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Vidme To Shut Down On Dec 15th 2017

Posted by msmash on from the another-one-bites-the-dust dept.

New submitter substance2003 writes: Vid.me has announced they are shutting down on December 15th 2017 citing that they could not find a path to sustainability. This news should be of concern as content creators have been getting increasingly frustrated with Youtube's algorithms that demonetize their videos and this means they have one less alternative to turn towards.

49 comments

  1. Um... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who?

    1. Re:Um... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > Who?

      Beyond that: "why?"

      The fact that we don't know them means that Google never took me there... either they failed to promote their site or Google might have some reason to not show them to me.

    2. Re:Um... by pots · · Score: 1

      VID.ME I can't believe how deaf readers can be sometimes.

      They're not huge, but I've been seeing them around more and more lately. People who attempt to make a living by posting videos on the internet keep searching for better options than youtube, because youtube is terrible for content creators, and vid.me is the most recent popular option. Trouble is, there's no money in it for the host, even youtube only breaks even, so they don't last long. Remember Blip? Same thing.

    3. Re:Um... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Video host mainly used for amateur porn clips. RIP

  2. In a bid to create a pathway to sustainability... by Lab+Rat+Jason · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... an unknown video platform began publishing news of their eminent demise on random tech aggregation sites.

    Use this one weird trick to launch your YouTube knockoff company!

    --
    Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?
  3. Vidme by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Who are they, and why is this important to me?

    1. Re:Vidme by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      porn.

      lots and lots of small clips of home made amateur porn.

  4. who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Never heard of it.

    1. Re:Who? by MightyYar · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Sorry, Google can't have it both ways. When you use the site, you need to agree to terms and conditions. That's a commercial contract - that's a business relationship. People can gripe all they want as far as I'm concerned. If enough of them gripe together, they might even change their side of the deal for the better.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    2. Re:Who? by MBGMorden · · Score: 2

      That doesn't sound like the case here. From what I can tell, Vid.me was essentially an alternative to Youtube - it allows people to upload their videos, control who can advertise on them, and offer subscription/tip services to their creators.

      All sounds like a perfectly fine idea - kinda like Youtube but with the monetary structure of Twitch and/or Patreon built-in.

      The issue, likely, is that like you, I had never heard of them until today, and I'm betting most other people hadn't either.

      Also, to really compete you need ubiquitous app availability. Not just on phones but on set-top devices and game consoles. If people have to work too hard to access the content they won't bother.

      --
      "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
    3. Re:Who? by morethanapapercert · · Score: 1
      For what it's worth, I don't think trying to create popular content so as to get a slice of the advertising revenue is "free money". After all, that's what most websites try to do, does it matter if the platform is Youtube or Wordpress?

      It's almost certainly true that Alphabet/Youtube owes those content creators nothing in a contractual sense, since the terms of service and payment plans are all written by them on a "take it or leave it" basis. Like it seems every other technology company (and no few non tech outfits), they will have included a clause that basically says "we can change this agreement at any time, without notice and your only recourse is mediation in a place we picked as being most friendly to us"

      My questions would be : What kind of content is being demonitized and why? Taking away ad income from say hate speech, trippy kid-targeted adult content, ISIS execution videos and so on is basically a form of moderation. That sort of thing is already covered by the existing TOS, so I don't have a problem with it. However; if they change the algorithm so as to demonitize content in order to give a competitive advantage to partners who pay more, then that might be regarding as anti-competitive behaviour and be legally actionable regardless of what the TOS says. Or, if they pull a Paypal and just rewrite the contract regularly to give themselves an ever increasing share of the profits by paying content creators less and less, then I think that is an ethical failure. It is those content makers who are bringing in the clicks and ad impressions that make Youtube such a valuable site in the first place. Some of the channels on Youtube I am aware of are by people who are spending at least several days a week and money out of their own pockets to create the content they upload. It's only fair that they get paid proportionally.

      --
      I need a wheelchair van for my son. Help me get the word out. https://www.gofundme.com/wheelchair-van-for-jj
    4. Re:Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      Nice grammar, retard.

