The Daily Reel - What You Should Watch

The Daily Reel has just raised seed round funding from Boston's Prism VentureWorks, which is reported to be in the high six-figure range. The LA based startup also had over 200,000 unique sign-ups last month according to co-founder and CEO Jeff Stern. The ad supported site's function is to sort through the maze of online video and recommend sites to users. The Reel is also trying to help new talent to rise above the confusion and reach industry executives with their video creations. Movie producer Jamie Patricof is also a co-founder of TDR, so the site appears to have a little Hollywood backing it. 

The Daily Reel was launched last fall according to an article on paidContent.org, and the site essentially recommends and reviews video from around the Web for their users. TDR categorizes these selections but the categories are rather loosely defined, and I am not exactly sure how the offerings are rated either. I just find it hard to believe that the one million videos produced yesterday did not include one or two really striking examples, but perhaps it was a slow day.

Today's offerings appear to reflect the general consensus that "goofy is king" in online video, as there are more of that genre than any other on TDR's obvious pages. Ads for the site are prevalent but not overly tacky, and the review/presentation of the videos is very tasteful. A few more categories or some definitive reason for these suggestions would be helpful, but again this is another developing site and every site can use improvement.

One aspect that I really like about The Daily Reel is the "Schmooze Forum", where users can share information and questions about everything video. The forum will be a big asset to users but a blog would have made the site a bit more Web 2.0 in my opinion. The developers claim that the site was created out of frustration, because of the massive mess of videos people have to sift through. TDR is supposed to sift through all this video and present the very best to its users. Whether they actually accomplish that is a subjective matter, but the site does have some very nice examples.

The Daily Reel is a unique and interesting (and logically progressive) twist in online video. Their methodology and premise are excellent, even if there might be questions about the rating system. TDR claims contributing critics from The New York Times and other notable sources. I don't visualize a columnist from the NYT sifting video all day, so a little more explanation of the process and people would help here. Judging from the rather mediocre front page lineup for today, either YouTube and others are devoid or TDR uses a sifter with a few holes in it. Then again it could just be my lacking video taste buds.

TDR is another one of those sites our readers will have to check out and weigh for their own utility. I like the site, and additional users will really dictate content there in the end. I expect to see more sites like this because people really need reviews to save their lives from the endless searching sometimes necessary to enjoy great video.