Vimeo compression have changed. Please help change it back.

O

oron cohen

Member
Hi to all,

I’ve decided to write on all forums that I belong to and I think relate to this matter.

Recently, Vimeo have changed the way a video is loaded, instead of letting us, the filmmakers decide what resolution the audience will watch the video, they made the player more similar to Youtube, they call it “adaptive streaming”, like it’s some revolution , in fact this is going backwards in many ways on what Vimeo is to most pros.
Now they added resolutions like 360p and 240p, that’s amazing ain’t it?

I’ll try to be short here, this is for me and many others unacceptable, the all point of Vimeo is/was that I can decide what resolution people watch my videos, and I decide if I want them to wait 2-3 minutes for it to load or not.
In any case, I don’t think 240p or 360p should be an option on Vimeo at all!

Vimeo is about quality streaming, they should work hard so videos will load fast.
What I’m asking is:

1) Let me choose what resolution people will watch videos as default (like it was), if they wait to long, in any case they could always reduce resolution.

2) remove anything lower then 720p from my videos or any videos, maybe save this option as an option you can add in case you live in places with very very very bad connection.

3) let me disable this adaptive streaming all togehter.

How can you guys help? Please send emails to their support, I did, and in the beginning they ignored me a bit, but then they saw I CANCELLED my Plus membership and they send me an email saying they are reconsidering changing it.
Guys, This is a BIG DEAL, Vimeo at the moment is without alternatives, they are the only platform for professionals, if they will be some sort of Youtube we are in a bad situation.

There is a page they’ve made about it here: https://vimeo.com/forums/topic:278667 please, put as many comments as possible,
also please send vimeo costumer support as many emails as possible! they have a few other pages related to this, also please share this anywhere you feel fit.
It’s important they change there mind and let us professionals choose which resolution we want our videos to be displayed on!

Will be good to get everyone's input on this as well.

Hope people help out on this,
Oron.
 
I believe that if you pay for their service then you should be able to set the default resolution. I liked it when you could embed in HD and tick 1080p.
 
Mark Williams said:
I believe that if you pay for their service then you should be able to set the default resolution.
Click to expand...

I do pay for their services, this is what my post is about, you CAN NOT set default resolution at the moment, it's gone, and they said they don't want to bring it back, then they got a lot of angry posts and emails so they are starting to reconsider, but people should wake up and post on the link I provided plus send them emails to show we mean business.
 
This is part of an emails they sent me from customer support:
part of email 1: "Unfortunately, adaptive streaming is the future of Vimeo’s streaming capabilities and we completely understand your hesitation if you content is not displaying as you’d like it to."

Part of email 2 (after I replied I don't like this idea): "I’m sorry to hear that my rely has disappointed you. We strongly encourage you being able to find and use a video hosting platform that is best for your needs and we’re sorry to hear that we cannot be that for you at this time."

After I decided to stop my Vimeo plus membership that will end next month, they send me this email:
"I want to be clear that I do understand your concerns about HD video, and having control over what qualities your viewer sees. Our product team is evaluating this kind of feedback, and I will certainly pass yours along for consideration."

So, again, if more people will say something it will change, I'm sure people that have Vimeo Plus or Pro don't want other people to view their videos on 720p or 360p just because vimeo thinks they don't have the bandwidth, I want to decide those things, that's the all point of vimeo.
 
Wow, that was a reason people were sticking with vimeo and sacrifice amount of views: quality that they could control. Now when it's gone flock will fly somewhere else.
 
Yeah - we have to send the angry emails. We just do.

The OP's point is absolutely right.

Controlling the playback quality of our work IS exactly why we use Vimeo over YouTube.

As a "Plus" member I'll be sending my angry email today.

Thanks Oron.
 
alohype said:
Wow, that was a reason people were sticking with vimeo and sacrifice amount of views: quality that they could control. Now when it's gone flock will fly somewhere else.
Click to expand...
Yes, true. Also, now the HD button they left is confusing, as people you send your videos to think they're watching everything in HD but in fact this button now as changed to be the button that control the resolution, so for example, you might be watching the video in 360p or 540p or something like that and thinking you're watching it in HD...
 
