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Such poor behavior creates gaps in the canopy, providing sunlight for other services to grow. If you don't like how a service is treating you, switch to a bette

Such poor behavior creates gaps in the canopy, providing sunlight for other services to grow. If you don't like how a service is treating you, switch to a better one and make the case to your peers why they should do likewise. A healthy internet is ultimately up to us to build and maintain.

plopz 7y ago
This is actually interesting right now because Microsoft, Google and Facebook all seem to be trying to get into streaming. I would definitely like to see more competition in this space so that Twitch doesn't get complacent.
fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago
The issue is that an alternate service can only grow in the gaps if it has a viable business model: so far, monetizing internet services for the general public without advertising and tracking is a mostly-unsolved problem, despite interesting efforts like Brave.
- jlarocco 7y ago
  > monetizing internet services for the general public without advertising and tracking is a mostly-unsolved problem I feel like that's not a real problem. Or, maybe only a problem for services that care more about having a ton of users than being profitable and sustainable. There are quite a few services (SmugMug, Vimeo, NetFlix, etc.) that charge money, don't have advertisements, and are doing just fine. It's weird that so many web companies decide to go the sleazy advertisement/tracking/malware route rather than just charge money for the services they provide.
  - hombre_fatal 7y ago
    > It's weird that so many web companies decide to go the sleazy advertisement/tracking/malware route rather than just charge money for the services they provide. You will find very quickly how reluctant people are to pay for anything despite a few cultural-phenomenon-level exceptions like Netflix. I'm amazed how many people, like my own coworkers making $100k+, listen to Spotify all day every day yet will endure advertisement after advertisement in their stream of music instead of paying $10/month. If someone isn't even going to pay for Spotify despite it being a central part of their day to day experience, GG to your little service. I think advertising has played a major hand in shepherding us into this position that divorced us from the idea of paying for content we enjoy. There is going to have to be a major cultural change to bring us back into a healthy relationship with content. One common response to this is "well, maybe everyone should be hobbyists again making content for free," but surely we can find a better middleground than structuring things such that we depend on people toiling away in their freetime to produce the content we happen to want. For example, I'd rather my favorite content providers be able to feed themselves working on this content. We both benefit: I get to enjoy more content. Depending on hobby work doesn't get us there.
    - jlarocco 7y ago
      > You will find very quickly how reluctant people are to pay for anything despite a few cultural-phenomenon-level exceptions like Netflix. That's absolutely not true, though. People buy stuff all the time. Clothing, shoes, sporting goods, dishes, food, housewares, books, DVDs, etc. The "freemium" approach Spotify takes is a poor example because they're not charging for their real service of music streaming, but instead to get rid of advertisements. They've moved their own goalposts, and the question isn't "Is streaming music worth $10 a month?" but "Is it worth $10 a month to get rid of this commercial?" If the options were "Pay $10 to stream music" or "Listen to nothing," the results might be a lot different. > One common response to this is "well, maybe everyone should be hobbyists again making content for free," but surely we can find a better middleground than structuring things such that we depend on people toiling away in their freetime to produce the content we happen to want. For example, I'd rather my favorite content providers be able to feed themselves working on this content. We both benefit: I get to enjoy more content. Depending on hobby work doesn't get us there. I'm not making that argument, and you're setting up a false dichotomy. There's no reason content creators need to use advertisements and can't charge for their content instead. It worked fine for music and movies for over a hundred years, and books have been using that model for hundreds of years before that.
      - rstupek 7y ago
        I think the world of consumption has changed though. People expect things (music, games, etc) to be free and balk at paying for them. Why would they when there is likely someone offering something comparable for free but supported by ads?
        VRay 7y ago
        Maybe you could ship them a real item as part of the service somehow I'd never pay $10 for a character in a game, but I'd happily pay $15 for a plastic toy that coincidentally unlocks something in a game I was enjoying anyway
        7y ago
  - plopz 7y ago
    Vimeo was so well positioned to beat out youtube back in the day. Stage6 had just shut down and vimeo was offering HD while youtube was stuck with low res. But then they made the mistake of banning video game content for not being artsy enough which led to youtube jumping in popularity.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    People don't like paying and even 2 subscriptions is more than many will care for. Also lots of people can't afford all the content they consume today, and would much rather have access with ads than nothing all.
    - BlueTemplar 7y ago
      If ads didn't exist, the pricing of that content would be quite different...
      - fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago
        Or, the content just wouldn't exist
        BlueTemplar 7y ago
        The distribution of content might be quite different - but remember that ads aren't free - they're just another middleman that has to be paid, priced in in the cost of goods, a net drain from the point of view of the consumers (on first approximation at least).
        tripzilch 7y ago
        > Or, the content just wouldn't exist I mean, on the whole, the vast majority of ad supported content is in fact clickbait trash.

