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Consumer Consideration

5/28/2013

6 Comments

 
I wonder how much thought really goes into the decisions made by the entertainment industry's current generation of policy-makers. From where I'm sitting, the prevailing attitude seems to be, "We're doing things this way, because we said so. There's no need to consider our consumers, because we know what's best for them. They've supported us in the past, therefore we have their guaranteed support for the future. Our happiness is their happiness."

Example: Nintendo is identifying videos on YouTube that feature Nintendo-created content (e.g.: "Let's Play" videos of Mario and Zelda games) and is collecting any advertising revenue on those videos that otherwise would've gone to the video creator. All discussions of "Fair Use" aside, has Nintendo considered the ramifications of their actions?

Yes, this allows Nintendo to make a profit while protecting its intellectual property. But what happens when reviewers stop posting video reviews of Nintendo games, claiming it's not worth the effort to review something (no matter how good the game may be) when they can't make money off the video? What happens when fans whose enthusiasm for Nintendo is infectious—often inspiring their subscribers to go out and buy more Nintendo games—stop making "Let's Play" videos because they're afraid of having a copyright strike on their account? What happens to fan loyalty when Nintendo, in effect, starts stealing the ad money that allows its biggest fans to avoid working a traditional job? Is the obvious gain worth the potential loss of your fanbase? Or was that not part of the discussion to begin with?

Another example: Microsoft announced the Xbox One.

Yet another example: YouTube is forcing its users to switch to the new "One Channel" design on June 5th, citing an increased focus on content and the ability to reach a broader audience. It's telling that one of the top four autocomplete options for a Google search on the topic is, "youtube one channel sucks." I say this every time YouTube, or Facebook, or anybody at all introduces a so-called "upgrade": Make it better, not different. One Channel strips away much of the individuality of the old channel designs, introduces obnoxious new restrictions for making a channel banner that has to double as a background (depending on how you're viewing the site), and leaves little or no way to keep things THAT WORKED PERFECTLY WELL arranged as they were before. One Channel is targeted at a very specific type of YouTube user, which is great as an option when choosing how best to set up your channel for yourself and your audience. You might be the biggest game in town, YouTube, but you're not the only one—and especially with Nintendo making all those copyright claims, it's not outside the realm of possibility that gamers such as myself might find a more user-friendly site to call home.

I have to wonder whether anybody at Nintendo, Microsoft, Google, or anywhere else is thinking about the people keeping them in business as they pave the roads no one wants to drive on. And I have to wonder what kind of consumers we are to let them get away with it.
6 Comments
Tpcool link
5/28/2013 01:56:00 pm

I understand your discontent with the new channel layout (everyone on YouTube needs time to adjust to new layouts, I see that I'm probably the only happy one), but what kind of individuality did the Cosmic Panda design give, besides the background? To me, it is easier to get around and there are slightly more customization options to work with. Like I said on the Facebook page, One Channel is better just because Cosmic Panda blew so badly.

Reply
Nathaniel
5/28/2013 03:39:01 pm

"Cosmic Panda"? Is that actually what it's called!?

I wasn't thrilled about the current (soon-to-be-retired) layout to begin with; I've gotten used to it, worked around it long enough, and now it's the devil I know. It also seems I'm still partially thinking of the previous design when referring to individuality—I was thinking all the modules could be moved around yet.

At any rate, I'm most focused on how One Channel moves your "About" information to a separate tab. I think it makes sense to have all this info organized on a separate tab, but at the same time, nobody's going to click on it. The videos featured on the front page now need to do all the talking, and you don't get as much of a sense of personality from thumbnails and video titles with some people.

I'm also not fond of how this "Popular" section has seeped into the sidebar below the featured channels section. It takes away from the handpicked uniqueness of the channels the channel owner wants to share.

This isn't so much a matter of individuality as it is general organization—I like having my playlists in order, in a neat list and small enough to scroll through quickly. One Channel emphasizes the individual videos of each playlist (which is pointless for me, because they're supposed to be watched as a group), using twice the amount of vertical space to display a playlist. My scroll wheel starts to cry if I need to give more than one or two spins to get through everything, and the built-in Playlists module doesn't allow me to organize the order in which they appear.

As a standalone design, One Channel works just fine. As the next evolution of YouTube designs, it overlooks a few items that really aren't that major, but bother me more than most of the things they fixed.

Reply
Tpcool link
5/29/2013 07:05:26 am

I do agree with your dissatisfaction with the "About" section, I doubt that most people will bother to look there. I *do* however like everything else they added to that section, though: the ability to show your subscriptions and the custom link and social link section.

You can get rid of the "Popular" section actually, just hover over it and it will give you an option to disable it.

With the playlists, I haven't been having any problems. I don't have very many playlists (or very many videos within them), so I suppose I'm just not experiencing the same problems as you are.

Tpcool link
5/29/2013 07:06:35 am

Oh, and yes, the channel design before One Channel is called "Cosmic Panda." :p

SwordHMX
5/29/2013 11:19:02 am

"You might be the biggest game in town, YouTube, but you're not the only one—and especially with Nintendo making all those copyright claims, it's not outside the realm of possibility that gamers such as myself might find a more user-friendly site to call home."

Dead on! What the fall of MySpace has proven is that nobody is invincible in this business. YouTube can lose it's spot on top of the mountain frighteningly fast if they have an imperious attitude towards the people who make them great: the posters.

Reply
Nathaniel
6/7/2013 06:20:59 am

Excellent point!

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    This work by Nathaniel Hoover is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.
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