DPStewart said:
Yeah - we have to send the angry emails. We just do.

The OP's point is absolutely right.

Controlling the playback quality of our work IS exactly why we use Vimeo over YouTube.

As a "Plus" member I'll be sending my angry email today.

Thanks Oron.
Click to expand...
Thanks you DPStewart, as more Plus member will send emails and post comments I think Vimeo will change their policy on this. I mean honestly, it doesn't make sense what they do. Also, I don't mind going somewhere else but at the moment we are short on alternatives what makes it more important to convince them they are wrong.
 
alohype said:
Maybe Wistia? Will have to dig this more.
Click to expand...
From quickly going through their website, it seems like the closest thing to what I'm looking for, but at a slightly higher cost, I'm actually thinking to skip all of this and just upload stuff directly to my server on my website, the downside is that places like Vimeo are also a community and it's always good to have your video shared and seen by millions of other users that then in turn could check out your website because of it.

I still don't understand what's the big deal of letting payed customers the option to control the resolution?
 
oron cohen said:
I still don't understand what's the big deal of letting payed customers the option to control the resolution?
Click to expand...
I guess they want to grow and directly compete with youtube. What they don't understand is the fact that image quality is the only reason Vimeo became popular.
 
alohype said:
I guess they want to grow and directly compete with youtube. What they don't understand is the fact that image quality is the only reason Vimeo became popular.
Click to expand...

It's the only reason I have gotten close to becoming a member. I have some work I'd like to release in the spring I felt justified in wanting to control the viewing resolution, literally the only reason I have considered Vimeo over YouTube.

Will email them as well. As current paying member I wish you guys luck! Definitely sitting out for now :)
 
hojomo said:
It's the only reason I have gotten close to becoming a member. I have some work I'd like to release in the spring I felt justified in wanting to control the viewing resolution, literally the only reason I have considered Vimeo over YouTube.

Will email them as well. As current paying member I wish you guys luck! Definitely sitting out for now :)
Click to expand...
I'm not a member but was considering it for the same reason. I was hoping they will be first with new codecs like h.265 or VP9 that will give more image data/resolution with same bandwidth instead they've chosen worst approach. But don't worry, I would say that 90% of users have chosen Vimeo for that so if everyone or most will send them e-mails they will quickly change their strategy.
 
I brought this over to the BMCUser forum as well. Lots of paying Vimeo customers there for sure.

I'll take this over to the EOS-HD forum as well.
 
Thanks for the heads up on this one Oron. I'm not happy with this either - it feels a bit like a bait & switch. You buy a service but then someone slips in an algorithm that overrides the choices you paid for... but not consistently. WTF?

Although I'm just an amateur I've been OK with paying Vimeo so my stuff wouldn't be out there in SD. I also spent a lot of effort to create videos that look as good as possible. This thing stinks!

I've let them know what I think and hope many others will too.
 
The only thing that will make them change is mass exodus, when enough paying customers exit, then they will consider the change. But I bet that change comes with a bigger price tag for you ultra premium members to control the playback size.

As for me, I would never consider them as an option because I've had too many issues trying to play videos hosted with them, nothing (and I repeat), nothing turns a potential "customer" off more than having the video not play. Windows, Android, Chromebook, Mac, and Linux have given me problems. Don't know the solution, but I certainly won't give that kind of service my money.

I wish you luck in your quest.
 
They've had this for quite a while for mobile devices. I mailed them a lot a year/year and a half ago about that. In my old flat Vimeo decided my bandwidth was too low when watching videos on my iPad. And there were no way to change the resolution. And much of what I watch there is camera related videos, which makes low resolution videos useless... As far as I know you still can't choose to view HD from a mobile device if Vimeo thinks your bandwidth isn't good enough. Which is also bullcrap.
 
It makes me think their business model is not working as they originally intended. Their server costs were probably too high to sustain the dedicated resolutions. They always seemed like a customer experience focused company which means their hand is probably being forced financially.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top