
Netflix’s biggest competition isn’t sleep, it’s YouTube - throwaway255
https://venturebeat.com/2018/12/09/netflixs-biggest-competition-isnt-sleep-its-youtube/
======
quxbar
I've quickly become addicted to longform (10+ minute) nonfiction youtube
videos, whether it be a comprehensive analysis of Neverwinter Nights or 24
minutes on the advanced features of the laserdisc. Most, if not all of the
content creators have Patreon pages, and I even contribute to a few. The
content is so niche it's unimaginable that Netflix or any other content
behemoth would develop their own version of it.

~~~
s0l1dsnak3123
I'm exactly the same. Some favourites I've collected over the years:

3Blue1Brown - math essays

AlfieAesthetics - Bushcraft, botany and survival skills with some fun english
humour mixed in

CNLohr - fun hardware hacking livestreams

Eliminator Performance - mechanical troubleshooting and maintenance vlogs

Engineering Explained - Automotive engineering explainers and mini-lectures

FearlessFront - Mechanical engineering, welding, and vehicle hacking

How to make everything - multi-skill projects on making things from scratch as
much as possible

Kurzgesagt - Philosophy and science essays

Lie Likes Music - Music essays

Mathologer - Advanced (to me) Maths essays

Matthew Cremona - Woodworking

Matthias Wandel - Woodworking

Nativlang - Essays on the history of spoken and written language

Nerdwriter1 - Essays on Art, philosophy, and the sciences

Nightmare Masterclass - Essays on fringe culture

Numberphile - Mini-lectures on Maths

Polyphonic - Essays on Music

Primitive Technology - Vlogs on primative/ancient building techniques

Rick Beato (specifically his "What makes this song great" series) - Essays on
what separates iconic music from the rest

Strange Parts - Hardware hacking projects, mainly based in Shenzhen, China

The Drug Classroom - Scientific essays on recreational drugs

This Exists - Essays on cultural oddities and internet culture specficially

Uri Tuchman - Very intricate woodworking and engraving Wendover Productions -
Video Essays on a variety of subjects including economics, travel, geography

Wisecrack - Essays which examine pop culture through a philosophical lens.

~~~
Balgair
Alec Steele - A hyperactive Brit makes swords in Montana

Invitica - essays on ancient civilizations

Wintergarten - a Swede in France making a musical marble machine to
millisecond precision. Good project management tips are included.

Man At Arms ReForged - Baltimore swordsmiths make ridiculous videogame sized
swords that are mostly unusable.

EDIT: A few others

Bon Appetite's "Brad Makes": A New Jerseyian mumbles his way through
fermenting anything edible. Frequent field trips ensue.

Kiwami Japan: A very very strange Japanese man makes the same knife, over and
over, from various materials such as jello, underwear, and pasta. ASMRy.

Primitive Technology: The journey of a mute, nearly naked QLD programmer in
the forest and his attempts to make a nuclear reactor from local mud. Turn on
English subtitles.

Contrapoints: A trans PhD dropout comments on current issues through the lens
of grad-level philosophy and copious innuendo. Impeccable set design and
pacing.

~~~
mrguyorama
You can't mention Brad from Bon Appetite and not mention "Half-sour Saffitz"!
She recently got brought back onto the team to continue her "Professional chef
makes oreos/twizzlers/twinkies etc" videos.

