18 ms·

So let me get this straight: a video streaming service fails, and they're blaming... the pandemic? I don't think there has ever been a time in history when peop

• Traster 6y ago
  It was mobile first, so I could see how you could argue that a pandemic was bad for a platform built around mobile. Having said that, the management seems to have been crap too and it seems crazy that they weren't able to acqui-quit.
  • fastball 6y ago
    I don't know anyone that has used their phone less during lockdown.
    • Twirrim 6y ago
      I haven't used it for watching video media, that's gone way down now that I'm not commuting. When I watch videos now it's almost always on the TV instead. I'm not even sure if my streaming device supports Quibi.
      • redisman 6y ago
        Isn't the whole pitch that they're bite-sized? So you'll watch a clip on the toilet or while waiting for your turn in the covid test line. Mobile games and most apps are doing better than ever. This whole thing had a very "fellow kids" vibe, so I think the content must have been the main sticking point.
        • input_sh 6y ago
          Yes, but you have no idea how long that bite size will last. While scrolling your feeds or playing most games, you can stop at any time. You can't say ahead of time "I'm going to spend 6-8 min waiting in this line / at the toilet, enough for a byte-sized episode".
          • cik2e 6y ago
            There is this thing called a pause button. Which basically invalidates the whole concept of “bite-sized” entertainment to begin with. My biggest deterrent from streaming video away from home is data usage, not the length of the content.
            • drusepth 6y ago
              I don't know if other people feel the same way, but I definitely feel a downside whenever I get invested in something (even a small bite of something) and then have to pause halfway through and resume at a later date/time. Tension drops, references to earlier things lose some meaning, you're completely pulled out of whatever you were watching and it starts feeling more like a disjointed effort to watch instead of a singular experience to enjoy.
              • anon9001 6y ago
                I thought everyone felt this way.
              • SilasX 6y ago
                Yep, that’s the irony: as much as they promote bite sized entertainment, their ten minutes is still too long for the use case they’re looking at. For people on the go (in transit, waiting in line), users want content that you can drop immediately. Like Reddit of Facebook or instagram. At the point where they’re willing to focus attention ... they want much longer stuff anyway. Quibi fails on both fronts. Edit: well, someone else said it more succinctly: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24856020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24856020
  • rajangdavis 6y ago
    > It was mobile first, so I could see how you could argue that a pandemic was bad for a platform built around mobile This argument would have to ignore the massive success of TikTok during the pandemic.
    • gnulinux 6y ago
      TikTok has been getting popular since summer 2019.
      • rajangdavis 6y ago
        TikTok usage tripled in 2020 versus doubled in 2019 (according to the Verge)
    • drchiu 6y ago
      It’s kind of funny they got Meg Whitman to be the CEO of Quibi. Pretty sure Bella Poarch (or someone similar) would be a more appropriate choice for knowing how to get something viral.
      • jariel 6y ago
        She was for Ops. They had Jef Katzenberg for content. That said, maybe neither of them had their finger on the pulse, and they are too old and rich to be 'hands on' founders - so without some really competent lieutenants this was going to fail. $1B is goddam lot of money to spend on something with $0 capex. The mobile app is a tiny cost. So you have paying for the content then distribution. The later should have been royalty based and also drive most of the distribution. It almost smells fishy.
  • baobabKoodaa 6y ago
    "Mobile first" implies that there's something second. Like a webpage that's optimized for a mobile experience but is also viewable on desktop. This could have been Quibi: they made vertical videos ("optimized for a mobile experience") but they could have also allowed users to view those videos on desktop. That would have been mobile first.
    • DennisAleynikov 6y ago
      they did eventually enter TV streaming but way after their announced stance of Mobile-Only
      • wlesieutre 6y ago
        "Eventually" being a day or two ago
    • chrisseaton 6y ago
      Do you understand how the culture changed, though? Do you realise people used to consume a lot of media on their phones vertically... but now they don't... for obvious reaons. That can't be that hard to understand? Market changed. Previously valid opportunity vanished. They didn't do anything wrong but be around at the wrong time.
