Is Tiny Seesmic Going to Take Over the World?
Andy Plesser at Beet.TV got the scoop from video chat platform Seesmic that the company will be powering video comments for Moveable Type and TypePad blogs beginning next month, just like they have for WordPress.com since last month. Founder Loic Le Meur wrote this week that Seesmic will this month become the first Silverlight video service on mobile phones and next month the company will be integrating XMPP real-time messaging into Twhirl, the leading 3rd party Twitter client that they recently acquired.
Is Seesmic blowing up right now, or is it set to eventually implode? Read on and we will consider the issues...
As we wrote when Seesmic acquired Twhirl, the combined company is a vision of the future of the web. We hadn't taken video commenting on blogs into account in that post, and have since written a post highly skeptical of that feature's viability, but that's not the point here. The point is that the Seesmic team is a business development machine and their technology is incredibly seductive.
Questions About Seesmic
There are some big questions remaining about Seesmic - it may be too lightweight, too tied together with charisma and may be as screwed regarding a business model as many companies these days are said to be. It may be too niche, as only so many people want to broadcast themselves on video. (Though for the rest of us there's Twhirl.) We think there's something very substantive here though, regarding real time multi-media, group communication.
We can't help but compare the SixApart blog commenting news with the relative slowness of uptake for the video commenting plug-in offered by competitor Viddler. Viddler's technology is arguably superior, but their execs come across more like (very likable) football players than like hip French art-lovers who want to pour you a glass of wine and tell you fascinating stories about ethereal and potentially monetizable online phenomena. To be fair, Viddler does a lot of things with video and there's no reason to expect blog commenting to be a big part of their traffic.
Growth Possiblities
The moral of the story is that you'll likely be seeing Seesmic everywhere, soon. If you'd like to try out Seesmic - just add @getseesmic as a friend in Twitter and DM it with the word "get" to receive an invitation.
Whether being available everywhere leads to the platform actually being used is another question. Social news site Mixx, for example, keeps getting added to more mainstream media websites than you can shake a stick at and their traffic has not made the kind of jump you'd expect from such an association.
Video comment capabilities everywhere (except Blogger of course) may not make a huge impact on Seesmic use, but throw in some Silverlight on mobile phones and some video through an XMPP powered Twhirl and you've got a recipe for a well distributed pattern of heavy use in aggregate.
Share
Comments
Subscribe to comments for this post OR Subscribe to comments for all ReadWriteWeb posts
The fact is no one does video comments. It isn't popular and is awkward to do. Just look at Techcrunch comments. Even though they have seesmic commenting, no one really uses it. Good effort though...and it was smart for them to buy Twhirl.
why is "adding video comments to mt/tp" a scoop in your opinion marshall? naturally they will add other platforms. I could easily write that seesmic will add video comments to drupal as well :)
the way video comments are setup today overall is meaningless - and fyi, mashable had a story about disqus also joining the video commenting movement.
Seesmic thrives to become the leader of distributed online discussion platforms in my opinion. Video is just an original way to step in the game. The Founder has the know-hows and know-whos to surprise us.
Jeez. Talk about an over the top title!
Whether being available everywhere leads to the platform actually being used is another question. Social news site Mixx, for example, keeps getting added to more mainstream media websites than you can shake a stick at and their traffic has not made the kind of jump you'd expect from such an association.
I don't think you'd expect to see a sustained "slashdot effect" in terms of traffic from these associations. What is more likely is that the rate of traffic growth will increase - ie the exponential factor goes from e(alpha*t) to e((alpha+delta)t).
Consider Mixx - their association with the various news sites hasnt probably doubled their traffic, but it may mean that they will reach double today's traffic levels in half the time it would have otherwise taken.
This is because only a small fraction of the readers will actually click on the new button, since they still don't know what it does, and Mixx doesn't have mindshare in the mainstream web audience. However, the mere fact of the button's presence will increase that mindshare, leading to more and more clicks on that button over time.
Wait long enough, and everyone on eth web will be reading your blog eventually :)
Thanks for the kind words about Viddler!
stupid question from a newbie non-geek:
What is the difference in service between Youtube and Seesmic ?
>What is the difference in service between Youtube and Seesmic ?
Youtube has traffic and purpose and you can upload videos and Seesmic doesn't have any of those features ;). But you're absolutely right, there's no reason to use Seesmic at all.
People tend to forget WHY the video phone failed! It failed because people hate worrying how they look when they answer a damn phone.
About the only person who uses Seesmic on TC is that obnoxious, derelict-looking Loren guy.
PS: Marshall, this was one of the silliest articles on RWW in a long time.
I believe Video comments to make a lot more sense on a family/friend blog. The are millions of such blogs.
Seesmic sounds nice but it's a mirage. Seesmic needs to stop adding features and open up the service to those who have been patiently waiting months to join. I'm sure Twitter would have nothing but nice press if they limited it to 2000 of the digerati.
I dont watch video comments and I will never leave one...
If you have something important to say then write it out so I can skim over it like the rest of the comments. Lets not waste eachother's time.
Marshall, when can I pour you a glass of wine for real? Thanks for your comments. Yes, it is challenging but I still can't find a good reason why the video conversation should not become as large as the text covnersation we have been enjoying on social software. It will take time for many reasons (people not use to record themselves, not willing to show their face, etc) but I think it will happen. Time will tell.
Nice, good article!
Twitter invite codes don't seem to be working. DARN!
We did it on blip.pl. And video posting doesn't work. Why? Maybe it takes to much time to post? Maybe it is not easily browsable? I don't know. But it really doesn't work, sorry Seesmic.
Seesmic will be a pure consumer play. I can tell you from experience that video doesn't work in the enterprise. People don't want to be seen in the enterprise, they want to be heard. Video like Seesmic in the enterprise will take 5-10 years, in my opinion, when younger people who are less resistant to it will be entering the job market. You may find one or two companies interested in using it internally but it will be on a limited basis. Most people will say, "So what". But most people have also forgotten how profitable the enterprise can be. Just ask Microsoft, IBM,...Google.
Doug
Short video conversations make much since within private groups of people. Video is just too intimate of a thing to take off in a big public space.