the company itself is bleeding money because it doesn't turn a profit, every single change to the site is a downgrade and it just keeps making itself shittier. Why does Youtube still have the monopoly on mid-to-long-form online video content? Why did it succeed when every other attempt failed even with widespread praise from creators?

Sure, nowadays a lot of alternative sites like Bitchute tend to be more politically focused and skew towards one side or the other which often turns moving to one into a larger statement than just "Youtube sucks". But there have been plenty of neutral alternatives over the years which all failed miserably. I mean, hell, Stage6 was objectively superior to Youtube in every single way yet Youtube still won out.

It really is a wrench to me in the idea that our current form of capitalism is meritocratic because if it was then Youtube would have been out of business more than 10 years ago.

 

[Troonos]

50% addiction.
50% low IQ that prevents them from knowing how much YouTube sucks.

 

[Beelzebub's Lawyer]

Because it's good and useful.
Could be a bit less censored but other than that, it's solid.
You can literally find anything on it and the content that pisses you off can be easily ignored.
People whine about everything all the time so of course they will whine about youtube.

 

[Breadbassket]

Biggest game in town, largest video library and has the corporate backing of Alphabet/Google.

 

[UncleFezziesPantsPuppet]

None of the users of the site like it, none of the creators on the site like it

Yet they’ll still use it.

 

[Pedophobe]

Why does Youtube still have the monopoly on mid-to-long-form online video content? Why did it succeed when every other attempt failed even with widespread praise from creators?

As far as we know, YouTube has never been profitable. Google probably keeps it around purely for the clout of being able to claim they're #1. Nobody else can compete because it's a money pit; it's not a viable market.

 

[Nero Fiddled]

I guess it really depends on what you use it for.
If you're relying on it for "news" or anything that could be perceived to have a political slant to it, then you're on the wrong platform, the same as relying on BBC news.

I use it for "factual" stuff (how to repair a faulty XYZ) and music.

 

[Pierre D'Olnique]

one of the few creators I still respect post there and it still contains tons of memories back from when it was still good (pre-2012)

 

[Lemmingwiser]

A better gym with no equipment is inferior to a worse gym that has a ton of equipment in various state of new vs disrepair.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Like every other social media site, it's pretty much impossible to compete with YouTube since everyone, both creators and users, is already there. And zoomers and boomers will commit suicide rather than go between two different sites. Only way to compete is getting government ruling to allow competitors to show youtube videos while getting some of the ad revenue. But this will never happen.

And while Youtube is garbage, it is the least garbage of the social media giants, and infinitely less gay than most streaming services. And everyone bitching about YouTube at least gives the illusion of some sort of balance. Especially as many of the people bitching are ones doing the same content for more than a decade and expecting the audience to stay.

 

[User names must be unique]

Why do people go to walmart for low quality produce when they could visit the butcher, the greengrocer and the fish market? No video platform will ever equal youtube in variety of content and traffic.

 

[darksydephloyd]

It has hours long video essays on shit I kinda care about that I can put on as background listening slop while doing drudgery in life.

Also kino casino clips. I use BravePipe app on my phone to listen and download. I don't really watch YouTube videos any more I just listen to them.

In a sense it has the only thing that matters in the end: the kawntint

 

[Jace on ice]

There's no viable alternative.

The YouTube clones that do exist and haven't gone under have basically no content other than mirrors of popular YouTube channels that haven't been updated in six years and Eastern European schizophrenics ranting.

The only way a viable YouTube competitor will emerge is if Elon decides to fund one.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

it's got a ton of shit I can run in synchtubes so I don't have to fuck around with downloading a show, repacking it, and upping it to a pomf or archive or whatever

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

1. Because everybody uses Youtube, creating a network effect.
2. Because video hosting is hideously expensive, locking out competition.
3. Because somehow everything else is EVEN WORSE.

 

[BiggestKai]

A better gym with no equipment is inferior to a worse gym that has a ton of equipment in various state of new vs disrepair.

0:10

 

[BubbaRobot887]

Show me another site that makes it as easy as Youtube to upload videos and have them seen by normal people on everything from cellphones to movie projectors.

 

[Ozul]

People on Odysee, DailyMotion, Vimeo, Peertube and Bitchute pretending to enjoy their shitty sites so they can have some sort of superiority complex, watching as everyone feasts on the infinite commentary and drama slop YouTube provides fresh cooked daily.

 

[FlipTopBox]

I was optimistic about Odysee when it was first getting popular, but now it's just completely irrelevant. The few creators I followed on there stopped mirroring their content and Jersh stopping streaming there so I had no real reason to stay. Unfortunate.