    5. Re:Who? by beckett · · Score: 1

      It will be interesting to see what happens next when content creators that have sufficiently large enough followings will be able to wean themselves and their followers off youtube. ultimately it's the content that is more important than the platform.

    6. Re:Who? by Rockoon · · Score: 1

      At least one of the big boys on YouTube (Joe Rogan) also releases his vodcast on iTunes and he says he gets significantly more views through iTunes. Not sure how to view his iTunes numbers, but he has 1.9 million subscribers on YouTube with many of his shows getting 1 million+ views within a week there.

      The issue on the table is convenience. YouTube and iTunes are convenient because people already go there. I check my YouTube subscriptions every day. Its like turning on the TV and looking at what the DVR has collected.

      So there is probably a market for a master site - a site that does not stream videos but instead manages "subscriptions" across a broad range of these services.

      --
      "His name was James Damore."
    7. Re:Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe you didn't understand the GP.
      translation: corporations should be able to stomp on individuals with no consequence. If you disagree, fuck off, and hopefully the corporations with stomp on you.
      interpretation: it doesn't hurt me, so who cares?

    8. Re:Who? by hairyfeet · · Score: 1, Troll

      You obviously haven't been paying attention. in case you haven't heard Google has put a full on SJW as president of YouTube who went so far as to give exclusive interviews to the Young Turks (you know, the ones that deny the Armenian genocide because it doesn't fit their political narrative?) and while not doing shit about the "kill all the whites and jews" far left channels like BAMN or even doing shit about the rampant pedo invasion they've had for FOUR FRICKING YEARS now what they HAVE done is rush to demonitize anyone whose views are farther right than Trigglypuff, going so far as to set up blacklists of anyone whose political views don't follow the narrative. Popular YouTuber Razorfist showed everyone it was indeed a blacklist when he uploaded a 5 minute video of him pointing to a blank wall and going "blah blah blah" and it was demonitized in less than 10 minutes.

      Never forget YouTube is MAKING MONEY off of these people, they are able to sell spots based on traffic and its these YouTubers that are driving the traffic. Steven Crowder alone gets more views than CNN but gets instantly demonitized despite his vids being more tame than Seinfeld while the jihad and pedo channels? Yeah never demonitized. The faster YouTube is replaced by a company that cares about the free market more than politics? The better.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    9. Re:Who? by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      What kind of content is being demonitized and why? Taking away ad income from say hate speech, trippy kid-targeted adult content, ISIS execution videos and so on is basically a form of moderation. That sort of thing is already covered by the existing TOS, so I don't have a problem with it.

      It's not even a TOS thing. Advertisers are a very conservative bunch, and they have a whole list of topics to which they will and will not advertise with.

      What happened was Google screwed up and a few of those ads were shown on content the advertisers said to never show their ad on, so a lot of big names pulled ads.

      This especially so with people like PewDiePie who basically turned from new media hero to pariah in a single video, causing advertisers to withdraw ads in shock. A lot of YouTubers who obviously didn't know how ads work were stunned when monetization got pulled on their videos because they thought they were going after "free money" - produce whatever the hell you want, ask YouTube to stick ads on it and reap the rewards.

      Well, the "adpocalypse" happened and "content creators" were no longer isolated from the fact that they only make money when there are advertisers willing to advertise on their videos. No longer did clicking "monetize" mean easy money - advertisers were very cautious about what content their ads appear with, and are really quick if they see their ad on something they disagree with. And face it - advertisers have the thinnest skins around - they're deathly afraid of offending someone, anyone. Unfortunately, a lot of YouTube "shock jocks" found that out the hard way.

    10. Re:Who? by Rockoon · · Score: 1

      Unless Crowder is also streaming elsewhere, he doesnt get more views than CNN.

      Joe Rogan does tho, and that just on YouTube numbers, and he also streams elsewhere. Significantly bigger than all the CNN talking heads combined.

      On the subject of Crowder, I think he has found a good way to monetize while being demonetized. His Mug Club seems to be paying for half a dozen employees. I find that incredible.

      --
      "His name was James Damore."
    11. Re:Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not him but: what I've observed is a number of video bods who don't offer any great amount of creativity but have managed to attain fairly extensive cash value by being popular. Why does a privately funded company need to offer infrastructure to these people?