~~~
s0l1dsnak3123
Yes! Brad's "it's alive" and Claire's "Gourmet makes" are both great. I
started making Kombucha and Sauerkraut because of Brad's video on the subject.
Giardiniera next!

~~~
jetru
OMG, they're my favourite youtube people. So, much, joy.

------
S_A_P
I don't necessarily agree with this. If I want to watch well produced online
content, I do not think Youtube.com. I do think that Netflix and amazon Prime
video have "traditional" studio created content that has high production
value. That said, I watch youtube and Netflix almost equally, but for
different reasons.

Youtube is great for short videos, interviews and niche interest. IF I want to
watch scripted drama like NARCOS, I can't find anything close to that on
Youtube. At this point, I dont think that they are competitors. The content is
not even close to being equal. Im not even saying one is better or worse, they
just are too different to call them competition.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _If I want to watch well produced online content, I do not think
> Youtube.com_

I do. _Historia Civilis_ is presently my favourite channel. Production quality
is nothing to write home about, but the quality is fantastic. Moreover, I
don’t walk away feeling like I crapped away thirty minutes—I learned
something.

~~~
nindalf
There’s two things I adore about Historia Civilis. One is the way he
represents terrain and units on a battle field in battle related episodes. It
might not look fancy but it gets the job done. Normally I struggle to imagine
unfamiliar terrain so this helps a lot. The second is he passes the Gell-Mann
test for me. There are certain sections in history I know really well because
I’ve read multiple books on it and he gets those absolutely right. So when I
watch an episode on an era I’m unfamiliar with, I’m confident he’s done his
due diligence.

~~~
Scriptor
What do you mean by the "Gell Mann" test?

~~~
sah2ed
The quality of a news source passing a simple test of credibility by
presenting an accurate account of a topic the reader is deeply familiar with.

For instance, if you are a Computer Scientist and you find yourself agreeing
to a layman explanation of the halting problem while reading a NYTimes article
(targeting a general audience) then the article passes the Gell-Mann test.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gell-
Mann_amnesia_effect](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gell-Mann_amnesia_effect)

------
whizzkid
> “I think one of the main reasons YouTube is so successful in emerging
> markets is that it is more mobile-centric." explains Michael Goodman,
> Director of Television & Media Strategies at research firm Strategy
> Analytics

I think he can be wrong here. It is because it is free my friend. People
already pay enough for their phones, internet packages in emerging markets
comparing to their monthly salaries. As soon as their income increases, you
will be able to see a hike in subscriptions.

~~~
josteink
> As soon as their income increases, you will be able to see a hike in
> subscriptions.

But that would be youtube pro subscriptions, right?

Because they already have all the content they watch there, and just want
offline or ad-free.

Disclaimer: ditched Netflix, bought YouTube pro.

~~~
whizzkid
I think, It depends. As far as I know YouTube Premium is only for removing ads
and music streaming. If there are movies and quality professional content on
YouTube Premium, then Youtube will have a bigger advantage since both amateur
and professional content creators will be on the same platform. But right now,
Netflix is the place to watch most of the desired pro content when it comes to
both films and tv series.

~~~
kkarakk
youtube is rolling out a program where you can pay your favorite creator
directly(it's a sponsor button next to subscribe)

------
gwbas1c
I'll be honest: I probably watch more Youtube than Netflix. But, and this is a
big but: I'll continue paying for Netflix long after I stop paying for
Youtube.

Why? Netflix is quality content that I watch when I plan on sitting in front
of the TV. In contrast, I only watch Youtube for a few minutes here and there.

A different analogy is live TV versus a DVD. Youtube is more like live TV:
lower-quality, news, commentary, interactive. Netflix is well-produced
narratives.

~~~
random878
I don't pay for either, but I'd also add:

Netflix has a threshold level of quality. There's probably plenty on there I
wouldn't want to watch, but nothing that I'd deem offensively bad.

YouTube, however, I find to be increasingly toxic. There is some amazing
content on YouTube, which is often superior to traditional media, but I find I
need to wade through increasing levels of garbage to get to it.

~~~
theWheez
As a platform, YouTube's incentives don't serve the user as well as they
could.

A prime example was a video with millions of views on a very popular channel
about 9/11 conspiracies. Did the YouTuber believe them? No. But cranking out a
10m+ video every day is more important than what he believes.

Then you look at high quality channels who put out a video once a week, or
even month, and they are forced to rely on Patreon (which is a great
platform!).

Not sure what the solution to this would be, but I feel similarly on the
wading through garbage to get to the good stuff.

