[asciimo]

All this may be historically true. But entertainment has been evolving since the birth of the internet, and some entertainers will evolve with it. Yes, this is a poor substitute for conventional stage stand-up. But surely the core of a talented "funny person" can be adapted to this new format.

There's an interesting phenomenon with late night hosts doing their monologues from home. They're really bad at it (at least they were for the first couple of weeks). They're writing the same type of material they wrote in their televised audience shows; same type of language, same topics, same timing. It was really awkward. A common critique was, "My 16 year old daughter does better youtube than _______" (e.g., Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers). So maybe this is the dawn of of a new era, and the big TV stars will either adapt or fade away.

[gexla]

Love this comment and totally agree. If a service such as this takes off, it will look much different years from now. I'm just criticizing the early ugly attempts. You're right.