      • naderkhalil 6y ago
        TikTok is mobile-first, vertical video format that I can still watch on my desktop. Makes sharing it or watching funny ones with SO very easy
        • rchaud 6y ago
          Portrait on TikTok makes sense because the videos shown in algorithm driven order and are usually around 1 minute long at most. People are also swiping to skip to the next video, and you can't swipe comfortably in landscape. A 10 minute Quibi episode is already half the length of a standard sitcom with ads (20 mins). It's not meant to be skippable. There really wasn't a need to make it portrait mode.
  • ffggvv 6y ago
    meanwhile snapchat stock up 30% today
  • RobRivera 6y ago
    Hehehe - acquihire, acquiquit. La misma cosa
  • rswail 6y ago
    I don't get this "mobile". What you're talking about is "phone" first. People mostly use laptops for school/work, they spend their personal time on their phone. Saying that the pandemic has stopped people using their phones for this purpose is excuse-making bullshit.
• commandlinefan 6y ago
  > go ahead and dictate to users the exact manner in which they must interact with your product Well, Netflix did that for a long time, too. Last time I tried to watch Netflix on Linux it was still impossible (supposedly you can do it now, but I haven't tried in a few years). Restricting modes of access isn't necessarily a death knell.
  • gnulinux 6y ago
    I've been watching Netflix on linux since late 2018~early 2019 (can't remember exactly when I opened an account). Not sure when it's fixed but I had no problem. Criterion Channel doesn't work on linux though, which I realized only after buying their product and watching a few movies on my Mac. Had I known it I would never have bought since I spend 90% of my time on linux.
    • jandrese 6y ago
      Netflix on Linux has worked since at least 2015, although very early on you had to hack the browser string to make it work and you had to use Chrome. Now it works without fuss in Firefox as well, but you may have to install "non-free" extensions depending on the distro, so purists are still out of luck.
  • Nextgrid 6y ago
    Well, Netflix at least kinda makes sense from a business point of view. The reason they don’t allow watching on Linux is because some of their content providers insist on a DRM scheme which they can’t guarantee will be secure on Linux. I disagree with this on an ideological point of view, but from a business point of view it makes sense as Linux is a minority in their potential user base. Quibi’s decision really does not make sense. It is reasonably cheap to release a viewer app or website for the mainstream browsers & OSes, and indeed if there is a good Quibi show then offering it on desktops & TVs would significantly improve the viewing experience and bring more people in.
  • ac29 6y ago
    Netflix on Linux has worked for many years, but lots of content was (is?) limited to 720p or even 480p. This doesn't actually have anything to do with Linux - the same limitations apply to Windows as well unless you use Edge or the Microsoft Store app which implement a stronger level of DRM.
• mhh__ 6y ago
  > Yeah, go ahead and dictate to users the exact manner in which they must interact with your product. Don't allow any alternatives. Apple?
  • FreakyT 6y ago
    While I see where you're going with that, in all fairness Apple has made an effort to shove Apple TV+ onto pretty much every streaming device, including non-Apple ones.
    • theturtletalks 6y ago
      I was shocked when they made an Apple Music app for Android however subpar the app was.
      • snazz 6y ago
        It increases the number of people who get family Apple Music subscriptions, so it makes sense from a business standpoint. iMessage on Android, however, would kill the iPhone's biggest network effect.
        • fastball 6y ago
          Honestly I don't feel like the iMessage network effect exists much at all anymore. Sure, I use it frequently for communicating with other iPhone people, but I just as easily communicate with others using WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal. In fact I generally prefer Telegram to Apple Messages.
        • mhh__ 6y ago
          Is this an American thing? I've owned an iPhone and currently still on a increasingly crap android phone and I've never ever heard anyone get hazed for iMessage colours or similar.
          • snazz 6y ago
• dredmorbius 6y ago
  The pandemic is fuelling viewership, but killing advertising. It's also making video production difficult If paid subscriptions failed to fill the ads hole, the yes, the pandemic would be bad for business. That's on top of competing against Google, Facebook, and established broadcast/cable advertising markets, with likely unestablished or unattractive demographics.
  • Nextgrid 6y ago
    Does Quibi have ads? My understanding is that they are a paid service (with free trials) but aren't an ad platform themselves. Thus, if anything, they should've benefited from the pandemic as the falling advertising supply meant they could advertise for their own service for less money than usual.
    • cbsks 6y ago
      Quibi cost $5 a month with ads. 8$ a month without ads.