~~~
random878
I completely agree.

There's stuff on YouTube that I just can't see existing, or getting noticed,
on alternative platforms. A great example would be a channel called 'Primitive
Technology'[1]. It's superb, and I really enjoy each video despite having no
real interest in the subject!

But, this is 0.01% of YouTube. The rest is horrendous political videos pitched
at the level of 4chan, vloggers aimed at 13 year olds, and millions of shaky
footage of unboxing items.

I wouldn't mind so much if there was a suitable way to curate a decent feed
(without signing in and giving my life history to google). I generally only
find out about the decent content on YouTube via word of mouth off-platform.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA/vid...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA/videos)

------
godelski
I think both would do better if they actually recommended me something I
wanted to watch.

Like why doesn't YouTube put on the front page a user's new video who I'm
subscribed to (Applied Science), pressed the dumb bell icon, and have watched
literally every video of (which are always over 10 minutes)? I can't think of
any more clear indication of "I want this" than that.

Netflix does similar things. Pushing their own content. The difference is that
YouTube actually has more content that I want to watch.

~~~
mod
My YouTube homepage is about 75% stuff I want to watch or that comes from
subscribers I usually want to watch.

It’s badically exactly what you just said you wished for.

I’m not sure why your experience is different from mine.

~~~
godelski
Huh, I wonder what causes that. Because I'll watch some of the political
comedians (like Trevor Noah and others) and then that takes over my feed for a
few days.

I do like viewing new content, but it seems like the algorithm encourages
showing stuff I'm not subscribed to (like the above comedies) as opposed to
stuff I am subscribed to. I also frequently get suggested videos I've seen
before. Like even the same day. And I do have history enabled.

~~~
tk75x
Try checking out the subscriptions tab on their mobile app.

~~~
godelski
That does show me only stuff I've subscribed to. What I'm asking for is mostly
what exists, but when something I've subscribed to posts new content, _put
that on the home page so I can 't miss it_

------
alecco
And they both suck.

Netflix content is weak. The catalog outside US is terrible.

YouTube ads are annoying yet original content is not worth the price for
Premium. At a price point of $12 it's ridiculous. Music catalog is sub-par and
not worth the switch from Spotify.

Both seem to be more dedicated to push PC propaganda than matching what
viewers want. Original content is quite bad save for some exceptions (Wild
Wild Country, Cobra Kai).

Months ago I canceled my Netflix account and hope some alternative site to
YouTube comes up.

On the other hand, it was good for me. I've been listening to more audiobooks
instead. Money better spent.

~~~
sametmax
I'm just amazed somebody can come to this conclusion.

20 years ago you had to go to the shop, buy ONE film for $15 from a limited
shelve, bring it back home, put it in a device you bought specifically for
that film format and that does only that, navigate through a dubious UI, be
forced to watch ads, then eventually get to the film. If you didn't like it...
too bad.

Now for the same price, you have access to thousand of movies __and__ TV
shows. No ads. Instant watching. Most of them were release on TV or on theater
so basically same quality than other channels.

And people complain ?

I mean I do think the general level of quality of movies and TV shows is going
down, but it has nothing to do with netflix. The good/sucks ratio is
plummeting much the same on every medium (and I think it's because of us
voting for crap with our money, like for most things in our society).

Well, I guess it's beautiful some people arrived at such a level of comfort in
their life that they consider that amazing commercial offer to be not up to
their standard.

> PC propaganda

While their original content do try to target specific niches including PC and
SJW trends (it makes sense IMO), there are plenty of excellent content on
netflix that don't follow this trend. Just opening my front page: Ajin, Rick
and Morty, black mirror, battle royal, altered carbon, lastman, dirk gently,
breaking bad, american beauty, pulp fiction, drive, trainspotting, house of
cards, david chapelle, mad max furry road...

Yes, things like Sabrina, disenchantmenent, etc are pandering to a certain
crowd. So what ? You can just click on something else. There is a lot of
something else.

