Social news site Reddit launched a great new service today called Reddit.tv. The new page allows users uninterrupted viewing of videos submitted to Reddit. Videos are split into categories and top comments from Reddit users appear beside the video player.
It’s not perfect but it’s pretty great. It’s reminiscent of the excellent StumbleUpon Video but more timely, less repetitious and less full of commercials. The main question that comes to mind is: why hasn’t Digg launched something like this yet?
Note that the video that appears first in the “best of the web” section is one long, juvenile joke about sexual violence from the comedy group “The Whitest Kids You Know.” So not all readers here may appreciate the audience on the site and their taste. Unfortunately that’s what you often get when you open up editorial selection to a vote of computer savvy folks who like to populate these kinds of sites. It’s rule by the loudest voices with the most time on their hands.
The service isn’t technically perfect either. On Safari we’ve needed to refresh the page regularly in order for it to load. You can’t vote videos up or down from the Reddit.tv page – the designer says he wants to keep it simple but that may come soon. There doesn’t appear to be a very high threshold for the number of votes a video needs to appear on Reddit.tv. Several we saw were just submitted. Finally, it would be great if there was a way to have continuous full-screen viewing of these videos. That might be easier said than done but it would add a lot to the user experience.
Those issues aside, though, Reddit.tv is pretty cool. It’s a good way to see popular current events and cool science and tech videos in particular. The inclusion of TED Talk videos is great; those help balance out the rampant stupidity you find on any video sharing service.
This kind of viewing experience is much nicer than what Digg offers in its video section. Surely it’s only a matter of time until Digg does something similar to this. In the meantime, if you want to watch up-to-date online videos that have been voted up by a crowd of geeks, Reddit.tv may now be your best option.
