Should MS launch a Brand new youtube competitor? or buy Vimeo or Hulu

[ilabene]

Everybody's saying Vimeo, what about Dailymotion? I always thought that was kind of the "underground YouTube."

 

[4Tiles]

Bing.com/video




The reason MS doesn't do a YouTube, is YouTube is not profitable. Microsoft had a YouTube competitor, it was called Soapbox. They pulled the plug on it because it is a terrible business model. Microsoft's solution is Bing Video which is one of the most trafficked online video sites on the Internet every month. Instead of hosting the videos they let all the other companies incur the bandwidth costs and they aggregate everything right on the Bing website.

I am a fan of the idea of Microsoft purchasing Netflix because there is a business model there at least.

 

[Keith Wallace]

Oh God, I think MSfans are worse than Fandroids or iSheep.
Windows Phone7 was not a success, no matter how much you wish it to be.
Windows Phone 8, as good as it is, still has to penetrate the market.
In my honest opinion, Microsoft should just drop the pride, make good with google and give a dozen WP8 phones to top devs in both play store and iOs app store.
If they can stimulate developer interest, we may very well have a hit with windows phone 8

What do you mean? Didn't EVERYONE who attended BUILD 2012 get a free Windows Phone AND Surface RT? I mean, there's only so much you can do to convince devs. While they could go the route of just THROWING money at the devs, those devs could easily take the money, half-ass some apps, then never give them support.

A better suggestion would be to have MS subsidize the phones and get them out there where you have a flagship like the Lumia 920 free on-contract. The other option would be to give people $15-20 of free MS Store money with a Windows Phone purchase, as that would be free money to devs as well. The devices though, I think that they were already handed out.

 

[wpstan]

I think that MS should develop their own Utube app...why not..they have their own search engine so why not make their own Utube..they have the resources..I say go for it

 

[Coreldan]

The only Google service I use anymore is YouTube. I dont see why MS would need to compete with that, would most likely be too hard for no gain.

I used all Google services before, but switched all I could to MS services when I got a Windows Phone and Win 8. Havnt looked back.

 

[ag1986]

Microsoft could easily replicate every Google Service out there. The problem is how to monetize it to make it pay off. Google uses Services to collect personal, private information about you that it resells to advertisers and profilers. Every new service from Google that you use provides it valuable information about you that it can further use to flesh out your personal profile. It can target you with ads, sell information about you to private investigators or government agencies, sell information about you to banks or other companies who want to know your personal information, etc.

If you start with Gmail and e-mail your significant other, Google can scan through each e-mail and determine your age, marital status and sexual orientation. Your bank statements mailed back will tell them that you have a Premier Account with JP Morgan Chase and are probably a holder of some significant assets. If you use Chrome to log on to your bank's site, they can scrape and report back your balance and other data, as well as your browsing habits. If you do a search for "Citibank Citigold," that can tell them that you're considering switching banks.

Then, they can go to banks who want your business and say "hey, here is Joe. He's a gay guy in a domestic partnership with someone who lives 800 miles away. He frequently flies back and forth to see his partner, and has a Chase Premier Bank account with $120,000 in combined balances. He's interested in switching banks, and wants an account that is easier to access in Missouri, as well as has an affiliation with American Airlines, his preferred airline. Citibank, you offer just such an account. Will you pay us $50 for Joe's information and the ability to access him?"

It's a profitable business that more than covers the cost of the services.

Microsoft lacks that business model. The way they make money is by less-targeted banner ads, and through sales of Windows, Office, other software, and services. They'd have to work out a business model that links expensive server farms for a YouTube competitor to sales of software, devices or services. A bit tougher.

Wow, that is by far the largest amount of poorly-informed FUD I've ever read. Google does not sell your data to anyone. Citibank could, for example, come to Google and say hey, we want to target anyone who's searching for Citigold or who is browsing sites that talk about Citigold. In the first case, ads are just shown when you search for Citigold on Google.com and in the second, when you're on sites that talk about it. Neither of these means that Citibank finds out anything about you. In the case of Gmail ads, the Adsense system treats your Gmail page like any other site and shows ads based on the content of the mail you're reading - the nature of the interface means that Adsense doesn't know where the data is coming from. Text gets sent to Adsense just like any other site text, adsense says hey, this matches Advertiser X's keywords, please show this ad and Gmail does so. Gmail is just another publisher as far as the Adsense system is concerned.

I'm an Adwords/Adcenter professional and Google's Adwords targeting options are almost identical to those found in Bing Adcenter - this would indicate that both of them collect the same data on users, no? Furthermore, it would be business suicide for Google to sell data in the manner you postulate - where would be the need for banks/whatever to come back and keep paying? If you want an example of a true privacy nightmare, Facebook is your bunny.

 

[Florin Anghel]

Hey people, that only think US exists on this planet, you do realize that Hulu and Netflix is not an international video service? It's only for US, and for MS to compete with Google they have to offer the same service worldwide, which Google does with Youtube. That leaves only Vimeo but MS won't take it, because Vimeo is set for something else, not for clips like on youtube. In order to make an analogy between youtube and vimeo I would say that youtube equals cinema and vimeo equal theatre, they both offer a similar show but you don't get the same feel, it depends by your taste.
MS should launch in Xbox Videos an online public video service and in the same time the chance to rent/buy movies through this service. But! IT should not be like Xbox Music, they have to recode everything from ground up, their Xbox eco-system that is newly created lacks stability.

 

[Jaskys]

Fighting youtube ?
No way, it's too big no way to beat it....

