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Younger folks forget that YouTube launched (2005) a few years before both the iPhone launched and Netflix pivoted to streaming (2007). In that weird era, (a) a
by ethbr1 2y ago
Younger folks forget that YouTube launched (2005) a few years before both the iPhone launched and Netflix pivoted to streaming (2007).
In that weird era, (a) average home Internet connections became fast enough to support streaming video (with a healthy adoption growth rate), (b) the most widely deployed home recording device was likely still the VCR (digitizing analog video from cable to burn to DVD was a pain), (c) there was no "on demand" anything, as most media flowed over centrally-programmed cable or broadcast subscriptions, and (d) people capturing video on mobile devices was rare (first gen iPhone couldn't) but obviously a future growth area.
So early YouTube was literally unlike anything that came before -- watch a thing you want, whenever you want.
- treyd 2y agoThe slogan "Broadcast Yourself" was really inspiring at the time, because it actually was kinda hard to do that at scale in video.
- ghaff 2y agoAnd Cisco didn't acquire Flip until 2009. Really most of the content that YouTube had available was material recorded off of broadcast/cable which was mostly not available otherwise unless you had recorded it or gotten it off a torrent.
- hnburnsy 2y agoFlip has a special place in my heart, right next to my memories of my Diamond Rio MP3 player.
- lawgimenez 2y agoWow I just realized how old YouTube is. My video on YouTube was uploaded on 2006 and it is still there. I remember uploading it from my Sony handcam, then editing it in Sony Vegas and exporting it to make sure it hits the required YT file upload limit.
- qingcharles 2y agoAnd it was a video dating site when it started!
- kylec 2y agoThat was also an era where bandwidth to serve content was extremely expensive, I still don't know how 2005 YouTube was able to find a way to make serving user-uploaded videos for free financially viable, but that was a HUGE component of their success.
- ghaff 2y agoSelf-hosting video at scale is still pretty expensive although using CDN can reduce it.
- ethbr1 2y agoAt YouTube scale, it feels like that quip: 'When you need to serve a few videos, it's your problem. When you need to serve video everyone watches, it's the ISPs' problem.' I'd be fascinated to look at their peering terms.
- hedora 2y agoAlso, the DMCA had just passed, which basically eliminated liability for hosting copyrighted video content as long as the infringement was laundered through a service provider. I honestly don’t think YouTube would exist without that particular piece of regulatory capture. Contrast the video and podcast ecosystems. Podcasts are arguably much healthier (the publishers maintain creative control), and are certainly decentralized.
- takinola 2y agoI think the secret was being acquired by Google. Without the deep financial pockets and strategic patience of Google, I doubt they would have been able to become what they are today.
- Kye 2y agoHow YouTube would pay for itself was one of those top topics back in that thin slice of time between when YouTube took off and Google bought it. The Techmeme page from the day of the announcement (October 9, 2006) if you want to dig into it: https://www.techmeme.com/061009/h2355 https://www.techmeme.com/061009/h2355
- Kye 2y agoOn-demand was a thing before, but it was mediated through slow, glitchy cable and satellite boxes. There was also a thriving scene of RSS-delivered web TV shows.
- -mlv 2y agoEven cheap digital cameras back then could record video + audio.
- ethbr1 2y agoTrue, but scale drastically changed once there was serviceable video recording in every mobile phone. Lots of people carried digital cameras, but even more have mobile phones.