Facebook has introduced a new platform called Watch, exclusively for videos. The feature is available on Facebook TV apps, mobile and desktop, as a preview for a limited number of people.
Video view time on Facebook is increasing as people finding it more engaging and entertaining. With the increase in demand, Facebook felt the need for a dedicated place so people can go watch videos, which is why the video feature was initially launched in the U.S last year. As a mark of evolution, Watch now makes it even easier to catch up with shows you do not want to miss – be it live or recorded.
Daniel Danker, Director of Product said, “We think Watch will be home to a wide range of shows, from reality to comedy to live sports. To help inspire creators and seed the ecosystem, we’ve also funded some shows that are examples of community-oriented and episodic video series.”
The new platform will help all creators and publishers expand their community, and get paid in the process. In this open platform, the publisher has an option to make their own shows spanning a wide range of genres.
It is more personalized than ever before, so it will help you discover upcoming shows and what your friends and communities are watching. Watch has a couple of sections – Discover and Watchlist. Under Discover, videos will be categorized into sections like What Friends Are Watching, News This Week, Most Talked About, Coming Soon and so on. Under Watchlist, you can find your saved videos and episodes for watching at a later time.
Publishers are allowed to share their shows to the News Feed to help people discover them. The Watchlist feature also lets people subscribe to updates on new episodes of their favorite shows. Fans can connect with each other and with creators through a new feature that links shows to Groups.
The videos on Watch will be made available in the form of episodes, though they aren’t TV shows. Some of the shows that connect with fans directly, like Nas publishes a daily show where he makes videos together with his fans around the world, A&E’s “Bae or Bail” reality TV game show, Major League Baseball and much more. The Watchlist makes it easy for fans to catch up with every single episode, even those they may have missed.
Facebook does have some shows funded, but only a small percentage to seed the new Watch platform. The company is encouraging publishers to create their shows in the future, and the plan is to gradually scale up from hundreds to thousands and beyond.
Facebook has currently introduced Watch to a limited group of people, and also to limited creators to upload their shows before it is rolled out globally.
YouTube is the biggest platform for videos, and has been for quite a while. Now, with the new Watch feature, Facebook is also making its way to serving more personalized video content on its platform.
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