Dailymotion, the Paris-based video sharing portal that is extremely popular in Europe, just launched its first set of iPhone applications. Dailymotion launched two apps: a free, ad-supported version (iTunes link), and a paid version for $5.99 (iTunes link) that does not feature any ads. The apps allow iPhone users to play videos from Dailymotion’s catalog of roughly 12 million videos. Dailymotion users can also use the apps to upload videos directly to the service.
Until now, the only way to access Dailymotion from the iPhone was through a mobile-optimized web interface. Given YouTube’s position as a default app on the iPhone, this put Dailymotion at a significant disadvantage.
In terms of content, Dailymotion can’t really compete with YouTube, where users now upload more than 24 hours of video per minute, but the app can easily compete with those from other streaming video services.
One feature of the app we especially like is how easy it is to browse through different categories. This is also where Dailymotion’s international focus shines through, as the app also makes it very straightforward to restrict searches to popular videos in a specific country.