~~~
romanovcode
Did you try to use Netflix outside of U.S.? It's pathetic.

~~~
sametmax
I'm french, we have one of the weakest offer in the netflix world. It's still
way, way more content I could (sanely) consume in my entire life.

I think the problem comes from something else.

Regularly I watch movies with friends: they can't appreciate many good movies
anymore. They need fast attention catching stuff. Otherwise they get bored,
they loose focus (even watch their phone), and it snowballs since they miss
pieces of the movie used to construct it that eventually gives it life.

I see plenty of netflix watchers that do it on the side, while browsing the
web, in the background of a social activity, or even watching another movie
(!).

You cannot taste "Scott Pilgrim", "The Shawshank redemption", "12 monkeys",
"Forest Gump", "Pain and Gain" and "Life is beautiful" if you watch them the
way you gulp "Rogue 1", get drunk on "Avengers" or skim "Transformers". Just
like you don't eat a burger and osters the same way if you want to enjoy both
of them.

In fact, you can't appreciate anything special that way. The problem here is
not netflix. It's that the way many people consume things now will always
leave them unsatisfied.

Also, there is a quantity effect. You can now watch more than you should, and
many do. But it will make you numb.

And to finish on a more positive note, the fact we have watched so many things
now also educated us more to what's quality and what is not. It's fair we have
now higher expectations.

~~~
cableshaft
There was always ways to consume things on the side. I remember way before
Netflix (around 2003) I went through a phase of about six months where every
day I would come home from work, put a playlist of Mr. Show on my computer (a
single TV show that only had 30 episodes), and play Dynasty Warriors 3 for 2
to 3 hours. I probably rewatched Mr. Show at least 10 times in that six
months.

And after the first time I mostly didn't look at it anymore, it was just the
audio I chose to play while I was playing the game, and since I'd already seen
the whole series, it was predictable and didn't distract too much from the
game playing.

I don't find watching TV to be that virtuous, and usually when I'm doing it
I'm feeling guilty for not doing other things. So yeah, I'll do that as a
'side thing' and not feel too bad about it.

However, it's gotten more difficult than it used to be, as I used to think
that TV wasn't too good and was an easy to skip medium, now I think there's
just waaaay too much good stuff, I just have to actively choose not to watch
it (like so far I've managed not to watch any Marvel TV shows on Netflix, but
it's always there tempting me).

It's also usually the only leisure activity we can do together in the evenings
during the week that my girlfriend feels like doing, so that's how I keep up
with Game of Thrones, West World, Silicon Valley, Doctor Who, and whatnot. But
I might be designing something on the computer while we're watching them.

I wish it were easier to write with TV on in the background though. I'm
getting way, way behind on that.

------
fouc
Does anyone ever feel irritated by "amateur" produced videos that approach the
quality of professional studios? Sometimes it's distracting when there's too
much work done on the video, and you can tell there's additional people
helping out behind the camera and you never get to see them as part of the
video.

Basically amateur/gonzo level videos feel more truthful than the highly edited
videos.

~~~
aequitas
Do you have any examples of this? I have never noticed this so far, the "crew"
is always in the video or am just not watching those videos?

