Dailymotion makes it to the iPhone

Popular Parisian video company will struggle, competing with pre-installed YouTube app

Dailymotion, a Parisian video sharing service quite popular in Europe, has just debuted its own pair of iPhone apps. Previously, Dailymotion had only been accessible as a mobile version via the Safari browser. Notably, the new apps will have a tough time competing with the pre-installed video app, YouTube, which has secured itself as the prime video site with over 100 million visitors per month.

That said, Dailymotion will like be competing with other, smaller streaming sites.

The app comes in two different versions: free and not-free. While the free app is ad-supported, the paid version ($5.99) is ad-free. While this business model could possibly work well for the company, the app is at an even further disadvantage considering that the pre-installed YouTube app already comes without ads.

Just like the YouTube app it will endlessly be compared to, Dailymotion's app allows users to search the library, browse the most popular and featured videos or by category, and access their own account. Only users with iPhone 3GS will be able to record and upload video. (The newest iteration of the Ustream app allows even owners of the older iPhone 3G to shoot live video, which makes me wonder why new apps, like Dailymotion's, would ignore such a large portion of the iPhone user base.)

Dailymotion serves around 12 million videos, a number that grows as more people use the site. Again, while this is tiny compared to YouTube, where users upload 24 hours of video per minute, Dailymotion should have no trouble making a splash, especially in Europe, where it is most popular.