Dev Update: Videos and Series
In the days of yore, before the GameWisp team took an exodus to TechStars and emerged with a shiny new thing called the WatchRoom, we were hard at work developing the features that allowed video game content creators to upload and distribute gaming video. We called these features “videos and series” because we lack the creativity required to whimsically name things.
Videos and series were the first idea we worked on, and while we think the premise was sound, it was very hard to make the kind of product we wanted to make as a two man development team working nights and weekends. When we were accepted into TechStars, we were pretty stoked to finally have the time and resources to see videos and series through to completion.
At TechStars we initially worked on videos and series alongside our WatchRoom prototype. With only two full time devs (one of which was doubling as our CEO), it was proving to be too much strain on the development team to support both projects concurrently. So we shelved videos and series while we crafted the WatchRoom.
Our long term vision was always more holistic, though. We realized that WatchRooms were not a panacea in the world of gaming video and knew that videos and series would eventually make a comeback when we had the time, staff, and resources to tackle the problem correctly.
Based on discussions with numerous content creators, we knew that a worthwhile stab at videos and series had to meet the following design goals:
- Better presentation and management of all that content. Gaming video content creators churn out a metric ton of content. Oftentimes, this content is long form (greater than 15 minutes in length) and episodic. YouTube playlists are one approach to organizing long form episodic content, but creators urged us to “do better” and create some sort of mechanism that was specifically tailored to the kind of content these creators were making.
- Alternative and supplementary monetization to ad revenue. We (and the creators we talked to) knew that there could never be a replacement for ad revenue in the current digital media economy. However, there should be avenues that serve as alternative means of monetization to ad revenue, such as early access / premium video content.
- Complete interoperability with YouTube. It is highly unlikely that YouTube will be dethroned as the online video king anytime soon. So we developed GameWisp with complete YouTube interoperability in mind. You can import playlists directly from YouTube to GameWisp and content can be automatically pushed to YouTube in a way that doesn’t suck.
Of these three goals, the remainder of this dev update is going to discuss the first. Subsquent posts will tackle how we’re taking care of the other goals.
It’s all about that content, about that content, about that content…
Gaming video content creators make so much content. From our talks with content creators, it wasn’t uncommon to discover that a single creator can upload as much as two hours of content per day, if not more. That’s a lot of video, and it can become a huge hassle to manage. So we set out to create tools to make content management easier: a dashboard, a series manager, and robust series editor.
The New and Improved Dashboard
The dashboard provides at-a-glance activity about your channel, such as when new content is premiering on GameWisp, when that content will be automatically pushed to YouTube, and if you have any upcoming WatchRoom events scheduled. The current default viewing range for activity is seven days, but will likely be customizeable when released.
Information about followers of your channel and channel sponsors is also provided on the dashboard. Followers are users that opt-in to be notified about new content that’s added to your channel. Sponsors are those users that pay monthly to get access to premium and early access content.
The Series Manager
The series manager provides quick access to any series a creator has on GameWisp. High level information includes the number of episodes in a series, whether or not it’s currently published (i.e., viewable) on GameWisp, the series’ status (e..g, In Progress, On Hiatus, Completed), and the last time the series was updated. Each series can be viewed, edited, and deleted from the series manager.
The Series Editor
Of all the new features being developed for GameWisp, the series editor has seen the most attention. The series editor existed in the original version of GameWisp, but has been massively overhauled.
The Info tab of the series editor (shown above) allows creators to change basic information about the series, such as its cover art, its series progress, tags, and published status. Much of this is unchanged from the original implementation.
The episodes tab has been completely reworked. Aside from numerous bug fixes, we’ve also implemented auto saving, such that series and episode state is saved automatically as it is updated by the user. Episodes are now standalone entities that can be provided their own video, title, description, cover art and release date. This allows creators to reuse videos with different titles, cover art, etc. A useful feature if a creator wishes to create a compilation or anthology series from previously uploaded videos.
GameWisp now supports hosted video. Creators can upload video content directly to GameWisp, have that content encoded into multiple resolutions, and delivered to end users via the HLS protocol on desktops, laptops, tablets, smart phones, etc. We built the video encoding pipeline from scratch such that we have complete control over how videos are encoded, packaged, and delivered. Self-hosting this pipeline also allows us to scale more effectively using a very fine-grained approach.
Additionally we’re able to report the encoding status of a video to creators on a per episode basis. This means there will be less confusion or mystery surrounding when a particular encoding resolution of a video will be available for viewing on GameWisp.
I want to briefly touch on Subscriber Access options since they appear in earlier screenshots. First, any episode made on GameWisp, whether it uses video from YouTube or video on GameWisp’s servers, has a GameWisp Publish Date. This is the date that the video will be viewable on GameWisp. Videos uploaded to GameWisp’s servers can be either Premium or Early Access. Premium videos will live on GameWisp’s servers indefinitely and only be viewable by your sponsors on GameWisp. Early Access videos will be automatically ported to YouTube for you on the YouTube Publish Date. We’re working very hard to make sure this process is bulletproof.
Interoperability with YouTube is a tougher problem than you might think. For one, you’re at the mercy of YouTube’s API, so if the API changes or removes critical functionality down the road, we’ll have to develop an entirely new approach. Second, there are many scenarios to consider when automatically porting content to YouTube. For example, should the ported video be put into a particular playlist? Should a playlist be created for that video with the intent that other videos will be added to it later? Should the cover art be ported along with the video as well? In many cases, there are probably reasonable default approaches to each of these questions, but we would want to support as many use cases as possible.
Other Stuff
If you’re concerned about WatchRooms, don’t worry, they’re not going anywhere. We’re currently reworking the WatchRoom to support videos that have been uploaded to GameWisp’s servers. We’re also brainstorming ways to incorporate WatchRooms better into videos and series, such that their use is more seamless. If anything, expect WatchRooms to get even better in the coming weeks.
It’s still a bit of a mystery to us when we will formally release videos and series. We will be looking for testers very soon, so if you’re interested in trying out videos and series let us know. We’re not concerned with a creator’s size or view count, we’re just looking for creators that make content on a regular basis, such that we can determine whether or not using GameWisp is an improvement to a creator’s regular workflow. If you’re interested in trying things out, email us at info <at> gamewisp <dot> com, or reach out on Twitter.
If you’d like to chat with the dev team in semi-real time, we host a thirty minute stream every morning from 9:00–9:30 AM CST on Twitch where we talk about the state of GameWisp and plan out our daily development tasks. Feel free to stop by and chat.
Finally, here’s our new main page, rife with creator content:
For more thoughts on what we are up to, check out our previous update here:
Originally published at blog.gamewisp.com on Nov. 18, 2014.
