[Enhancement]: Allow creators to edit/reupload video without losing view counts and interactions

[Baralheia]

Description

I have two shorts on my profile from a little over a year ago that I would like to update with captions and a watermark, but there doesn't seem to be a way to re-upload an already-published video. The only option is to upload and publish a new video and then delete the old one - but if that video was popular, then you lose all the views and interaction you got on that video including comments. I'd like to have the ability to reupload an already published video without losing views/interactions.

Use-case

This feature request, if implemented, would enable creators to fix issues with their published videos without losing the view count and any likes, shares, or comments the video received after it's original upload. Corrections could be either for aesthetic/artistic reasons (adding watermarks or correcting mistakes in visual elements of the video) or to bring a video into compliance with the rules for an instance (i.e. if the video receives a strike because of the audio, a creator could replace the audio track to bring it into compliance - or for a hypothetical - say an instance had a rule that specified any spoken words in a video must have subtitles in the video, but a creator uploaded a video without subtitles that quickly got popular; this change would allow that creator to add subtitles then reupload the video without losing any interactions or views that the original had accumulated).

Acknowledgements

Yes

[Barbapulpe]

Sorry but I don't like that idea. I could have favorited a video or interacted with one, but if it changes, the interaction might become inappropriate.

Fictitious example : I like a video, I comment favorably on it and later on it is changed to offensive content. My followers will think I liked the second version.

[Baralheia]

Understandable, but there are ways to combat this. Mastodon, for instance, will notify you if a post you have interacted with was modified afterward, and you can see the edit history. On Loops, I'm not sure if video edit history could be done in a way that doesn't cause storage needs on the server to explode - maybe copies of the old version could be kept but just in a super compressed format, or maybe there could be an admin, mod, or community review process required before edits are approved/published, or maybe there could be restrictions on changes to video runtime to ensure the video isn't replaced with something wildly different... Just kind of spitballing ideas here. One thing's for sure though - if video edits are allowed, at an absolute minimum, notifications that the video was changed could and should be sent out to those who interacted with the video, similar to Mastodon.

[Barbapulpe]

Sounds super-complex to implement for rare use-cases and a benefit which sounds to me very marginal.

I would like to see other features and bug corrections first! (But that is just a matter of priorities)

[Baralheia]

Having the ability to fix issues in published videos without losing the interaction numbers they've already racked up is "very marginal"? Nah. Tons of use cases. Correcting subtitles, updating logos, changing contact details, replacing infringing content that isn't a substantial part of the video... Four things I can think of right off the top of my head. It's a pretty common thing that creators on short video platforms want, though currently to my knowledge only YouTube allows editing a short after it's been published.

I filed this feature request because it's something I'd like to see added to Loops in the future at some point, not because I think it needs to be a top priority. Feature requests are a "Hey dev, could you add this to the list of features to consider adding?", not a "OMG OMG FIX THIS NOWWW" sort of thing. There are definitely other things that need to be worked on and fixed first!

[thoroughmas]

Love this functionality on PeerTube, would be great to see it here too.