What Is Dtube?

What is Dtube? This article will attempt to answer this question. This article will also consider if Dtube is a good alternative to YouTube.

Before I explain what Dtube is, I have to first mention steemit. Steemit is the platform that Dtube runs on. Steemit is a social media website. The system of steemit is somewhat complex.

The steemit website is based on the cryptocurrency STEEM. You can exchange STEEM on cryptocurrency exchanges to get Bitcoins. You can then exchange your Bitcoins for money on a website like Coinbase to get money. You can keep your STEEM on steemit and power up your Steam Power. People have voting power or Steem power. The more Steem Power you have, the more your votes influence content. STEEM can be earned or bought on cryptocurrency exchanges. You can earn STEEM in several ways.

• Make content that gets upvotes. You get more rewards from people who more Steam Power.

• You can also earn STEEM by getting votes on comments.

• You earn STEEM by upvoting recent posts.

The important thing to remember is that for all earning methods you can only earn STEEM from content for a week (seven days). The system is confusing for new users, and I highly recommend giving the steemit FAQ a read.

Dtube is a video upload platform that runs on the steemit platform. Content creators upload videos to a channel. Dtube is structured very much like a YouTube alternative website. Everything about earning on steemit applies to Dtube. You still earn from votes, and you earn STEEM on content for seven days.

Why use Dtube or any YouTube alternative? YouTube is the largest website for user-created content. But YouTube is not perfect, and some people want alternatives.

Recently YouTube has made earning money from ads much harder. YouTube has been demonetizing videos and enforcing a much stricter ad policy. As this article from the Verge points out this is causing much frustration. The fact is on YouTube unless you have other revenue streams if you earn from ads you are at the mercy of Google. Advertisers are cracking down, and some are leaving YouTube. It also doesn't help in recent two cases high profile YouTubers have caused huge controversy. Felix Kjellberg (PewDiePie) and Logan Paul. It is no secret that YouTube is losing Google money. Google is getting much more strict with who can earn money from ads.

In addition to these advertiser driven changes YouTube. YouTube just recently as on January 2018 made getting in and being eligible for the ad program harder. In 2017 you needed to have 10000 lifetime views to earn money from ads. Now you need to have 4,000 hours of watch time within the past 12 months and 1,000 subscribers. This policy change means unless you get that much view time and have this many subscribers you not be eligible for the ad program. You can read more about these changes in this Google blog post.

The truth is unless you get thousands of views often you won't earn from ad revenue anyway. Not in any significant amount. But this recent change has annoyed many small-time creators. They feel like unless they grow big, they will make no money. While ad revenue is only one way to make money from videos, in most cases small creators will not get the other possible options. These issues are where potentially where a platform like Dtube could solve these issues and provide a good alternative.

On Dtube you earn rewards from votes. Anybody can upload videos and earn votes if people like your content. Other than having a steemit account there are no requirements to earn STEEM. Dtube is also decentralized. Content cannot be removed or censored. Users control what content is shown by voting. DTubes open nature and easy way to earn money could be what attracts people.

As of January 2018, Dtube is still very much a new platform, and it shows. The platform lacks features a more mature website has. The fact that videos only earn for seven days means no long-term earnings. Content creators need to make a lot of content and upload videos often. Creators can't rely on old content to earn money.

I also noted most of the content on Dtube and steemit are self-referential. People are making lots of videos about steemit and Dtube. The platforms also tend to focus on cryptocurrency and cryptocurrency projects. I don't think this type of content will appeal to mass audiences. People will want to watch videos on things they like. To be fair there is some original content on Dtube though. There is also nothing wrong with being excited about a platform in the beginning either. Just as long eventually people do start to post original content that everybody loves.

Steemit also has a unique problem with certain users. Some people are worried that users with the most Steem Power are getting the most STEEM and using their power to prevent others from doing so. These users are called Whales. Keep in mind that users with lots of Steem Power or Whales make a much higher contribution when they vote on content versus smaller users. Some small users or minnows feel like they don't get any contribution rewards or very little rewards.

It is far too early to know if steemit, Dtube and, other steemit based platforms have a future. Steemit seems promising, but many startups do. Being promising does not prevent failure. The future of Dtube and steemit are very much connected. Dtube relies on steemit. If steemit grows and gain many users, Dtube will probably as well. DTube needs more content creators and viewers. If Dtube does gain a user base, it could possibly be a website that stands out from YouTube due to its policies. But I am not bold enough to make a claim like Dtube will surpass YouTube. It seems for now YouTube will remain king. I will be very curious to see how steemit and DTube are doing years later.

So is Dtube a good alternative to YouTube? It really depends on if users are willing to give the website a try. The developers of the website also have a lot of things to add and features to polish.