    • dredmorbius 6y ago
      The streaming service attracted blue-chip advertisers including PepsiCo Inc., Walmart Inc. and Anheuser-Busch InBev SA, securing about $150 million in ad revenue in the runup to its launch. From TFA.
  • dredmorbius 6y ago
    s/the yes/then yes/
• jandrese 6y ago
  This doesn’t seem as crazy as it appears on the surface. Quibi was streaming video targeted at people on the bus/train or sitting behind a register with nobody in line. It had no interest in serving people stuck at home.
  • nostromo 6y ago
    TikTok is in the same niche (short form, mobile-first video content) and hasn't been hurt by the pandemic.
    • ViViDboarder 6y ago
      Social media is pretty different.
      • fumar 6y ago
        How is it different from a consumer perspective? As a consumer I have the ability to choose when and what media I interact with. Wouldn’t Quibi be a fun distraction at home for 10-15 minutes?
        • awinter-py 6y ago
          tiktok has infinitely more content and pays infinitely less for it tiktok has more viral hits per day than quibi generated in its whole lifetime tiktok is expert at recommendation, quibi doesn't have enough content to have a recommender quibi doesn't have anything share-driven
          • eric_h 6y ago
            > quibi doesn't have anything share-driven and that right there is why quibi failed - the only quibi clip I've seen was taken by someone using another phone to record it and post it to twitter. By not allowing viral hits to be easily shared on any platform they shot themselves in the foot.
• dpcan 6y ago
  You didn't miss anything. I paid them for the same reason. They failed because their content was terrible, they just aren't admitting it.
  • bigbubba 6y ago
    I never even heard of them before today, and I don't consider myself particularly far out of the loop.
    • sushshshsh 6y ago
      They made some pretty big ad spending like x months ago, I can't remember, but that's the only value I have associated with "Quibi" in my brain. I think they paid some famous celebrities to endorse.
      • zwily 6y ago
        I first heard of them during the Super Bowl I think.
    • cgriswald 6y ago
      I heard about them one other time, on HN a few months ago. I didn’t bother checking them out because they were mobile only. Other than that, nothing. No one I know has mentioned them to me even in discussion of such services and the people I’ve asked haven’t had a clue they existed. Maybe their content sucks. Maybe their choices and interface are garbage. But surely their terrible marketing was also a nail in the coffin?
      • prawn 6y ago
        Same. Heard about them once before and thought it was at least an interesting idea. However, if you've spent that much money and generated virtually zero chitchat on various social networks and places like HN, what have you been doing on the PR front?
    • cheeze 6y ago
• Nextgrid 6y ago
  The pandemic is a frequent excuse for shutting down unsustainable VC-funded crap that shouldn't have existed to begin with. I am however surprised how they thought it would be believable when it comes to a media/entertainment service given that most people have more free time than ever due to the pandemic.
• AzzieElbab 6y ago
  I think the whole idea was about short clips on the go, since no one is going anywhere these days ..
  • Cthulhu_ 6y ago
    And yet, tiktok / instagram seem to be doing fine. Mind you, they have big companies behind them that can keep them alive for years if they choose to.
    • AzzieElbab 6y ago
      tiktok and instagram are running on free content. quibi was supposed to be netflix for people who have no time for netflix
• arvinsim 6y ago
  From what I understand, they were planning to serve 5-10 minute "chapters". In a pandemic, I think people would prefer longer form of content.
• bccdee 6y ago
  Yeah I find it funny that the pandemic and the competition get blamed for Quibi's utter failure to design a product anyone wants. Their "selling points" were "each new episode is only a few minutes, you can only watch it on your phone, and we pan-&-scan it into portrait mode for you." Nobody wanted any of those things — they actively make the product worse.
• 867-5309 6y ago
  it's quite trivial to run Android apps on a desktop using Bluestacks. it's also free
• dec0dedab0de 6y ago
  Yeah, go ahead and dictate to users the exact manner in which they must interact with your product. Don't allow any alternatives. This is what happens. I had a similar experience recently when my phone broke and many services wouldn't work on my older phone, or older iPad, even in the browser. The worst offender was HBO Max which also flat out refuses to run on linux. I had to cancel it because I'm not going to buy a streaming service to exclusively use on my work laptop. Does anyone remember when we made websites with the goal of as many people using them as possible? streaming video has been mainstream for over a decade, yet everyone still fucks it up.