YouTube copycats: Indian video sharing sites October 3, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , 7commentsHere is a thought: I think there are more people trying to start a video-sharing website than the people actually submitting videos. And where better to achieve this glorious distinction than our own motherland, brimming with starry-eyed internet entrepreneurs.
Now that you can purchase an off-the-shelf script to jump start a YouTube-clone website for only 10$ (If you think I’m kidding, check out vShare.in), there is a rapidly growing pile of indistinguishable Indian video-sharing sites. Being a fearless internet-warrior, I thought I’ll review all of them (how many could there be?) but was soon overwhelmed by the stampede of half-baked sites. Some of them are going down (and then coming back up again) so fast that I don’t think its useful to waste any reviews on them yet. Hence I thought of another solution- I’ll maintain a list of them here, and assume by default that every site on this list is not going to survive. If time says otherwise, I’ll move them off the list and give them a new, independent review.
In general, all these sites have unoriginal content (hacked movie clips, serials etc). The user interface is almost identical (thanks to 10$ scripts from vShare.in), user base is insignificant and there is no business model except site advertising.
A word of caution- some of these sites are replete with adult content haphazardly thrown here and there. So don’t explore if you cant handle it!
- Infeeindia
- Merovideo (Nepali videos!)
- Meravideo
- Tubedesi
- Chatpatavideo
- YouClipIt.net
- Apnaspace
- Crictube
- Connectfilms
- Aapkavideo
- Apnavideos
- Apnatube
- Canaravideo
- Bollywoodtube
- Mastitube
- DesiSexTube (Warning:Disgusting adult content)
- IndianReunited
- AajKaTV
- EelamTube
- IndiaStage
- MotionFlicks
- TumTube
- VideoDabba
- VideoMirchi
Of course, there may be a chance that I’ve thrown the baby out with the bathwater here. So if you think any of these sites deserves a better treatment, let me know. Feel free to send in additions to this list too.
Note: Some well-deserving websites have been purposely omitted in the list above because I had already spent precious time giving them independent reviews before getting overwhelmed. Check them out on the eIndia ‘Lists’ page (’Video Sharing Sites’ subsection).
26thJanuary September 26, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , 4comments26thJanuary is another video sharing site for Indians online. It started somewhere in July 2007, according to techtalk blog. Although it manages to steer away from adult content submissions for the most part, there are bunch of family-unfriendly videos here and there. Overall, it has decent censorship and mostly Indian content when compared with other similar sites. With nobody making money enough to break even through advertising model, I’m wondering how such sites keep paying the bandwidth bill.
LayFile September 19, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Media Streaming, Video Sharing , add a commentAllright, I’m going to dive into the Indian youtube-clones reviews with LayFile. LayFile is a startup that went live sometime in April 2007.
Layfile seems to have a lot of content- but most of it is adult stuff. I didn’t waste my time clicking through the navigation to confirm their share of mainstream content though. The site seems to be overwhlemed by porn, although there is a feeble attempt to categorize it under “Adult videos” navigation link. The fact that LayFile decided to have a “Recently Viewed Videos” on the homepage accentuates the adult theme- every one of the recently-viewed is an adult video clip. Layfile may have started as a generic video-sharing service, but in a short span 5 months, is no more than a database of Indian porn.
Their LiveTV section seems to have plenty of streaming Indian cable channels (free), so that may be worth a look. There is no way to avoid the adult images on homepage though, so if you have kids in the house, it’s best to block it entirely.
ApniCommunity June 29, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , add a commentA reader pointed me to ApniCommunity and I half-expected it to be a content aggregator like Bollyclips and Muft.TV. I found it to be a bit more organized than that. As the name suggests, it’s primarily a discussion board for the online Indian community.
It does have videos, but mostly movie promos and concert shows that are hosted on YouTube etc. Other than that it has bunch of community features like forums, friends, etc. The navigation layout is pretty similar to Muft.TV (maybe they use the same content management system in the background). Again, no idea about the business model except advertisements.
I prefer my useless media content on the rocks, no need for discussion threads or forums. If you like to indulge in supplementary gossip and make online friends along the way, try ApniCommunity out and let me know your experience.
Muft.TV June 29, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , 6commentsMuft.TV is another one of the almost ubiquitous ‘content-aggregator’ sites. They dont actually host any of the content, just simply point to it. Think of it as a media library, with the actual content being stored on popular sites like YouTube and DailyMotion.
Muft.TV has a better interface than others, although it still has too much navigation going on for me. Besides Bollywood, you can find tamil, telugu, malyalam, kannada, punjabi, marathi and bengali stuff here. There are some interesting categories like “Deleted Scenes” (which doesnt have anything yet), “Telly Videos” (links to episodes of sitcoms), “Shows & Concerts” (in case you missed Femina Miss India 2007 and likes) and “Music Videos”. They also have a page that lists a handful of online desi radio stations.
Anyway, it’s free
, much like MeTube and Bollyclips. I still cant figure out how these sites are paying the bills for bandwidth utilization with meager ads sprinkled here and there. If you are interested in more Indian media streaming sites, look here.
MeTubes May 18, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , 1 comment so farThe link to MeTubes was sent in by a kind reader (thank you, Monica Patel!) who praised its good interface and easy movie selection.
The concept is similar to BollyClips- MeTubes aggregates the links to media hosted by other sites in one place. They have a big disclaimer regarding this at the bottom of each page, along with a FAQ page polite tip on copyright violations and take-down policy.
But MeTubes is not just about Bollywood, it’s categories range from TV sitcoms and movies to Math, Food and Autos. So you can watch a Bollywood movie or Simpsons show and then a clip on how to jumpstart your car, all in one place now. The video quality is what you would expect elsewhere- its flash based, so doesn’t look good full screen. But its free, so I’m not complaining.
So there you go, another site pooling together the infinite videos and clips on the internet. No business model except placeholders for ads, so not sure how long they are willing to foot the bandwidth bills.
By the way, I couldn’t understand the text on thier ‘About’ page. Was something about ‘connecting back to family and nurture relationships’, but I’m lost on the connection with the media collection/playback. Enlighten me, if you figure it out.
BollyClips February 15, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Video Sharing , 6commentsI feel like I’m turning eIndia into one of the ubiquitous bollywood-focused sites. But these Indian movie/video streaming websites keep popping up everywhere, and I’m amazed by the variety of startups in this domain.
BollyClips is a free (no need to signup/register) online collection of trailers, music videos, full-length movies, albums, slideshows and miscellaneous stuff related to bollywood. I am sure that they are breaking one or two media copyright laws here- these are syndicated content, for god’s sake! Although some of the links are to external repositories (like YouTube), a significant amount is hosted by BollyClips. I clicked on a really old film (Ek Duje Ke Liye- Kamal Hasan, Rati Agnihotri, 1981) and it loaded up in under a minute on my DSL connection. There is a sleazy-looking ‘Hot & Sexy’ section too, which has snippets of bollywood’s semi-vulgar content.
Don’t know how they plan to monetize all this content (or avoid the lawsuits). Even though they are named after bollywood, there are a bunch of YouTube hollywood movies links on their site too, for some reason.