
Apply HN: lumiverse – the best place to discover educational videos - rayalez
<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;lumiverse.io" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;lumiverse.io</a><p>I want lumiverse to become the perfect place for people to publish, discover and discuss great educational videos. I want to build a friendly and intelligent community, make it easy for video creators to find an audience, and make it easy for viewers to discover awesome videos.<p>In the future, I want to expand into other types of content(starting with tutorials, art, short films, and comedy), and create the most awesome platform for hosting and selling high quality video series.<p>lumiverse will become to youtube what hacker news is to reddit.
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ajsgarage
This is a practical idea. With capital I think you might even be able to
recruit existing talent (video series on YouTube or specific person/team who
makes them) to help consolidate the utility. I've seen first hand how
educators of different levels strive to find good, usable content online in a
variety of subjects. The hard sciences is of particular interest.

Related idea(s) for revenue: Purchase of 'supplemental' course materials
(PowerPoints?) and/or "asset packages" that bundle relevant, high-quality
graphics for educators to use in their own classrooms.

The layout is straightforward and I appreciate the tags for the type
(Tutorial, Math, Chemistry). Feels just slightly busy but it's easy on the
eyes. Hope it goes great for you and the team!

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rayalez
Thank you very much for your feedback!

I'll think about supplemental materials, it's an interesting idea....

And I am definitely planning to create original content. I have just started
working on my own video series about rationality -
[http://lumiverse.io/series/orangemind](http://lumiverse.io/series/orangemind).
Right now I'm working on them alone, but in the future I would love to
assemble a team. And it's possible that I'll recruit other video creators as
well.

I am also very interested in producing series about hard sciences, it's one of
my major goals. I will start CS and programming, and then possibly do math and
physics. But that's a more of a long-term thing.

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christudor
I make educational content for a living, so am fundamentally quite interested
in this. A couple of questions from me...

Why would I use a platform like this when I've already got my own site which
attracts lots of users/customers?

Would the site be free to use? Would you pay the content providers? How would
you make money?

How will you maintain the quality of the videos on the site? If I'm a creator
of videos, I want to make sure they only appear alongside similarly high-
quality videos. But the higher the bar, the fewer videos you'll have on the
site. Where do you see the balance between quality and quantity?

There are /surely/ other people out there who make platforms of this kind
(right?). If so, how do you think this will be different from any of the
others already on the market?

[Note: I'm sorry if these come across as a bit blunt. Just some questions that
came to my head as I read about the site, and I typed them out quickly. If I
were a potential customer, I probably wouldn't beat around the bush with
niceties...!]

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wturner
To be contrarian...

"hosting and selling high quality video series"

As a creator coming from a business perspective I see these platforms as
mostly a liability to be avoided.

I write videos and have decided to create my own subscription site that is
coupled with other services/features. I look at Youtube as nothing more than a
free promotional tool to release sample content. Why include a middle man when
it is unnecessary ?

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rayalez
1\. lumiverse has reddit-like discovery system, so it will be a great way for
creators to be discovered, being on the front page brings you a lot of traffic
and subscribers.

2\. Building your audience on a platform is _much_ easier than building
traffic to your own website. Basically I want video creators to be able to
focus on making great videos, and not have to worry about self promotion,
monetization, and other business aspects.

3\. We will have a convenient system for selling video series, which makes it
much easier and more convenient than doing it on your own website. Users
connect their card/paypal once, and then can buy videos in one click.

4\. I want lumiverse to be generally a much better place for hosting videos
than youtube. Better interface, no nonsense ads, intelligent and friendly
community, high quality content, etc. I focus on building the perfect platform
instead of trying to manipulate people's attention. Youtube has a lot of
flaws, and it's time to make a better alternative.

6\. Not all video creators want to develop and host their own video
subscription website. It may make sense to you, but I think that most people
will prefer to use a platform, if it's really awesome and convenient.

7\. You can have both. You can sell your videos on lumiverse and on your own
website. Or you can build your audience and subscribers on lumiverse, and put
a link in the header to drive traffic to your site if you prefer.

8\. Perhaps we will have pro accounts, allowing people to buy their own
domains and create their own easily customizable websites. So if you want your
own design with some extra features/services, it might be an option. Though I
am not sure that we will go in that direction.

~~~
wturner
If I'm not your target audience then ignore these words as they might sound a
bit harsh. My primary concern in using any service like this would be how
easily I could port all content over to my own servers when ready. This
includes not just videos but user accounts, email lists , video comments,
payment system, authentication, etc. I want the freedom associated with
independence and not to feel like a tool of another business designed to make
me reliant on their platform.

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rayalez
Clickable link - [http://lumiverse.io](http://lumiverse.io)

After I've deployed the beta(couple of weeks ago), lumiverse gained 239 users,
and 105 subscribers to the mailing list of our best videos.

We already have some amazing video creators, 98k views, and people keep
joining. Feedback is great.

I am planning to monetize by allowing people to sell video series, and by
producing original content(starting with awesome educational videos about
rationality).

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kumarski
This looks cool. I think hyper-niching is important in anything related to
educational videos online.

TED talks is presentations. Udemy is lectures/courses.

Etc...

The video format is well defined for each site.

