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So the videos are content, not ads? Will I only see the embedded ads if I watch the video? I was kinda thinking that paying a Netflix level subscription / membership would innoculate members from the crudity of the modern Internet economy but here we are. Obviously 1000 members can’t fund the site but they should probably get a premium experience on the site to which we cared enough to voluntarily contribute.
I like the minimal frame. Also, you guys are doing a fantastic job. Keep it up!
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Is it really worth it to pay for your own player if you’re going to be putting them on yt anyways? Is the stock yt player not sufficient?
The themed frame looks really spiffy, but the minimal frame would probably work better for a variety of browsers and devices. Also, I really like the idea of Off-Road Classes.
If the video frames were selectable, I’d probably choose the VCR, just because it’s fun. But for a one-solution for all, the minimal frame is the way to go. Infinitesimally smaller bandwidth draw due to smaller graphic size, too. I’d also like video captions. And I’m spending more time on my mobile, so compatibility testing is important. I don’t have unlimited mobile data, so auto-play is sortofa drag, but I get that’s how the ‘Net is.
Less border so larger content. Fyi an larger text for senior members good idea. Rotate the videos go 1st with least seen as keep getting same video boring. Allow jump button to skip to next video. If possible remove already seen videos.
The VCR themed player is cool and all but might get old after a bit. I think the Themed frame is probably the most professional looking but there weren’t any renders for how they’ll look on mobile. I’d probably lean more towards the Minimal themed option for mobile.
New name works!
I’d love to make the trip to Holly Hills, are we allowed to bring our own rigs?
My brain read it as “Steve’s House of Cats” at first. Tracy’s articles have me expecting felines in all the contents now 😉
I don’t care how you theme the player, just make sure you thoroughly test it for cross-browser and mobile usability.
I kind of like the themed frame version for videos myself.
Themed is OK. Minimal is best. BTW, I love, love, love your priorities here and fully respect your choice to go the “less money” route. It may not end up being that way, of course, as I’m sure you know. My wife makes her living with a blog and works with a highly regarded ad management company. She let them make the call on ads initially, but after a few months, she didn’t like the way it cluttered up her website. She deliberately scaled way back on the ads and her traffic went up enough that she ended up making the same amount of money and is sure she has happier readers now.
That’s awesome! And also our theory. Our main ad partner was like: Here are the amount of ads you should put on the page and the amount of money you should expect to make. We cut the ads in half and made twice as much money as predicted.
Gosh, this is good to hear after YEARS of screaming about intrusive ads being a turn-off to everywhere (…and relaying feedback from unhappy readers about ads getting in the way of actually reading whatever site I was working for).
I like minimal, but I’m also pretty unlikely to watch videos if I can avoid it. Please be sure you have subtitles/closed captioning. If I’m watching with sound off, just not correctly processing what I’m hearing, or having trouble making out what’s being said, they’re a massive help, not to mention the obvious utility for any folks with hearing-related difficulties or disabilities.
This is a good note! We’ve been doing captions on our Instagram videos and YT offers auto-captioning. I’m not sure what our best option is here, but there are definitely services (like Rev.com).
Matt possibly have people star ideas they like to track instead of dozens of similar posts?
It takes some time, but you can have YouTube do auto-captions, which you correct, and then download the caption file, which hopefully your own video player will then be able to take.
That’s how I got the caption file for my movie on Prime Video, so hopefully it works for you!
I’ve now emailed you twice (once to Matt, once to Tips) to ask how I can access the comments dashboard and got no reply. I missed the announcement for how to access that. And I just now noticed my full name is being displayed instead of my internet handle as you mentioned. I would love to change that but I have no bleeding idea what Memberful is or how to access it. Can you help a dumb-dumb out?
Sorry, I was waiting on tech for an answer, I’ll email you now, but for everyone else: https://autopian.memberful.com/account
Thanks for that, got my handle back which is half the battle!
For anyone else interested: We had a fix for comment notifications and then had to launch our GDPR compliance plugin so we could legally be a website in Europe which, hilariously, blocks the comments notification widget on the FP and is making some video issues pop up for people. We’re in the process of figuring out how to tweak it.
The positive side of using WP with a bunch of plugins is that the website is fast and extremely reliable (our up time is nearly 100%). The downside is that each new plugin ads a little more complexity and requires a lot of testing.
I like the minimal look, but if you need space for static ads outside the frame to help revenue, I get that.
Thank you for resisting autoplay ads. My browser is muted by default because of those types of ads.
Sorry to have to miss the trivia this time around. I’ll be on vacation. It was a ton of fun last time.
In newspapers for over 20 years. The smart advertisers paying by the click got smart and realized force feeding ads was paying to piss future customers off. An idea require viewing an ad after a time of content but give a selection of ads so people can pick their needs as they pick their noses?
“I’m pretty sure no readers love it.” You would be correct! Autoplay, sticky frames and ads can all rot in hell. I also hate the videos that just stop playing once you click a different tab or scroll down. If I want the video to shut up, I would click the button. Just do what I tell you in your own stupid frame and nothing else! I have other crap to do and sometimes just want the audio!
Anyway, my vote is for the minimal frame. The magenta is a little eye-searing and distracting, and I want my eyes to rest and focus on the video.
Hmm… I’m not sure. We have a two-month test period with them where we can tweak settings. I’m not sure if that’s a feature or not.
Not a big fan of auto-play video – it still forces more bits to download, and for some people, say on phones or with data caps, to burn data they might not want to. And what if you have multiple videos on a page like you do today? Will they ALL be playing/downloading?
Auto-play audio would be a killer, so thanks at least for that.
Good questions:
My heart wants the TV surround with the VCR but my brain says that minimal would look better in an article.
Things might be different if that TV was more of the console variety and the VCR was a big ol silver early 80s one. Bonus points if the screen on the VCR was animated and constantly flashed 12:00
I appreciate that Torch was going for a Mk1 Golf look in the “themed” frame, but when it comes to elements like this, less is more. But I think you need some kind of framed element, which is real estate that can be turned into ad space. So I’d go with the minimal frame. Appreciate the effort to solicit feedback!
Have you reached out to MavTV that streams on Roku? I know after Stacey David quit and started his own show on YT, he’s now on MavTV.
I’d go for the minimal design since it’s going to be inline. The screen space lost to ads, particularly on mobile, is already plenty.
And thanks for not doing autoplay audio! That would be a killer non-feature for me.
Maybe don’t have autoplay videos for members?
I like the minimal and themed frames, but please don’t use the giant one
I would say autoplay in any context would turn readers off. I’d rather not have it at all so people stick around long enough to join, y’know?
I hear you. We’re trying to find the lightest version of it possible. I’d love to show you an example from some of our competitors, but they have a lot of the options we don’t want turned on, unfortunately.
An example, this has two different videos playing in seven different spots showing up on the page: https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/comparison-test/a44664658/2023-honda-accord-hyundai-sonata-subaru-legacy-toyota-camry-compared/
Ack! That Shell video ad is getting partially covered by the Honda Accord ad to the side.
Don’t do that.
Thank you very much for refusing to auto-play audio!!!!
Minimal maybe with “autopian” in the top left corner and logo in the bottom right.
Good idea and, absolutely.
If this player is going to be directly in your articles, there’s no need for any themed elements. The minimal frame looks best. Maybe give it some taillights.
Minimal frame is clean.