YouTube Creator Blog

Keeping the conversation going

Monday, July 27, 2015

YouTube is built by one of the most engaged communities on the web, and you tell us when you want changes. Today, you heard from Google+ about upcoming changes based on user feedback. We wanted to give you an early look at what this will mean with respect to comments on YouTube, and to your overall YouTube experience.

The headline: we think you’ll like it.

Comments

Comments are super important to the relationship between creators and fans on YouTube. You love MyLifeAsEva and Kingsley. You thought that latest video from Tyler was his funniest yet. You want to tell Epic Rap Battles who their next match-up should feature. And these creators want to hear from fans like you, just as much as you want to communicate with them.

All of these conversations should be simpler and easier to have on YouTube, and we’ve been working on that.

First off, we’ve improved the ranking system that reduces the visibility of junk comments. It’s working—the rate of dislikes on comments has dropped by more than 35 percent across YouTube.
With today’s announcement from Google+, you’ll see more changes. The comments you make on YouTube will now appear only on YouTube, not also on Google+. And vice-versa. This starts rolling out today.
Creators told us they liked the moderation options on their channels, like reviewing comments before they’re posted, blocking certain words, or auto-approving comments from certain fans. All this stays.

Your YouTube channel

This one’s further off. In the coming weeks, YouTube will no longer require a Google+ profile when you want to upload, comment, or create a channel. If you’re happy with everything as it is now, then just keep on keepin’ on. If you want to remove your Google+ profile, you’ll be able to do this in the coming months, but do not do it now or you’ll delete your YouTube channel (no bueno). Please visit our Help Center for further details.

We’ve heard you. Keep talking to us.

The YouTube team

Say hello to the redesigned YouTube mobile app

Thursday, July 23, 2015

This story was originally posted on the official YouTube blog. We're excited to release a bunch of the mobile features you've been waiting for: putting subscriptions front and center in the app, a simple way for your fans to opt in to all new upload notifications from your channel, and simple editing and upload tools baked into the YouTube app.

If you watched a YouTube video recently, chances are you did it on your phone or tablet. That’s because today, more than half the views on YouTube happen using mobile devices. So to bring you an even better mobile experience, we’re updating the official YouTube apps – making it easier than ever to find videos you love and create them, too.

The update – available now on Android, mobile web, and soon on iOS – introduces three new tabs:

Home: Easily explore and discover videos you'll love with recommendations based on your watch history as well as playlists personalized just for you.
Subscriptions: Find the latest videos from your favorite channels and creators on the new Subscriptions tab. And to help make sure you never miss an upload, you can now tap the bell icon on the channels you love to get a notification as soon as a new video is posted.
Account: Check out your playlists, watch history, and the videos you’ve uploaded all in one spot.

You can also now watch full-screen vertical videos with just a single tap for the very first time.

But YouTube isn’t just about enjoying videos; it’s a place to express yourself and show the world what you love. With the redesigned app you can take your creativity to new levels using a new set of video creation tools. You’ve got an amazing camera in your phone or tablet, and now you can trim your footage, tint the image with filters, add music, and upload – all inside the app.

These are just a few of the features we’ve been working on, and you’ll see many more later this year.

Matt Darby, Product Manager, and Omri Amarilio, Product Manager, recently watched "One of those days 2 - Candide Thovex."

A peek at what’s next for Creators in our June Creator Preview

Monday, June 29, 2015

Curious about what we’ve been up to? Well, you’re in luck! We squeezed ten things we’ve been working on to make YouTube better for creators into this little list video. Read more about what’s coming soon, below.

Comments - We've come up with a better ranking system that reduces the visibility of junk comments...and it's working. The rate of dislikes on comments has dropped by more than 30% across YouTube. Huzzah!
Subscriber notifications - Your fans don’t want to miss out on videos from their favorite creators–and neither do we. So we're building a simple new way for fans to opt in to get mobile and email notifications each and every time the channels they subscribe to publish a new video.
Easier access to the subs feed - We’re making it easier to get to the Subscriptions feed in an update to the YouTube mobile app coming soon. This is another way your fans will be able to stay on top of your latest videos.