 

[despertador]

No, that would be a waste of time and resources. Although Microsoft still can make an awesome video service, not much people would really care about uploading there. YouTube has way too much videos there for people to even think about checking out the alternatives. They should just focus on what they already have, and make it better!

 

[ilabene]

I'm confused as to even why people are suggesting Netflix and Hulu. They're nothing like YouTube. That's why, DailyMotion!

 

[Jason Ward]

Hi.If at all possible I think it would be great for MS to buy Vimeo. Its something I've also thought about. For Microsoft to have it's own Video creation and sharing service would lessen the dependence of those within the MS ecosystems dependence on Google's product.
If some sort of incentive could be presented to Youtube channels hosts(particularly big name hosts with large subscriber numbers) to upload thier videos to Vimeo as well as to Youtube, which is relatively easy process in itself, specific Youtube content would make it to MS ecosystem and other tubers may also follow.
I of course don't know all the logistics involved but if I were working at MS this is a play I'd consider.

 

[paulm187]

Youtube is to video what Google is to search. If MS buys or starts a competitor they will never beat but another Bing service, good enough but in a distant second place. They should have bought Youtube or at least ramped up their own offerings much earlier. I don't think it will be a good move, just money wasted. Its too late now.

 

[mjrtoo]

Youtube is to video what Google is to search. If MS buys or starts a competitor they will never beat but another Bing service, good enough but in a distant second place. They should have bought Youtube or at least ramped up their own offerings much earlier. I don't think it will be a good move, just money wasted. Its too late now.

Geez, everyone might as well just give up and go with the status quo. Never innovate anything ever again....

 

[paulm187]

Geez, everyone might as well just give up and go with the status quo. Never innovate anything ever again....

Its also about evaluating where the best returns will be. Contrary to popular belief Microsoft are not a bottomless money pit and their share holders would like to see a return on their investments. There is a case for Bing but I don't think there is a case for a Youtube competitor. If there will be one, it has to be so much better that people will be compelled to move but that is easier said than done. What will be MS business model if they wish to make money from this new video service? Their ad services needs to vastly improve to compete with Google. Or will they make it free? so who pays the bills? I do see an argument to your point, but right now there are other areas, like getting WP where the money can be invested.

 

[Coreldan]

I think it would be another "chicken or egg" dilemma again. Even if MS video service was vastly better, people wouldn't move there cos their favourite videomakers arn't there and the favourite video makers won't move there cos their fans arn't there.

It's just like trying to make up a new social network out of nowhere while there's another superpopular one. Yes, sometimes, somewhat unexplainedly, a shift happens and people move but it's very hard to be sure of that or control it in any way. Despite Google's best attempts at forcing Google+ down people's throats, it still sucks and nobody actually uses it

 

[Pivotgeeks]

Just an idea, vimeo is manly for flim and Animation vids.. so maybe MS should up there "Move maker" to attest match little bit with industry slandered software like adobe premiere etc, and find a way to integrate Vimeo with it.. in same ways to help film maker,.. and vimeo is far better than youtube, in every way only thing it lacks is users, which is fine.. coz half of the internet user are haters anyway, and vimeo don't need that.

 

[Jason Ward]

I agree that Microsoft, even with the purchase of the likes of Vimeo(if either party is even willing) would be a distant second but a distant second is better than an absolute absence.
Bing's presence as first a decision engine and now a search engine has positioned Microsoft not to be totally dependent on Google for search, provides them with ad revenue not otherwise accessible, data collection on users online behaviors, integration of search with social networking, linking data with users of Microsoft's services across a broader scope as they use search connected with social , thus providing data collection/tracking opportunities for context computing, and a host of other things beyond search, so a distant second yes but being number one isn't required for the wider breath of their goals. Bing, the distant second is also the default search engine for Siri, on tens of millions of iPhone.

So having a broad suite of services, especially as computing makes its way to the cloud as a norm, Microsoft's new Office Online branding is good positioning of thier productivity services, Xbox music should be positioned right beside it as part of thier breath of services and if they could buy Vimeo, a video creation service would help to round off its offerings. Vimeo already has a thriving user base, so if it could be acquired, MS would not be starting from scratch. And again they can present an incentive to YouTube content creators to create a channel on Vimeo, "Increase your online footprint, the hard part is done, you've created the content, share on Vimeo and reach our 100 million unique monthly visitors and our 22million subscribers". Once the content is created its a breeze uploading to another service, the hard parts done. Anyway, I don't even know if either party is willing, but to have that based covered in Microsofts ecosystem would at least decrease users reliance on Youtube,Google, especially if some of the Youtuble content, even a percentage, is added to the already rich vimeo content.
Being a part of Microsoft's ecosystem, packaged and presented with their Online services, presented as their video creating services packaged in Windows, on Windows Phones and Xbox would also put Vimeo in front of millions of people in a way that it is not presented before the market now. I say they should make a play for it.

 

[Jason Ward]

Video makers don't necessarily have to "move" there, they can belong to both Youtube and Vimeo, like people belong to Instagram, Tumblr, and Facebook. Create content once, share on each.
If MS buys Vimeo, Content creators can remain on Youtube, create a Vimeo account and share the same content there, increasing thier online footprint. Vimeo has 100million unique visitors and 22million subscribers,(as of Dec 2013) that's a large audience.

 

[HeavyHanded]

Buy Vimeo and integrate it into everything they got.

 

[wtrmlnjuc]

No, YouTube is a service and a livelihood. Launching a competitor against YouTube, no matter how good it is, will not succeed.