With so many damn sites crowding the online alleyways trying to hock us their goods, it’s hard to know just where to look for good online video. That’s why I’ll be reviewing not just shows and producers, but also the sites that provide you with video content – I call ‘em the aggregators.

Youtube is the 800 pound gorilla in the online video crawlspace. Everyone knows it, everyone watches it – unless they live in one of those sensitive countries keen on keeping the malignant influences of differing opinion out.

Started back in the stone age (2005) by some seriously lucky or intuitive guys – who’ve since gone on to be seriously wealthy – Youtube was the first big-time video hosting site. A place where anyone could go to post their videos and share them. You know this. and if you seriously want to know more, there are better sources for Youtube history than this blog.

It has remained in the limelight despite the emergence of many many other video aggregating, social sites, most with better quality video to boot. A big part to of Youtube’s success must be attributed to the content producers who have become a new breed of celebrity – new media personalities. If you’ve spent anytime on Youtube or the online video scene for that matter you’ll recognize these names: Nalts, Renatto, Happy Slip, Fred, Lisa Nova, Charles Trippy, Smosh.… the list goes on. There must be over a hundred of them nowadays.

But you know that too. Let’s get down to the review:

• Navigation (how easy it is to find what you’re looking for and to discover something new)

It just went through a website re-design which pissed off a lot of old Youtube hands. I’m not too keen on it myself, to be honest, although the flexibility of re-ordering the the front page according to your preferences is kind of cool. The previous design was easier to navigate and for finding new content.

• Content (how good is the content on the site and how often is it updated)

With so many million videos already saved and so many thousands being added daily, it’s hard to think of another site having the sheer volume of content that Youtube has.

• Community (how easy is it to share, rate and comment on videos)

Youtube has a huge and vociferous community. Actually, it has several communities: the fans of specific content creators, the content creators amongst themselves, the regular users who log in daily to keep their finger on the pulse of things, the idiots – trolls-and assorted assholes who love to leave stupid comments, those looking for a political fight, etc…and this can be really overwhelming or an annoyance.  All the basic functions are there: rate, comment and share, but a few sites do these better.

• Quality (how good is the sound and image quality of the video)

This is where Youtube really suffers – and they know it, having recently added the view in HD function recently as a way of rectifying the problem. Most other sites simply have better quality and this is important.

• Extras (any unique functions or something different than the others)

Being the “gold standard” Youtube is pretty much the bench for all others -therefore most of the extra functions we’ve seen on other sites are ways to differentiate themselves from Youtube. Having said that, the Partner program is a neat extra for the content producers.

the Bottom Line:

You really should be watching Youtube, if for no other reason than it one of the best ways to stay up-to-date on what’s going on in online video. Furthermore, some great content producers are solely to be found on Youtube (e.g. the Clip Critics). But it’s not by any means my favorite site, as the quality of the videos really is crap and the Youtube community can be overtly cliquish or annoying.