~~~
kkarakk
any youtuber who averages 100k views per video with more than one video a week
probably either has a video editor or dark circles under their eyes.

a lot of them have camera men/audio guys and a personal assistant to keep
track of their schedule if they're the jetsetting type

amateur youtube only exists <30k views + maybe 1 video in a week

~~~
detaro
I don't think those numbers can only be reached with helpers.

How much effort camera/editing is really depends on the genre. E.g. for gaming
channels, camera work basically doesn't exist, so it's "just" editing (which
again highly depends on the style). At the lower level of "professional
YouTuber", having to pay someone else vs doing it yourself would also make
quite a difference for making the financials work out or not. Actually, I'd
guess in gaming the most common external help would be a chat moderator for
live streams.

------
puranjay
I have very different expectations from YouTube than I have from Netflix, and
my viewership patterns are very clear.

If I have 20 minutes to kill, I'll follow some food vlogger on YouTube.

If I have more time, I'll opt for something that requires "deep" engagement
like Narcos

But I'll admit that there are times I wish Netflix had a stronger library of
shows I can watch without thinking too much about them. Like The Office, but
original to Netflix

~~~
slantyyz
>> If I have 20 minutes to kill, I'll follow some food vlogger on YouTube.

There's a lot of time waster content on Netflix now compared to before. They
have a bunch of 20-30m reality TV shows (some of which are pretty good), and
they have some even shorter form content as well (for example, Mike Tyson
Mysteries).

------
thom
I watch a fair bit of YouTube personal interest stuff (Magic: the Gathering
and Chess channels). Same to a lesser extent with Twitch. I realised while
reading this that I don't think I've ever sat down and watched YouTube with my
wife. I watch a lot of Netflix stuff with my wife, and it's the only video
platform I let my kids have access to. Beyond that, I torrent stuff
generously.

In my head, I'd probably reflexively claim that I'd never pay for YouTube, but
then I'd realise I'm paying almost as much on Patreon to _one_ video creator
as I am to Netflix each month.

I must admit I've managed to get to this point without ever really thinking
these things competed - YouTube is quite personal, Netflix is good for family,
and you have to torrent if you want to watch anything new.

------
ryanmercer
I used to watch 3-4 hours of Netflix every evening, then I started actually
subscribing to YouTube channels and now I have 2ish hours of subscription
content to watch every single day of the week. n=1 but I don't doubt it! I
even contribute to several via Patreon.

------
szastupov
I dunno, YouTube's catalog of originals is so tiny it can be watched during
free trial. Even if Netflix catalog is smaller outside US it's still huge,
originals are great and I'm willing to pay for it.

------
mohi13
I get disgusted by thinking why does Netflix want people to not sleep. Why
auto-play in 5 sec? Isn't this morally wrong, like dangling cocaine in front
of a drug addict.

I agree that people have free will but designing products so that people waste
days just watching TV is very very sad IMHO.

~~~
mschuster91
> I get disgusted by thinking why does Netflix want people to not sleep. Why
> auto-play in 5 sec?

It's like linear TV. No one complains about the "non-stop" aspect there.

~~~
lloeki
Well I do, that's part of why I stopped watching broadcasts altogether.

The autoplay-next-thing can be disabled in the settings though, although it'll
still auto-play a trailer after 15s if you complete a movie or whole series,
which I loathe since it's a real mood killer after movies (I very much enjoy
chilling or discussing while credits roll).

~~~
mschuster91
> that's part of why I stopped watching broadcasts altogether.

For me it was not because of linear programming, but because the ads became
ever more obnoxious and interrupting - first it was simple ad blocks. 5min,
nice, take a pee. Then the stations increased the loudness of ad spots, well
fuck your ears if you decided to not take a pee. Then stations started putting
layers of ads above the content and the last fad before I decided to tv-exit
was that stations PiP-ed the content right in the middle of action scenes or
whatnot - at 25% of screen estate, and the rest 75% was ads. Also, quality of
content that was not US cinema radically decreased - Germans who know the
Galileo of pre-2000 know what I mean... it's all about the TV form of
clickbait, aka "eyeball-baiting", now.

------
thewhitetulip
I hardly think so. Youtube is a casual Netflix. Unless YouTube comes up with
epic tv shows it won't be a serious competitor to Netflix.

But that being said, Youtube is a den of self made videos like Honest
Trailers, how it should have ended.

Also sleep can't be a competitor. It is a bad thing if your product is so
addictive that people go crazy over it. This is the reaosn why most apps these
days let users track their times spent on the app. Because if people are
severely addicted, they will not stay addicted for the rest od their lives.
They will dump the site. I did the same to Prime, facebook and Instagram.

