Joost builds program list but no threat to YouTube

Stan Beer
Saturday, 03 March 2007 08:30

Opinion and Analysis

The news that online TV platform Joost is to add more programs to its growing inventory of TV shows with international TV program distributor JumpTV has the media buzzing with speculation of its growing threat to YouTube. However, after only a brief play with Joost, it will soon become obvious why there is no threat to YouTube because YouTube and Joost are very different beasts.

There is little doubt that Joost is going to become a very popular Internet destination for TV show viewers. However, comparing the new creation of Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom to YouTube is like comparing a white pointer shark to a fresh water crocodile. They are both dangerous water dwelling carnivores but they don't really inhabit the same space, they don't compete for the same prey and they don't feed off each other.

Quite simply, Joost is global TV on the Internet and, thus, will become a competitor to local cable and free-to-air TV providers. There is no interactivity involved, there is no uploading of video content, there is no social networking component. Current TV providers, however, must be quaking in their boots because Joost is global and it will enable Internet consumers to pull down their content at a time and place of their choosing.

It is true that a significant percentage of YouTube users, are using the site to watch illegally uploaded TV shows. They are prepared to sacrifice the sub-standard quality of video that the site provides because they can't wait to see the next yet to be released episode of Lost or Heroes. The video quality that Joost serves up is not HDTV but it's certainly much better than YouTube.

However, anecdotal evidence suggests that the vast majority of YouTube browsers are using the service to watch short clips rather than TV shows. Much of the content has been uploaded by users themselves with the intention of reaching an audience of like-minded YouTube users. It provides the ability for users to interact with each other with posted comments. It allows them to post and search for rare, hard to find, video clips. This is not TV; it's social networking.

The popularity of YouTube has been explosive because in the entertainment space it is a killer app. It is not a competitor to TV but an entirely new form of video-based interactive entertainment and information distribution. Its popularity is not going to wane because it has created a paradigm shift in Internet use.

Joost in its own way has the potential of becoming as popular as YouTube because as it gathers content from the traditional TV content providers it could easily be a disruptive force to the current batch of content distributors. The reason Joost is able to sign deals with the likes of Viacom is that it will enable content providers to sell their content in the same way as they do to TV networks.

However, content providers will still be forced to do deals with YouTube because its plethora of social networkers will not leave the site permanently to watch TV shows on Joost. YouTube simply has too big an audience to ignore. Many YouTube users will, however, use Joost to watch TV instead of switching on their TV set.

Incidentally, before Joost can really make its mark, it will have to overcome bandwidth issues. If the beta  version is anything to go by, even premium level cable Internet services will have problems coping with the load.