Joost give up on their desktop application

Joost was in the limelight a few years ago for their fantastic desktop application that allows you to chat with people watching the same video channel as you. But the problem since then is that YouTube have increased in side and Hulu came onto the market and took a good sized market share. Joost was still in beta and therefore having a desktop app made the process of watching YouTube or Hulu look incredibly easy. So they have decided to stop the desktop application.

There were some benefits to having a desktop application. The user experience could be more tightly controlled. Plus they built in peer-to-peer technology to all. As the files were coming from other users this mean that Joost had lower bandwidth bills.

In September Joost enabled their complete flash site that acts similar to the Joost application. This is obviously down to the fact that users are so used to getting their video content through the browser in desktop format.

They aren’t saying why they have discontinued the desktop application. Joost doesn’t offer anything particularly unique or compelling to users over competing sites with proprietary content (like Hulu can offer, although they do have series 1 of Peep Show which is a really funny show.

I still remember having people queuing up on TechJuicer for invites for the beta. I think they will have to find a new USP in order to compete with the likes of Hulu and YouTube.

Source: TechCrunch

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