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diff --git a/memos/WM-071.txt b/memos/WM-071.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e3be85 --- /dev/null +++ b/memos/WM-071.txt @@ -0,0 +1,143 @@ + + + + + + + +Document: WM-071 P. Webb +Category: Project 2025.06.16 + + Introducing Nickel + +Abstract + + I just want my own YouTube, but sustainable. + +Body + + Long story short, there aren't any video platforms that I want to use + or that want me as a customer, so I made my own. + + 1. The inspiration + + Vimeo is best suited for small businesses, filmmakers, and + agencies. The only other realistic option? YouTube…which is a + Google product and I've been largely anti‑Google for at least a + decade. At the top of this year though, I ended my anti‑Google + stance to not only create a Gmail account, but create a new + YouTube channel as well. The idea was that I'd just use them to + grow my personal brand or whatever but that felt gross. I cringed + every time I logged in. + + Around the same time, I remembered reading an article[1] where + someone had a **ton** of video they were storing with Cloudflare + and paying _pennies_. I finally re‑read the article and got the + confidence to try it out for myself. The idea of having my own + video platform always felt like an impossible dream, just out of + reach. Not anymore, I did it! + + https://nickel.video/77C015N7N2N3[2] + + Few things to note: most of the site isn't done; internal links + will show a nice "404, I'm working on it" message and the site is + NOT responsive. This is for two reasons: + + 1. I wanted to use this immediately + 2. I need to get over needing projects to be "perfect" before + launching them + + My personal deadline was the launch date of Nintendo Switch 2 + because I wanted to film an unboxing video. My son was a + persistent micro‑manager during this time of immense frustration + because guess what? Everything worked in development but not on + my server…WTF?!! + + 2. What went wrong + + I develop on an M1 Max MacBook Pro with 32GB of RAM. Transcoding a + 700MB video is fast af. Deciding to do so on a server with 2GB of + RAM and watching my app crash again and again for no obvious (at + the time) reason was excrutiating. What I know NOW is that the + large video was being kept in memory and when memory fills up, a + computer will crash. I had to learn how to chunk the video from my + app and stream its parts to my transcoder before reassembling said + parts so the transcoding could actually occur before sending + _those_ bits to Cloudflare R2. + + WHEW! + + Switch 2 launched June 5th and I wasn't able to get my unboxing + video onto Nickel until 5 or 6 days later…not terribly bad because + I literally didn't know what I didn't know. I thought the 4GB + Linode that's currently running my transcoder was good enough but + I think I'll upgrade that to 8GB before I get my initial group of + VIPs to find edge cases for me. + + Oh yeah, one of the avoidable issues I ran into was forgetting to + install `ffmpeg` and wondering why the transcoder API wouldn't run + LOL! Man, I felt like such a dummy. + + 3. What went well + + I'm having a blast figuring things out TBQH. Much of how the + internet works remains a mystery to me, until I'm forced to learn + something to develop a feature. + + For example, blob[3] URLs! They look more professional than having + your CDN or raw playlist files be exposed in your video source + tag. Transcoding is neat too! It basically creates several + versions of your source video in different resolutions so you can + serve video based on available bandwidth. I've gotta optimize my + `ffmpeg` config some more to optimize for size, although I want to + prioritize quality. + + Designing the video player took a few tries. I tried using Plyr[4] + first but when I found that serving HLS content was proving + difficult with it, I found the great `hls-video-element` and + `media-chrome`[5] libraries. Fan‑freaking‑tastic libraries, they + make themeing a _breeeeeze_. + + I made the video player add context when embedded[6] versus being + on the site (you can see the title and username of the creator, + along with a "NICKEL" button that'll take you to the video on the + site). I haven't quite managed to get video to preview within + Apple Messages or Discord but it seems like you need to be + whitelisted to make that happen anyway. Nickel won't get that + entitlement for quite some time (I thought adding Twitter meta + tags would work but they don't so I'll remove them from the + codebase in the next update). + + Speaking of updates, I thought I'd also record a video of me + talking about the latest changes coming to Nickel and post under + the official account there. Ya gotta dogfood your projects! + + 4. The future + + I've yet to setup a blog for Nickel so the next update or two + about it will likely be here on my personal blog as I get basic + site functionality done. I'm currently working on the pricing page + and will get that responsive before fixing the rest of the + ancillary pages. + + It was important for me to have a plan for sustainability because + as we've all seen, ad‑supported always devolves into the worst + possible experience for everyone who isn't an advertiser. + + It is my hope that Nickel can become the home of short‑form video + for at least 100,000 people; creators and the people that support + them. Stay tuned! + + 🕸️ + + P.S.: For the tech stack nerds, nothing's changed. I'm using Gel, + Deno, GraphQL, and SvelteKit (Typescript and Sass) on Linode. + +References + + [1] <https://screencasting.com/articles/cheap-video-hosting> + [2] <https://nickel.video/77C015N7N2N3> + [3] <https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Blob> + [4] <https://plyr.io> + [5] <https://www.media-chrome.org/docs/en/get-started> + [6] <https://nickel.video/embed/e219nIE95330> |