So YouTube has a lot of problems, there’s no denying that. Frivolous and selective (not to mention automated) copyright enforcement, bureaucratic termination appeal system, COPPA idiocy, the whole clusterfuck that is monetization, etc?
In contrast, Odysee is this open-source video platform that fixes many of these problems. It took of, like, I dunno, a year ago? Thing is, it’s still very inactive and dead. A lot of YouTubers have pined for a massive exodus from YouTube, which might sound familiar for many of us Lemmings here. Yet, the majority of them can’t seem to let it go, since YouTube/Google pretty much exercises a monopoly on the online video sharing industry.
What worries me is that Reddit alternatives, such as Lemmy, Mastodon, or kbin, could see a similar fate to YouTube alternatives like Odysee or BitChute. I’d love to see people quit Reddit en masse and hopefully find a “safe harbor” some place like here, but I’m hearing about realistic concerns regarding even the viability of this site’s databases, so I feel like the actual outcome will be more of a small dent than a massive crater.
Which is exactly what Huffman wants and he knows it.
Ugh, I hate this awful corporate creativity-stifling timeline.
Why would anybody move to Odysee? There’s no content there.
Why would any creator move to Odysee? There’s no audience there.
I was thinking earlier today about Invidious, an open-source alternative front-end to YouTube. And I was struck with a thought: would it ever be possible for something like that to simultaneously serve as an alternative front-end to a (※federated) YouTube competitor? Because I could only imagine that if such a thing were to happen, that audiences would have plenty of reasons to move to the alternative front-end (wrt. ads and data harvesting, access to exclusive content on both platforms from one location…), at the cost of being able to like and comment on YouTube videos; and then once a significant audience has moved to the alternative front-end, creators could transition to the competing platform without much fear of losing their audiences, and regain likes and comments.
I mean, I don’t know what I’m talking about so there’s probably a reason this hasn’t already happened. It just feels like it should be possible with enough time and resources.