    12. Re: Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Their problem was forcing the app on phones or use an MSE compatible web browser. YouTube doesn't need either to work. Linking a Vidme video to Reddit or Twitter doesn't embed properly at all. Playback fails on phones.

    13. Re:Who? by morethanapapercert · · Score: 2
      Thanks for your post. You made some good points there. As for as the surprised Youtubers, I have little sympathy. You go into business with someone, providing content which they then pay you for is just that, a business. If you don't understand how that business works and why it works that way, then you really don't have the moral high ground when that business has to change. No matter what field of human endeavour, ignorance is expensive.

      As for thin-skinned advertisers, I can understand why they are that way, especially these days with the much faster process of outrage, disseminated knowledge and organized protests. One politically tone deaf ad can cost big companies huge sums of money after all. It used to be that, if an ad on TV, radio or print put the corporate foot in its mouth, the company and/or ad agency could get the spot pulled and it would fairly quickly fade from public awareness. They could also run a risky ad in a isolated market as a test. But now, an ad is instantly seen by millions of people all over the world and mistakes get quickly recorded and uploaded to numerous forums, video hosting sites and so on. The corporate gaffe may still fade from the public awareness, but only if it doesn't go viral. A negative viral ad is pretty much a marketers nightmare.

      Problem is, safe tame ads might avoid that risk, but they're also less effective at getting the public attention. Take a risk and maybe lose enormous amounts of reputation (and more importantly, money) or play it safe and risk running a totally useless campaign that has no effect on sales at all. The "shock jocks" you mention had and still have a similar problem. They need to get eyeballs on their content, they need to get those likes and subscriber numbers pumped up. Shock and sleaze sells. But if they go to far, then advertisers pull out.

      --
      I need a wheelchair van for my son. Help me get the word out. https://www.gofundme.com/wheelchair-van-for-jj
    14. Re:Who? by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but some really good channels have been impacted: Cody's Lab, AvE, EEVblog, bigclivedotcom, ElectroBOOM... all have spent time in recent episodes showing how it impacts them.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    15. Re:Who? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Considering some of these people built YouTube's platform, yes, YouTube does indeed "owe" them something, at least an explanation, or even a simple, "Hey thanks for getting us started buddy, now fuck off. We're greedy assholes."

  5. second big loss recently by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It is too bad to see vid.me shut down.

    An even bigger recent loss is the redesign of dailymotion.com. Search sucks so much that the site is no longer usable.

    1. Re: second big loss recently by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dailymotion had my NoScript freaking out with all the Google scripts it needed me to approve. No thank you. Vimeo justs constantly flags content as spam if you have any URLs in your description. BitChute is the only thing I can find as an ok alternative, even though the video quality sucks and it's full of some seriously crazy people.

  6. Who? by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Never heard of them. But a lot of people have been trying - to various levels of success to squeeze free money out of YouTube. Sorry, but YouTube owns them nothing. If you can make money on YouTube, fine, but if you don't have a business arrangement with the Googlies, don't be crying when they change up the rules...

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
  7. It's never in Google search results... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    ...whenever I search around for videos. And these are for videos that I personally uploaded and know are the only copies. YouTube videos appear in results almost instantly. DailyMotion videos usually appear after a day or two, sometimes a week. Vid.me videos never appear in results.

    I don't know if that's Google's fault or theirs, but they can't have a web business without traffic.

  8. Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous+Cashews · · Score: 1

    Eli the Computer Guy on YouTube has a series of videos on his dealing with VidMe six months ago. Hilarious stuff.

    https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=eli+the+computer+guy+vidme

    1. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow! How come you like the exact same things as creimer but yet totally aren't creimer?

    2. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous+Cashews · · Score: 0

      Eli the Computer Guy posted a new video on the death of VidMe.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb1Rhdhx7J4

    3. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      CREIMER KARMA WHORING

      MOD DOWN
      Christopher Dale Reimer, aka creimer, aka cdreimer, aka Cashews, has been properly sent to -1 purgatory due to the quality of his post.

      Don't let him escape from that -1 ghetto he dug himself!