A faster, more useful Creator Studio app - While we're talking about apps: We're also working on improvements to the Creator Studio app. You’ll get more insight about what’s happening on your channel, and notifications that help you decide what to do about it.

Video management on the go - You asked us to make it easier to manage your videos from your mobile phone. So we’re adding two major requests to the Creator Studio app: the ability to update thumbnails from your phone, and to enable or disable monetization on your videos, wherever you are.

New types of cards - Cards are awesome. They help you promote other content, sell merch and raise funds and more. Your feedback is helping us develop even more new card types. First up: the Channel card, which lets you link your videos to other channels, and will be a great way to share the love with collaborators.

360° videos - How far we can take the online video experience? We’re not sure, but we’re having a great time trying to find out. We recently added 360º video on YouTube, and we're working on adding 3D to the mix. Get ready for an immersive world!

Better live streams - We just made it easier for you to set up and manage your live streams. And where better to show them off than in our upcoming YouTube Gaming app?
New creator community - You need to find your people, and we want to help. The new YouTube Creator Community will be a new online forum for finding collaborators, sharing advice, and giving us feedback.

Updated Creator Academy - If you’re a creator, you never stop learning. So, in addition to the more than 50 lessons we’ve now added to the Creator Academy, we’ve made it easier to search and personalize your learning experience.

We know what you’re thinking: when do I get all of this? You can expect to see some of these features in a matter of weeks. Others, we’re still perfecting, and we’ll be rolling them out throughout the rest of the year.

Let us know how we’re doing. Share your thoughts on Google+ or Twitter—we’ll be reading, responding and using your feedback to help make these upcoming improvements even better. And, as always, thanks for everything you do.

Matt Glotzbach, VP, Product Management, recently watched (what else?) The Creator Preview

A new tool for artists and their teams

Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Did you know that Kina Grannis has more YouTube views in Quezon City, Philippines than any other city in the world? Or that Alabama Shakes—the American rock band formed in Athens, Alabama—is viewed more in São Paulo than any city south of the Mason-Dixon line? Whether you’re Kina, Alabama Shakes, or a part of the broader music community, info like this can be used to create all kinds of opportunities for both artists and fans.

As part of the recently-launched YouTube for Artists site, we’re rolling out a new data tool called Music Insights that gives the music community more insight into YouTube views to grow their success on and off of YouTube. Music Insights shows the cities around the world where an artist is most popular, top tracks by artist, and views from both artists’ official music videos and fan uploads claimed using Content ID to get a full picture of how fans are engaging with music on YouTube.

Screen Shot 2015-06-03 at 6.08.18 AM.png

View live data on Music Insights. Watch Major Lazer at youtube.com/majorlazer

There are all sorts of ways this data can be put to work by and for artists. For starters, this data can help you get a song added to radio by showing a programmer how big your local fan base is. It can be a great resource when mapping a tour, since top cities could be a good indicator for where fans might come out to see a concert. And you can share insights from your data to build buzz for a new video or express appreciation to the fans who helped get you here.

Starting today, Music Insights offers data for more than 10,000 of the most popular artists on YouTube and Google, and we’ll add more artists all the time. And since YouTube’s music artists and their fans span the globe, we’re also making YouTube for Artists available in 22 languages.

Knowledge is power; the more information you have in your hands, the easier it is to bring your music to the people who love it the most.

Michael Cumberbatch, YouTube for Artists Product Manager, recently watched “Involve your fans.”

360-degree videos now on Google Cardboard and iOS

Thursday, May 28, 2015

Recently YouTube launched support for 360-degree videos on Android and Chrome, giving you a new way to connect with your viewers. From letting people sit front row at SNL's 40th Anniversary show to taking them around the world and to music concerts, you’re sharing your awesome world in 360-degrees.

Now we're taking the YouTube 360 experience even further by giving your amazing videos new places to thrive. All of YouTube's 360-degree content is available on Google Cardboard with Android, providing a truly immersive experience to your viewers. Additionally, your fans can watch these videos on iOS 8.0 and above.

