RSS
Twitter
Facebook
Yahoo has launched Yahoo WebPlayer beta, billed as a “new way to add video and audio to your site.”
The player allows users to include video and audio content on their sites through a new pop up interface that is said to keep users engaged longer by “intelligently adding relevant high quality videos and audio to [their] pages.”
The player itself can be described as next generation; instead of the regular embed, the player pops up in what can only be described as a very attractive interface.
At first glance its an appealing offering, but I don’t get it.
Unlike other web video options, the Yahoo WebPlayer is aimed at playing content on other sites (such as YouTube) or content hosted by the site owner themselves. Yahoo does offer some content (such as movie trailers and music video clips) but the range is at best limited; Yahoo canned its YouTube competitor a couple of years back and no longer offers services for site owners to host their clips on Yahoo itself.
Sure, it’s sexy, and it might find a limited market, but are site owners really going to start using Yahoo WebPlayer to display YouTube clips or their own content when the existing solutions available to display this content are already simple and in widespread use?
That’s the part I don’t get. It’s a solution looking for a problem that seemingly doesn’t exist.
If you are interested in taking a look, you can play with Yahoo WebPlayer here.
