Hello Vimeo Creator Labs!
Life update!
It’s been seven years since I started VHX with Jamie and almost two years since Vimeo acquired us. You read a lot of horror stories about acquisitions, but we can now look back and say it was the best decision we could have made. Since joining Vimeo, VHX (now called Vimeo OTT) has grown to 30 wonderful humans and it’s still focused on its original mission. Notably, we launched one of our biggest subscription services in partnership with Lionsgate: Kevin Hart’s new comedy network. OTT is alive and thriving with Kathleen at the helm, who is doing an incredible job making it a successful business.
No matter how much I read about startups, it’s fascinating that it still took doing it myself to really learn all the hard lessons. I’ve learned a lot and have been itching to use all my new and old skills on new problems.
Fortunately, Vimeo has given me a lot of fun problems to think about. Its mission has always been some version of “help creators tell good stories.” But what does that mean when the lines start blurring between filmmaking and fully, immersive experiences? As new storytelling mediums are created or redefined, how does our definition of a creator expand? How do we watch video when technology is all inside your eyeball(s)? How do creators evolve as artificial intelligence democratizes creativity?
To help answer these questions, I started a new team: Vimeo Creator Labs. We are diving into the fun grey area between video, film, art, media, and new technologies (e.g. WebGL, Unity, VR, AR, volumetric, and AI). Through research and prototyping, we are building new products, design patterns, and technology — and just making fun stuff that shows off the power of Vimeo.
Here’s a sneak peek at a couple of open source Vimeo plugins I built for Unity and WebVR. I’d love to get feedback on these and collaborate with you on projects that could leverage Vimeo.
</lifeupdate>
P.S. We’re hiring. Come work with me!