To give you more ways to start filming in 360, we've announced today the Jump capture rig, which consists of 16 camera modules in a circular arrangement. Jump lets you capture, assemble and share immersive, three-dimensional content so that even more people can experience a time or place like they’re actually there. While we are working to bring 3D viewing to 360 videos on YouTube soon, you can get a feel for Jump’s possibilities with this new 2D 360 music video from Avicii and Kurt Hugo Schneider, shot entirely on the Jump camera:

Inspired? 360 video camera rigs are available now at all 6 YouTube Space locations around the globe. We’ll be giving creators early access to test the Jump camera at our Spaces this summer.

These are the latest in a series of updates we’re making to provide you and your fans an astonishing—and accessible—virtual reality experience. While we’re working to add more platforms and bring 3D viewing to 360 videos on YouTube, please visit the new home for YouTube 360 videos.

Sanjeev Verma, product manager, recently watched Earth Encounter by StressLevelZero.

60fps Live Streaming on YouTube in HTML5

Thursday, May 21, 2015

We launched 60fps video playback on YouTube a few months ago, and from game walkthroughs to superbike racing, you’ve found all sorts of awesome ways to make use of higher frame rates.

Now we want to help you take it even further with something new: 60fps live streaming, launching today as an early preview on HTML5-compatible browsers. When you start a live stream on YouTube at 60fps, we’ll transcode your stream into 720p60 and 1080p60, which means silky smooth playback for gaming and other fast-action videos. We’ll also make your stream available in 30fps on devices where high frame rate viewing is not yet available, while we work to expand support in the coming weeks.

We know high frame rates are especially important for gaming streams, so we’ve worked with Elgato and XSplit on new versions of Elgato Game Capture, XSplit Broadcaster, and XSplit Gamecaster that support 60fps live streaming to YouTube, available for download starting today. In addition, any app using our live streaming API can add a new high frame rate flag to enable 60fps streaming.

But wait, there’s more! We’ve also added another long-requested feature for live streaming: HTML5 playback. As of this week, YouTube live streams will use an HTML5 player in supported browsers. And because our HTML5 player supports variable speed playback, you can skip backward in a stream while it’s live and watch at 1.5x or 2x speed to catch back up.

These are the latest in a series of improvements we’ve been making to live streaming on YouTube and there are plenty left to come, so stay tuned for more very soon. In the meantime, check out some live streams or create your own!

Alan Joyce, Product Manager, recently uploaded a 60fps playthrough of a terrible NES game.

YouTube Space Berlin – new home for YouTube creators in Germany and beyond

Thursday, April 30, 2015

The German creator scene forms one of the world’s most vibrant YouTube communities. They produce content for passionate audiences in a country where video consumption is amongst the highest in the world. To support this incredible community of YouTube creators and foster the next generation of talent, YouTube has partnered with MET Film School to open YouTube Space Berlin.

MET Film School is one of Europe’s largest film schools, running undergraduate, postgraduate and short programmes in practical filmmaking. Through this partnership, Germany's most talented YouTube creators, as well as, all of the students, will have free access to high end audio, visual and editing equipment, in addition to training programs, workshops and community events.

This collaboration follows in the footsteps of our YouTube Spaces in Los Angeles, London, Tokyo and most recently, New York City and Sao Paulo. Since the first Space was launched in 2012, creators have visited our Spaces over 100 thousand times, we have had over 800 events and workshops and our partners have created over 10 thousand videos.

Like all of our production facilities, YouTube Space Berlin will be a place where creators can collaborate, innovate and experiment with new content for audiences around the world to watch and love. It’ll also offer opportunities to:

Learn: From training programs and workshops to master classes, there are opportunities to get hands-on experience from industry leaders, and learn to use high end production equipment, production techniques, and YouTube best practices.
Connect: Attend events, meet fellow creators, spark new ideas and share experiences on how to succeed on YouTube: Happy Hours, Events for gaming, sports, family entertainment, collaboration events and more.
Create: This is a space for creators to bring stories to life. They’ll have access, for free, to a studio and all the latest audio, visual and editing equipment that will enable them to experiment and create great videos that fans will love.

The YouTube Space Berlin is another way for YouTube to help foster creativity, entrepreneurship and partnership with top video creators in the country and around the world. It’s amazing to see what creators have already been producing and we are excited to see what is coming next.

Posted by David Ripert, Head of YouTube Spaces EMEA, recently watched Kurz Gesagt - What is Life?

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