YouTube Lands on Playstation 3 & Wii

My first impession was the identical where is the fun in watching Youtube's low-definition videos on TV?

Well since, I have an Apple TV (with its' dummy friendly, clean AND easy User-Interface, I admit), I discovered that:

• The addictive side of Youtube is still there (one-click away for watching the next similar video),
• The huge library regarding whatever subject (the long-tail effect) makes it the default place to start whatever search for video (it was the easiest place to find Obama's speach yesterday evening)
• The youngsters (between 14 and 17 years old) are consuming all our monthly Gigabytes of allowed traffic* watching the episodes they missed on TV or that aren't transmitted over here.

I am convinced that it Youtube is indeed another source of content on the TV (as well as on other household screens), next to the existing sources like Cable/Satelite TV; IPTV; Video/DVD; Gaming Console ...

 The day that the Definition will be upgraded they will more than probably even increase their marketshare.

* Belgium ISP's believe that capped traffic is still a good business model. Apparently there is not enough competion over here ... but that is another story.

Nice observations. But I wonder if this is more a statement to the better "discovery" model on the Internet than it is the quality of the content. What I've found about viewing YouTube/Internet video is that it is more convenient, because you can search it easily. When you are at home and you turn on the TV, it is a different story because searching the video is a royal pain in the ***. If you want to find a movie, you have to scroll through alphabetical channel lineups. To find a show, you need to know when/where before you can find it.

Tivo has done some work on this with their interface, but what I think is missing in the TV/Internet integration experience is a universal, searchable content discovery mechanism. I.e. a Google/YouTube search model for ALL CONTENT.

Perhaps this is why Hulu is doing so well -- they have married the Internet search model with high quality content. Meld that with the TV experience, and bingo, you have content nirvana. We're not there yet.

Although I have never seen Hulu or TiVo working, I agree with you.

So, we could agree that the success Youtube on TV might depend on:

1) The Content (and not limited to only Hollywood-stuff)

2) Ability to find it quickly, easily and in a dummy-friendly way (UI is subject to improvement, applies also to my lovely AppleTV)

3) And finally, the user-experience while "consuming" the content. Where one should not only focus on the quality of the image and underestimate the effect on the user-experience of good an little-bandwith-consuming 5.1 audio.

Best regards,

Rik

I think the companies that are in the best position to deliver YouTube and other Internet video content to the TV are cable operators -- namely Comcast and Time Warner Cable -- the two largest. Who needs Apple TV if you already have a digital set-top containing a modem in your entertainment center? Comcast and Time Warner have deployed millions of digital boxes that contain modems, but for some reason they've failed to activate them. Perhaps they're protecting cable modem revenue? Maybe .. but I doubt many subscribers would dump their high-speed packages if the operators finally offered Net access to the TV.

The interactive program guides from cable and satellite providers could be modified to allow for searches on YouTube and other Web video sites. Giving customers inexpensive wireless keyboards would make it even easier.