Dailymotion is a French

video-sharing An online video platform (OVP), provided by a video hosting service, enables users to upload, convert, store and play back video content on the Internet, often via a structured, large-scale system that may generate revenue. Users will generally u ...

technology platform owned by Vivendi. North American launch partners included Vice Media, Bloomberg and Hearst Digital Media. It is among the earliest known platforms to support HD (

720p 720p (1280×720 px; also called HD ready, standard HD or just HD) is a progressive HDTV signal format with 720 horizontal lines/1280 columns and an aspect ratio (AR) of 16:9, normally known as widescreen HDTV (1.78:1). All major HDTV broadcas ...

) resolution video. Dailymotion is available worldwide in 183 languages and 43 localised versions featuring local home pages and local content.

History

In March 2005, Benjamin Bejbaum and Olivier Poitrey founded the website, pooling €6,000 (US$9,271) from six individuals to start it. In September 2006, Dailymotion raised funds in collaboration with

Atlas Ventures Atlas Venture is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in life sciences startup companies in the U.S. Atlas is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the majority of its investments are located. Atlas rolled out its elevent ...

and Partech International. They raised €7 million, which was considered to be the most funds raised in 2006 from the French Web 2.0. In 2007 Dailymotion created ASIC, together with other companies in the sector. Dailymotion supports a high-definition video resolution of 720p since February 2008, making it one of the earliest known HD video platforms. October 2009, the French government invested in Dailymotion through the Strategic Investment Fund. On 25 January 2011, Orange acquired a 49% stake in Dailymotion for €62 million, valuing the company at €120 million. On 10 January 2013, Orange bought the remaining 51% for €61 million. On or about 2 May 2013, the French government blocked Yahoo's acquisition of a majority stake in Dailymotion. On 25 February 2014, Orange revealed it was in discussions with

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washi ...

about a deal that could see Dailymotion extend into the US market. In an interview with a local television station in

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...

Stéphane Richard, CEO of Orange, said there was "great hope" an agreement would be reached. Any deal would see Orange retain majority ownership of Dailymotion. Richard said his company was in talks with other potential partners as well with a view to expanding Dailymotion's international appeal, but said discussions with others were more in relation to content. In 2015, Vivendi purchased an 80% stake in Dailymotion from Orange S.A. Vivendi increased its ownership to 90% that September. In September 2020, Dailymotion partnered with Mi Video, the global video app developed by Xiaomi. The partnership will help Mi Video to increase its engagement with its audience and continue its growth momentum. Access to Dailymotion's global and regional music, entertainment, sports and news catalogues will be provided to Mi Video users. The comment section was removed completely approximately in 2018, and the view counter was removed in mid-2021. On June 1 to 2, 2022, the picture-in-picture view mode which allowed browsing the site while playing a video in the lower-right corner of the screen was removed.

Global locations

The head office is located in the ''Immeuble Horizons 17'' in the 17th arrondissement of Paris.Giusti, Nathalie.
Inauguration du 140 boulevard Malesherbes

. '' Le Nouvel Observateur''. 27 July 2012. Retrieved 24 May 2014. "Hier soir s'est tenue l'inauguration de l'immeuble Horizons 17, au 140 boulevard Malesherbes. L'immeuble, entièrement rénové par CBRE Investors et en cours de commercialisation, comporte 6 000 m² au total, dont 5 000 m² de bureaux, le tout réparti sur 10 étages et 3 sous-sols." It was inaugurated by CBRE Investors. The ten-storey building has of space, with occupied by offices. Previously the company was headquartered in the

18th arrondissement The 18th arrondissement of Paris (''XVIIIe arrondissement'') is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. In spoken French, this arrondissement is referred to as ''dix-huitième''. The arrondissement, known as Butte-Montmartr ...

. Dailymotion began expanding its physical presence internationally in 2007, when the company opened its office in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Since then, Dailymotion offices have been opened in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

(2009),

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

(2011),

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

(2014) and

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(2016). In 2017, Dailymotion expanded its US presence with the announcement of several key executive appointments, including the addition of Mel Behassa as SVP of Advertising (New York), Claudia Page, VP and Head of Partner Products (New York), and Shana Eddy-Grouf as interim Head of US Content (Los Angeles). Dailymotion is available in 44 countries and areas including: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, and the United States.

Blocking of Dailymotion

Dailymotion was banned in India in May 2012, but in the following month India unblocked access to video- and file-sharing sites including Dailymotion. The Madras High Court changed its earlier order, explaining that only specific URLs carrying illegally copied content should be blocked, not entire websites. Dailymotion was again banned in India in December 2014, due to Government concerns that the site might be hosting videos pertaining to

ISIS Isis (; ''Ēse''; ; Meroitic: ''Wos'' 'a''or ''Wusa''; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎, romanized: ʾs) was a major goddess in ancient Egyptian religion whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. Isis was first mentioned in the Old Kin ...

criticism of Indian rule in Kashmir. On 31 December 2014, however, Dailymotion was again unblocked in India. Dailymotion has been banned in Kazakhstan since August 2011. In 2017, Dailymotion was blocked in Russia for repeated violations of Russian copyright law. Dailymotion also has been blocked in China and North Korea.

Copyright cases

In June 2007, Dailymotion was found liable for

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, ...

by a Paris High Court. The judges held that Dailymotion is a hosting provider, and not a publisher, but that it must be held liable for copyright infringement, as it was aware of the presence of illegal content on its site. Such illegal content may be copyrighted material uploaded to Dailymotion by its users. The judges held that Dailymotion was aware that illegal videos were put online on its site, and that it must therefore be held liable for the acts of copyright infringement, since it deliberately furnished the users with the means to commit the acts of infringement. In December 2014, Dailymotion was fined €1.3 million. The

Paris Court of Appeal The Court of Appeal of Paris (french: Cour d'appel de Paris) is the largest appeals court in France in terms of the number of cases brought before it. Its jurisdiction covers the departments of Paris, Essonne, Yonne, Seine-et-Marne, Seine-Saint-D ...

found that the site had infringed the copyright of French television station TF1 and news channel LCI. The court ruled that Dailymotion had failed to take action against users illegally posting TF1 content online. According to Guillaume Clément, Chief Product & Technology Officer, as of 2017 the company employs a combination of human curation and automated tools to ensure copyright holder rights are protected within the destination, and it is able to remove questionable or illegal content within two hours. Dailymotion has been permanently blocked in Russia since January 2017, because the Moscow City Court ruled that the site was repeatedly violating Russia's copyright law by providing access to illegal TV content.

References

External links