I have another question: how did anyone buy into Quibi?
Extremely short film only works for the spontaneity of people’s individual creativity and not as a corporately produced product. See: vine, tiktok, etc. When it’s a corporate production it isn’t cool anymore.
Step 1: "I read in the Wall Street Journal that young people's attention spans are shorter these days, and that PewDiePie and Jake Paul make bank on Youtube with 10 minute videos."
Step 2: "I feel my entertainment company was late to the party with things like YouTube, Netflix and TikTok. It would have been better if we'd got in at the ground floor."
Step 3: "I'm told even if those youtube videos look spontaneous, they have scripts and production teams behind them."
Step 4: "So Quibi is like that, but with celebrities? And other entertainment CEOs have already signed up to invest? Then count me in!"
Meh, Youtube is making bank on short videos (often <10min, like Quibi's cap) and many of those aren't spontaneous bursts of creativity anymore, but highly produced products.
And many if not most of those YouTube creators are increasingly dissatisfied with Googles management and are looking for an alternative platform. It seems like such an obvious missed opportunity.
I hate to play arm-chair executive, but I have this nagging feeling you're right. Many (most?) YouTube content creators are making a pittance that's growing ever smaller by the day - $1.75bn can buy a huge amount of organic content.
The obvious mistake was going all-in on the first (unproven) concept and leaving no time/budget to experiment with the latter. Smacks very much of the hubris of a entrenched, well-capitalized industry.
Didn't vine die and tiktok thrive because the biggest content creators were semi-pro, not individual spontaneous creatives, and tiktok provided better monetization options?
Extremely short film only works for the spontaneity of people’s individual creativity and not as a corporately produced product. See: vine, tiktok, etc. When it’s a corporate production it isn’t cool anymore.