    4. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This user is a sockpuppet of creimer. He's currently in a shitposting-furiously phase in an effort to keep his karma up so he can vote up his inane cdreimer account. Yes I know it sounds like a lot of work for something dumb but it's extremely important to him that the cdreimer account that bears his real name have it's rightful spot as #3 most respected slashdot moderator and commentator.

      Why don't you tell us about the time you referred to a mexican child bride as an "underage sweet thing"?

    5. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous+Cashews · · Score: 0

      Why don't you tell us how you can't live without creimer for three days and mucked up my comments with your bullshit comments?

    6. Re:Eli the Computer Guy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But why would you, who is totally not creimer, wonder about such a thing? Oh, and judging by your posting history, oh mysterious individual who totally isn't creimer, you're posting muck just fine by yourself.

      I've seen less shitty comments come from a clogged Weight Watchers toilet. Which of course, not being creimer, you wouldn't know anything about obesity.

  9. GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This user is a sockpuppet of creimer. He's currently in a 'shitposting furiously' phase in an effort to keep his karma up so he can vote up his inane cdreimer account. Yes I know it sounds like a lot of work for something dumb but it's important to him that the cdreimer account that bears his real name have it's rightful spot as #3 most respected slashdot moderator and commentator.

    Why don't you tell us about the time you referred to a mexican child bride as an "underage sweet thing"?

    1. Re:GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      You're a sockpuppet of creimer.

    2. Re:GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      This AC is a Pedobear Troll! Hide your chikdren and goats!

    3. Re:GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No one here has any goats and what are "chikdren"?

    4. Re:GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Slashdot is a nortious haven for goat fuckers.

    5. Re:GO AWAY CREIMER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Nortious", huh Chris? I've noticed that the more rattled you, the worse your spelling becomes.

  10. Advertisers pay more for video. by tepples · · Score: 1

    For what it's worth, I don't think trying to create popular content so as to get a slice of the advertising revenue is "free money". After all, that's what most websites try to do, does it matter if the platform is Youtube or Wordpress?

    Advertisers are willing to pay more for preroll video inventory than for text or static image inventory.

  11. Retard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "it's the content that is more important than the platform"

    No RETARD, it's the platform that's important.
    While literally anyone can put up a video website, nobody can compete with the google/facebook advertising duopoly, because nobody will get that sweet CIA venture capital funding ever again.

  12. Good riddence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What a shit hole site to begin with, filled with naive kids and child predators. Fuck them I hope they lose their shirts.

  13. Google does not care! by RhettLivingston · · Score: 1

    I couldn't find video views per month, but vid.me is apparently getting about 20 million "visits" a month. Youtube gets near 150 billion "video views" per month (nearly 5 billion / day from the billion+ unique users). 150 billion / 20 million = 7500. So, if every single visit to vid.me is resulting in a video view, they are still 1 / 7500th of Youtube's traffic. They are ranked somewhere between 2000th and 7000th in the world depending on which traffic ranking site you look at. Vid.me is nobody.

    So, yeh, why was this posted?

    And why shouldn't it be hard? I seriously doubt that there is a single Youtube video channel that could make more money if they were to abandon Youtube and set up their own site where they pay for the video storage and streaming bandwidth. The majority of sites on the internet that have any videos serve them from Youtube instead of their own site. You don't hear many complaints that they are getting ripped off.

  14. DUH by SmaryJerry · · Score: 2

    Vid.me had more ADs than the superbowl. It's basically a big advertisement site with a few videos. Not nice ads either, often the popups that claim your computer has a virus, or despite having popups blocked, still pops up ads in the background.

    1. Re:DUH by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What are these "ads" that you speak of? I haven't seen any since roughly 2002.

  15. who by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A company no one has heard of is having issues competing in a pool full of competitors, anyone see the issue here..

  16. solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The problem with Youtube is that everyone is either busy making videos or watching videos yet there is a third nefarious entity whom uses it for socializing and they need to be purged.

  17. I have a vid.me acct by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah, I actually had a vid,me account, (Some youtubers I knew were starting to put things there because of the assholes at google and there de-monitization bullshit.) I tried to subscribe to them, but not being a content creator I couldn't. Apparently they don't give a fuck about viewers who weren't also content creators--so fuck'em.