YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki Humiliates Facebook, Asks Them To Quit Video & Stick To Baby Picture

Facebook is trying to reinvent itself, part of which involves a new video property. Watch, as it’s called, is supposed to be the company’s answer to YouTube. However, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki doesn’t really even consider the move a threat.

Wojcicki told Recode during its Code Media conference earlier this week that “you always have to take your competitors seriously.” She said she wasn’t aware of any video efforts from Facebook aside from what’s already been reported about, but she wasn’t afraid to send a shot over the bow when pressed on the question.

“I mean, I think they should focus on what they’re focused on,” Wojcicki said. “I think they should get back to baby pictures and sharing.”

You really can’t blame Wojcicki for the sentiment either. Facebook has videos, sure, but it’s never been a serious competitor in that space. Its Watch tab turned out to be mostly viral videos and conspiracy theories, and didn’t even let you search for a video of your choice within the page.

Of course, Facebook has plans to improve that by planning to allow more content creators to upload for free, instead of selling the rights to their show to Facebook. That should help small-scale creators who got the short end of the stick with YouTube’s new monetization policies, but it’s hard to say whether the platform will ever gain any advantage over the well-established YouTube. That’s especially true if Facebook’s moderation policies remain as abysmal as they are now, so maybe Wojcicki really has nothing to worry about.