What is Vessel and should we be Worried - Ranting

Hands Up who's heard of Vessel?

The likelihood is that half of you won't know what I'm talking about, or will have looked across to the the cup, glass or mug. What I'm actually talking about is the new video hosting site that is setting up as the closest thing to a YouTube (YT) rival.

I've heard many people praise this.

 - YouTube needs competition
 - Not necassarily
 - But Monopolies are bad. Also think of the revenue it will generate for the creators, allowing them to live stably.
 - Yes, there has also been many cases where the creators say it gives them more security (which it will).
 - So, surely a rival is good?
 - Well...


Now, I'm not slating Vessel for existing, but I feel it might threaten the video sharing market as a whole and this may leave the door open for the end of YT, or at least the version of it we know. So what is it? Vessel is a service where you pay a monthly fee to watch the videos of YT stars before they release them to YT. It acts a premium service.

The Google owned giant has recently been making advertising revenue harder to come by. This has lead to many creators turning to kickstarter and patreon in order to sustain their income and current lifestyle. While many make a living off of it, youtube still only gives creators a small percentage of the revenue.

I'm not arguing against this, in fact I do feel the creators need a better income as to live off. However; this may impeed upon the YouTube monopoly. Now, I know most monopolies are "bad", but I see it a resource as opposed to a company. Google may have a large percentage of the search engine market, but it's not imposing on society, while we have the World Wide Web after other internet providers fell. YouTube, to me, has earned its place as the global video site.

I believe this is important because, in this world it is important to have convienience. With the rise of Vessel what's to say other sites wont do the same, or even  make a rival YouTube, as Yahoo threatened to do a few months back. This will be an issue if content becomes exclusive for each site. This may lead to extesive copyright issues with multiple videos of the same event being uploaded.

It may also make it harder to judge videos popularity. Imagine wanting to listen to a music video but having to visit 2 or 3 different sites to find it. What about trying to judge popularity of creators if they're on different sites with different audiences.

While Vessel is only offering a paid service everything should be fine. If they're only a premium service then nothing should change. However; we may see a cultural shift, as YouTube being a free place to make your name and Vessel a place to go when you're proffessional.

Vessel has been given $57.5m to help the project along. YouTube is also planning to launch its own paid subscription tier that will remove ads, which will, according to its email to channel owners; “generate a new source of revenue that will supplement your fast-growing advertising revenue”. Does this suggest we may already be losing the idea of a free to watch video sharing site. A concept that is a cornerstone of the World Wide Web.

Does Vessel represent the beginning of the end for the current YouTube or a benefit to creators?

Leave your thoughts.

A free commodity can be a need if advertised correctly.

-|CJ|-