~~~
philliphaydon
Cobra kai and impulse were pretty good. But YouTube said they will be
investing less in original content recently so I don’t know what will happen
with good content like this...

Netflix on the other hand every time I think I’ll cancel, comes out with a
bunch of new shows to watch and I seem to enjoy.

------
Shorel
I would watch Youtube a lot more if the ads did not interrupt the video in the
worst places.

I mean, there are places where there is a scene transition and they are
perfect for an ad. And there's the middle of an interesting explanation you
don't want to interrupt.

Youtube ads always interrupt the flow of the video. In many cases that makes
me close the player and do something else.

And many channels already have ads as part of their normal content.

It seems Youtube has the content, but the huge and obnoxious amount of ads
reminds me of old fashioned TV.

~~~
mrep
Well they do have a paid version which doesn't have ads.

~~~
Shorel
That only applies to the ads from Google, not from content creators
themselves.

And it is three times more expensive than Netflix where I live.

I don't see the value proposition there.

~~~
spookthesunset
> not from content creators themselves

They gotta eat too, you know. Some of the channels I watch cost real cash-
money for the creators to produce.

~~~
Shorel
> They gotta eat too, you know. Some of the channels I watch cost real cash-
> money for the creators to produce.

I can see that. But this means Google model doesn't work for content consumers
like me, and it also doesn't work for content creators.

------
petercooper
I watch YouTube a lot compared to any other TV or entertainment. Both TV and
Netflix seem to have got obsessed over the idea of the "box set".. dragging a
story out to 20 hours+ when I'd rather just get a novel story in a short time
and then move on to something else. I just haven't got the time for most shows
Netflix considers good nowadays when I can watch lots of 10 minute videos that
are more entertaining in a variety of ways.

------
mymythisisthis
Youtube is KING! Even if 99.9999% of the content sucks you still have
thousands of great videos. Like
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBmnQN78aZU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBmnQN78aZU)
Matthias Wandel.

Scripted shows are terrible. Movies are terrible. Edufun is where it is at.

I think that we need more people compiling the best of videos on Youtube.

~~~
spookthesunset
Sad you get downvoted. I too think YouTube is the future of content
consumption. I am perpetually amazed how much reasonably high quality stuff
exists on youtube. Damn near 100% of the screen time I have control over is
youtube videos. If I was single and living alone, all I would need is youtube.

------
jason46
I prefer Netflix, unless I need to see a HowTo or a product review. My 6yr old
daughter prefers anything on Youtube over Netflix. We also had cable which she
wouldn't hardly watch at all so we returned her cable box.

------
suddenstutter
Youtube is not even close to being a netflix competitor.

------
Inetgate
It seems there is a typo in subject. Current title is "Netflix’s biggest
competition isn’t sleep — it’s YouTube"

~~~
nicky0
Are you referring to the replacement of the hyphen with a comma?

------
En_gr_Student
Maybe the things I sent to Apple, so they could start cutting into YouTube
should also be sent to Netflix? :D

------
rasz
Sleep? more like Twitch.

------
keyboardmowing
Yeah I don’t think the modern minute-by-minute generation who live on their
phones are interested in dedicating an entire hour or two _per show_. Even
Youtube with its 10-min videos seem long now. Netflix might need to create
some ‘microshows’ to keep the younger generation’s attention.

~~~
gammateam
One of youtube’s greatest value adds for me is the competition to convey a
point quickly.

For the past 10 years I’ve found advanced topics explained extremely well in 3
minutes for free, much better than a university professor ever could. The
incentive models are not competitive fast enough in Academia

Imagine if Netflix had this kind of content, possible subsidized for high
quality

