First time I heard define YouTube as a social networkvery early in the last decade, I’ll admit I was quite taken aback by it, and even though it was explained to me in detail (and quite kindly, I might add), it still took me a while to get the hang of it at least partially. And yes, YT is primarily a video uploading and sharing service, but communities of users have developed around them and their creators.

Google, aware of the huge potential of this derivative of the functioning of the platform, has been focusing on take advantage of YouTube’s capabilities in this sensewith some features aimed at supporting this type of use. Now, and as is the case with other services that have social network “footprints”, its capabilities and functions are limited in this sense, and this is a space that other services have used to compensate for these shortcomings.

A perfect example of what I’m talking about We found it on Discorda community building service that, through great work, has managed to become a meeting place for many communities born around YouTube channels, Twitch streamers, multiplayer games and more. Once known as the gamer’s Slack, this service offers a huge set of customization and community control features, which has undoubtedly influenced it to be the preferred option for many today.

Although Discord has functioned as an ideal complement to these services in recent years, the truth is that this has translated into users’ time, time not spent on the platforms where these communities are born. Google clearly saw this and that’s why Today they introduced YouTube Communities, a space where creators and their communities will be able to communicate in a more direct and fluid way.. Like I said, any resemblance to Discord is purely intentional.

And why this new feature? In a publication announcing its implementation, YouTube points to a key aspect that explains the move, which is that until now, video comments and the already existing community tab are focused on the creator’s latest posts. . However, in the case of YouTube communities, the intention is to create a more general space for conversation… really in the style of what we find in Discord.

The company announced that at least initially This feature will only be available to subscribersbut that could be more than a significant mistake in my opinion, and one of the reasons for the great success of Discord is that the “basic” use (and I put it in quotes because it is quite complete) is completely free. If YouTube intends to compete directly with Discord, accessibility to new communities must be as broad as possible.