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You don't need to "replicate a video streaming service like Vimeo" which is obviously a massive undertaking, you just need a system to deliver your own videos,

You don't need to "replicate a video streaming service like Vimeo" which is obviously a massive undertaking, you just need a system to deliver your own videos, minus all the infrastructure necessary for a platform that is meant to support a multi-tenant video publishing and billing service as a product. That's like if I said "build your own web storefront" and you said "replicating shopify is not an easy task" or "build your own newsletter" and you said "replicating substack is not an easy task".

jb1991 5y ago
My emphasis was on the high-performance aspect, not the platform itself. It's not a trivial problem to host videos and have them easily watchable in a way like Vimeo does it. Bandwidth, streaming tech and other aspects can't be done adequately by the average development team without significant expense.
- root_axis 5y ago
  I'm going to copy and paste something I wrote somewhere else in this thread since it's the same point. The tech stack necessary to host your own HD videos is open source and really quite simple for an experienced developer. ffmpeg, nginx (with a couple plugins) and one of the many open source web player clients and you're all set. Payments and subscriptions are a long solved problem via stripe or paypal, it's really not a massive endeavor. Most of the work would be on the aesthetic side, not the technical side.
  - jb1991 5y ago
    That sounds very optimistic. I work for a startup right now which is private but valued in the 10 digits, and they have some video streaming features on their platform, and despite an engineering team spending a few years on this, it still causes some customers problems with freezing playback and stuttering video. On the surface, sure, you can probably get it to work in a basic way. But the reliability, consistency, the overall experience of the user, that is extremely hard to keep going. And I’m not even talking yet about the interface.

jb1991 5y ago

My emphasis was on the high-performance aspect, not the platform itself. It's not a trivial problem to host videos and have them easily watchable in a way like Vimeo does it. Bandwidth, streaming tech and other aspects can't be done adequately by the average development team without significant expense.

root_axis 5y ago
I'm going to copy and paste something I wrote somewhere else in this thread since it's the same point. The tech stack necessary to host your own HD videos is open source and really quite simple for an experienced developer. ffmpeg, nginx (with a couple plugins) and one of the many open source web player clients and you're all set. Payments and subscriptions are a long solved problem via stripe or paypal, it's really not a massive endeavor. Most of the work would be on the aesthetic side, not the technical side.
- jb1991 5y ago
  That sounds very optimistic. I work for a startup right now which is private but valued in the 10 digits, and they have some video streaming features on their platform, and despite an engineering team spending a few years on this, it still causes some customers problems with freezing playback and stuttering video. On the surface, sure, you can probably get it to work in a basic way. But the reliability, consistency, the overall experience of the user, that is extremely hard to keep going. And I’m not even talking yet about the interface.