(Un retour sur) Peertube. - Mr. Funk E. Dude - 0 views
-
One of the ways that it distinguishes itself from YouTube and Vimeo however, is in its peer to peer sharing structure. If just one person is watching your video, then it’s pulling it straight from the server. If two or more are watching your video, then it shares bits of the video between them, creating less activity on the server. The idea is that, like all other decentralized social networks, you can run your own instance of the software and the server load is significantly reduced.
-
As with most decentralized social networks each instance of PeerTube has it’s own rules, guidelines, and restrictions. The biggest difference between the instances probably boils down to daily upload file limitations. It’s important when choosing an instance to see what their restrictions are as it may effect your experience.
-
My first problem is with finding anything interesting to watch. Because PeerTube is worldwide you’ll notice right away that a LOT of the videos on the front page are mostly in different languages. French, Spanish, Russian, English, and others. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but it does slow down the amount of time it takes to find a good video to watch. An option to sort by language would be a big step.
- ...4 more annotations...
-
My next problem is with theft. There are a LOT of stolen YouTube videos. I’d say more then 3/4 of the videos on most of the PeerTube instances I’ve visited are taken from YouTube. I get how some people might have a grudge against Google and therefor YouTube and think that copying the videos and placing them on PeerTube might hurt YouTube, but in reality it hurts the creators that made them in the first place.
-
So if 3/4 of PeerTube Videos are just stolen YouTube videos, why not just go to YouTube? It’s the same problem any video sharing platform has. Content. If there’s not enough people creating content to watch, no one is going to use the service. YouTube is a HUGE source of content that no new service can really compete directly against. Turning PeerTube into a YouTube dumping ground is just admitting defeat. Until PeerTube finds a way to attract content creators, it’s going to struggle.
-
My last problem is with porn. Now, I’m no prude. I’ve got no issues with porn. It’s great, when in the right context. The problem is when it’s someone slinging their dick like a propeller right next to a video on how to adjust the settings on your hard drive. Fortunately most people put their porn behind content warning which blur the thumbnail and make you click on a warning to see the video, but not everyone does. Most instances will ban people for not using content warnings, but if someone is running their own instance, then the moderators for other instances have to ban the offenders instance from the Federation. It can be a slow process.
-
Until PeerTube fixes these four issues it’s going wallow in obscurity. It’s a good idea, being able to share videos across different social media platforms. Lessening server stress by using P2P. Decentralization. Federation. Content warning. All useful to the users, but it’s the content and how it’s managed by both the users and each instances moderators that will determine if, on a whole, PeerTube can survive and thrive like Mastodon, Pixelfed, or Friendica.