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Decentralised YouTube alternative Odysee no longer serving ads (odysee.com)

submitted 3 months ago by DreitonLullaby@lemmy.ml to c/technology@lemmy.world

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Odysee, a decentralised YouTube alternative focused on free speech, is officially ending the serving of ads on the platform, starting today. The post:

"Dear friends of Odysee, Starting today, we're removing all ads. We don't need ads to make money as a platform and we are confident in the development of our own new monetisation programs that will help creators earn a living and at the same time keep Odysee alive. Ultimately, sacrificing the overall user experience to make a few bucks isn't worth it to us and nor is it even sustainable for a platform that wishes to make something truly open and creatively free.

As we take this decision, one thing is certain to us, media platforms (even ones that market themselves as 'free-speech') typically devolve into advertising companies and end up becoming beholden to their paymasters. It's been that way for centuries and is never going to change.

As we see YouTube become more aggressive with their ad deployment and 'Free Speech' platforms try to build their own ad businesses it's apparent to us that we're building a model for Odysee that will keep it sustainable not only financially, but in its ability to provide an incorruptible user experience.

Our approach may be considered niche or unconventional, that's fine by us. Odysee will be used by the world on terms that are agreeable to its users, and we know our users don't like ads.

Best, Founder & Creator, Chief Executive Officer. Julian Chandra"

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[–] Smokeydope@lemmy.world 15 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I was a big fan of odysee but once LBRY lost to the SEC I figured it would die or change horribly. Im not sure who owns odysee now, how hosting works on it now that LBRY has been dissolved, or whos mining rigs are running the decentralized lbry blockchain that still presumably powers odysee. I need to know the details in clear detail before I trust it again on a technical level. I am more skeptical of crypto now and think a paid patreon membership peertube instance may be the best way to go. Peertubes biggest issue is scaling hosting cost as it gets bigger and donations can't keep up as well as lifetime of an instance. If I host my videos on your site and a year later it goes dark or they were deleted because the server maintainer just didn't want them taking up space, thats kind fustrating.

[–] linearchaos@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

r they were deleted because the server maintainer just didn’t want them taking up space, thats kind frustrating.

Yeah, the onus is on us to keep the backups and perhaps reseed if necessary. The whole part where Youtube is a massive free unlimited hosting library is not sustainable eventually. Crypto has always been a grift with a variable lifespan, it just funds the services while it's in it's bubble.

[–] DreitonLullaby@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 months ago

Odysee was owned by LBRY before the LBRY company was dissolved. They were founded by the same team of people who created the LBRY company, and the LBRY network/protocol (the decentralised part), but are not themselves the same company. So the LBRY company going away was never going to dissolve Odysee also, which is why they still exist today. LBRY (the company) dissolving did not affect the content on Odysee because the LBRY network/protocol itself is open-source and decentralised; and LBRY being sued and dying does not somehow make the LBRY network/protocol illegal for Odysee (or anyone) to use. If Odysee had gone away, anyone else could have jumped in and made a new replacement frontend for the LBRY network/protocol (Odysee is a frontend for LBRY, after all).

About a month ago, Odysee announced that they would be moving away from the LBRY network over to the Arweave network. Now, I'm not sure when they are going to do this, but it appears that at the minute they are still using the LBRY network/protocol for content uploads. The reason I think they are still using LBRY at this very minute, is that when I uploaded a video to my Odysee channel yesterday, I noticed in my personal uploads page that it was still using the lbry:// at the beginning of it's address on the network.