Vessel was a commercial video service launched in early 2015 by former

Hulu Hulu () is an American subscription streaming service majority-owned by The Walt Disney Company, with Comcast's NBCUniversal holding a minority stake. It was launched on October 29, 2007 and it offers a library of films and television serie ...

executives

Jason Kilar Jason Alan Kilar (; born April 26, 1971) is an American businessman. He was the CEO of WarnerMedia from May 2020 to April 2022. He was previously an Amazon executive, the founding CEO of the short-lived Vessel, and the CEO of Hulu. Early life ...

and Richard Tom. Vessel was acquired by

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas in ...

on October 26, 2016 and was closed on October 31, 2016.

History

The service resembled that of

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

, whereby a viewer could watch videos for free. However, viewers could add "Early Access" at a $3 monthly or $20 annual fee to their account, which allowed them to view videos a minimum of 72 hours before the video is released to the general public. Vessel then created mobile applications for

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

and Android devices which optimized the videos for mobile viewing. The idea behind the site was that creators would be able to gain more revenue from their videos than on YouTube due to the subscription fee as well as advertisements. After the site was created, YouTube personalities such as LinusTechTips,

Craig Benzine Craig Gene Benzine (born October 5, 1980) is an American video producer, musician, and vlogger better known by his YouTube channel name of WheezyWaiter. On July 15, 2020, his channel hit 1 million subscribers and has over 155 million total vide ...

, Connor Franta,

Shane Dawson Shane Lee Yaw (born July 19, 1988), better known as Shane Dawson, is an American YouTuber, actor, fimmaker, writer, and musician. One of the first people to rise to fame on YouTube, he began making videos in 2008 at the age of 19 and garnered ...

, Doug Walker,

Caspar Lee Caspar Richard George Lee (born 24 April 1994) is a British-South African YouTuber turned investor and serial entrepreneur. He was featured in ''Forbes'' 30 Under 30 in 2020 for his work in media and advertising. Career Lee started his YouTube ...

Tanya Burr Tanya Burr (born 9 June 1989) is an English YouTuber and actress, who began posting makeup and fashion videos to her YouTube channel in 2009. In 2017, Burr began pursuing a career in acting, and has since had guest roles in series such as ''B ...

, ''

Good Mythical Morning ''Good Mythical Morning'' (abbreviated as ''GMM'') is an American comedy, talk and variety YouTube series created by Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal. The show first aired on YouTube on January 9, 2012, and continues to be uploaded every weekda ...

'', ''

Epic Meal Time ''Epic Meal Time'' is a Canadian YouTube cooking show known for creating extremely high-calorie meals, generally out of meat products (with particular emphasis on bacon) and including alcohol (especially Jack Daniel's). It debuted in Octobe ...

'', Super Best Friends Play,

Marcus Butler Marcus Lloyd Butler (born 18 December 1991) is an English model and former YouTuber, whose channels have reached over 4.1 million subscribers. In 2015, he released an autobiographical book, titled ''Hello Life!''. Butler co-hosted a radio sh ...

, Kent Heckel,

LaToya Forever LaToya Howard, better known under the name LaToya Forever, is a Canadian YouTube personality and author, best known for her eponymous YouTube channel as well as her video blog channel "LaToya's Life". In 2012, she was the official Vibe TV host a ...

, Delaila Johnson, Tre Melvin and Jack Vale signed up to have their content streamed on Vessel. On October 26, 2016,

Verizon Communications Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas i ...

announced that it had acquired Vessel, and that it would be shut down on October 31. Vessel's team was hired to revamp Verizon's fledgling video streaming service

go90 go90 was an American Internet television service and mobile app owned and operated by Verizon Communications. The service was positioned as a mobile-oriented "social entertainment platform" targeted primarily towards millennials, featuring a m ...

(resulting in 155 members of the service's existing staff being laid off), with Richard Tom retained and appointed as chief technology officer of Verizon Digital Entertainment. Kilar departed after the sale.

References

External links

* Internet properties established in 2015 Internet properties disestablished in 2016 Defunct video on demand services Subscription video on demand services Defunct subscription services IOS software 2016 mergers and acquisitions Verizon Communications acquisitions Former video hosting services {{website-stub

History

See also

References

External links