plopz 7y ago

This is actually interesting right now because Microsoft, Google and Facebook all seem to be trying to get into streaming. I would definitely like to see more competition in this space so that Twitch doesn't get complacent.

fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago

The issue is that an alternate service can only grow in the gaps if it has a viable business model: so far, monetizing internet services for the general public without advertising and tracking is a mostly-unsolved problem, despite interesting efforts like Brave.

jlarocco 7y ago
> monetizing internet services for the general public without advertising and tracking is a mostly-unsolved problem I feel like that's not a real problem. Or, maybe only a problem for services that care more about having a ton of users than being profitable and sustainable. There are quite a few services (SmugMug, Vimeo, NetFlix, etc.) that charge money, don't have advertisements, and are doing just fine. It's weird that so many web companies decide to go the sleazy advertisement/tracking/malware route rather than just charge money for the services they provide.
- hombre_fatal 7y ago
  > It's weird that so many web companies decide to go the sleazy advertisement/tracking/malware route rather than just charge money for the services they provide. You will find very quickly how reluctant people are to pay for anything despite a few cultural-phenomenon-level exceptions like Netflix. I'm amazed how many people, like my own coworkers making $100k+, listen to Spotify all day every day yet will endure advertisement after advertisement in their stream of music instead of paying $10/month. If someone isn't even going to pay for Spotify despite it being a central part of their day to day experience, GG to your little service. I think advertising has played a major hand in shepherding us into this position that divorced us from the idea of paying for content we enjoy. There is going to have to be a major cultural change to bring us back into a healthy relationship with content. One common response to this is "well, maybe everyone should be hobbyists again making content for free," but surely we can find a better middleground than structuring things such that we depend on people toiling away in their freetime to produce the content we happen to want. For example, I'd rather my favorite content providers be able to feed themselves working on this content. We both benefit: I get to enjoy more content. Depending on hobby work doesn't get us there.
  - jlarocco 7y ago
    > You will find very quickly how reluctant people are to pay for anything despite a few cultural-phenomenon-level exceptions like Netflix. That's absolutely not true, though. People buy stuff all the time. Clothing, shoes, sporting goods, dishes, food, housewares, books, DVDs, etc. The "freemium" approach Spotify takes is a poor example because they're not charging for their real service of music streaming, but instead to get rid of advertisements. They've moved their own goalposts, and the question isn't "Is streaming music worth $10 a month?" but "Is it worth $10 a month to get rid of this commercial?" If the options were "Pay $10 to stream music" or "Listen to nothing," the results might be a lot different. > One common response to this is "well, maybe everyone should be hobbyists again making content for free," but surely we can find a better middleground than structuring things such that we depend on people toiling away in their freetime to produce the content we happen to want. For example, I'd rather my favorite content providers be able to feed themselves working on this content. We both benefit: I get to enjoy more content. Depending on hobby work doesn't get us there. I'm not making that argument, and you're setting up a false dichotomy. There's no reason content creators need to use advertisements and can't charge for their content instead. It worked fine for music and movies for over a hundred years, and books have been using that model for hundreds of years before that.
    - rstupek 7y ago
      I think the world of consumption has changed though. People expect things (music, games, etc) to be free and balk at paying for them. Why would they when there is likely someone offering something comparable for free but supported by ads?
      - VRay 7y ago
        Maybe you could ship them a real item as part of the service somehow I'd never pay $10 for a character in a game, but I'd happily pay $15 for a plastic toy that coincidentally unlocks something in a game I was enjoying anyway
        7y ago
- plopz 7y ago
  Vimeo was so well positioned to beat out youtube back in the day. Stage6 had just shut down and vimeo was offering HD while youtube was stuck with low res. But then they made the mistake of banning video game content for not being artsy enough which led to youtube jumping in popularity.
- manigandham 7y ago
  People don't like paying and even 2 subscriptions is more than many will care for. Also lots of people can't afford all the content they consume today, and would much rather have access with ads than nothing all.
  - BlueTemplar 7y ago
    If ads didn't exist, the pricing of that content would be quite different...
    - fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago
      Or, the content just wouldn't exist
      - BlueTemplar 7y ago
        The distribution of content might be quite different - but remember that ads aren't free - they're just another middleman that has to be paid, priced in in the cost of goods, a net drain from the point of view of the consumers (on first approximation at least).
      - tripzilch 7y ago
        > Or, the content just wouldn't exist I mean, on the whole, the vast majority of ad supported content is in fact clickbait trash.