Australia Blog
News and rising stars from YouTube Australia
The YouTube Awards Are Back!
Thursday, 13 March 2008
In 2007, we witnessed an explosion of ideas and creativity on YouTube. You showed us that online video is not just a way to share pet and baby videos (though it is certainly good for that, too), but rather it can be so much more: a showcase for aspiring artists, a megaphone for everyday people, a way to learn new skills and even to change the political process.
In recognition of all of these vibrant uses of and communities on YouTube, we expanded the awards this year to include five new categories -- Best Short Film, Best Political Video, Best Sports Video, Best Eyewitness Video, and Best Instructional Video – for a total of 12. Each category now has six nominees instead of 10 (a special nod to those of you with short attention spans). If you want to vote local,
DarkHeartProductions
is representin' strong for Australia.
You'll also notice that the structure of the awards and the way voting works look a little different this year. Every time you refresh the page, the order of the categories and the featured thumbnail change in a random order so there can be no bias in the way the content is viewed or presented.
As you might imagine, whittling down any category to six videos was a gargantuan task and already we'll say we're sorry to the hundreds/thousands of deserving content creators who didn't get nominated. But you can't exactly blame us - you made these videos memorable and helped them rise to the top of the YouTube charts. The nominees reflect some of the most buzzed-about videos on the site, particularly the ones you bookmarked to watch later (and presumably again and again).
So head over to our
YouTube Video Awards channel
to start watching and voting for some of the videos that defined '07. You can vote once per day (though you may not change your vote on the same day) and you have until 11:59pm PT on March 19, 2008, to do so. Winners will be announced on March 21, 2008, at which point we'll feature them on
this page
as well as overnight them
a trophy like no other
(and believe us when we say this). Winners will also get a special invitation to a YouTube event later this year.
Good luck and have fun!
The YouTube Team
YouTube Everywhere
Tuesday, 11 March 2008
We try really hard to make YouTube as open as possible. Anyone can upload and view videos, which can be embedded anywhere and viewed on all kinds of different devices. And, of course, anyone can participate in our community by commenting on videos, rating them, and sharing them with friends.
Nevertheless, we worried that we weren't open enough. So, we pulled some all-nighters and added some powerful new ways to integrate YouTube content and community into other websites, desktop applications, video games, mobile devices, televisions, cameras, and lots more.
For users, the exciting news is that they will be able to actively participate in the YouTube community from just about anywhere, including the online destinations and web communities they already love and visit regularly. For partners and developers, YouTube has grown into much more than a website. It has become an open, general purpose, video services platform, available for use by just about any third-party website, desktop application, or consumer device. We now provide a complete set of (CRUD) capabilities for uploading, managing, searching, and playing back user videos and metadata from the YouTube "cloud," managed by us. We do all of the hard work of transcoding and hosting and streaming and thumbnailing your videos, and we provide open access to our sizable global audience, enabling you to generate traffic for your site, visibility for your brand, or support for your cause. Meanwhile, we provide full access to our substantial video library, enabling you to attract users and enhance the experience on your site. It's all free, and it's available to everyone, starting now.
Technically, we have introduced some new APIs. (This is just a geeky acronym for Awesomely Powerful Interactions, which is what users are now capable of performing from just about anywhere.) Building upon our existing APIs for querying the YouTube library and playing embedded YouTube videos, we have added the following new API services for external developers and partners:
Upload videos and video responses to YouTube
Add/Edit user and video metadata (titles, descriptions, ratings, comments, favorites, contacts, etc)
Fetch localised standard feeds (most viewed, top rated, etc.) for 18 international locales
Perform custom queries optimised for 18 international locales
Customise player UI and control video playback (pause, play, stop, etc.) through software
The number of possible new applications is endless.
Electronic Arts
has enabled gamers to capture videos of fantastical user-generated creatures from their upcoming game, Spore, and publish these directly into YouTube. The
University of California, Berkeley
is bringing free educational content to the world, enhancing their open source lecture capture and delivery system to publish videos automatically into YouTube.
Animoto
enables its users to create personalised, professional-quality music videos from their own photos and upload them directly to YouTube.
Tivo
is providing its users a rich and highly participative YouTube viewing experience on the television. For more details about the innovative ways these other partners are utilising YouTube APIs, see our
case studies
.
What will you build with our new APIs? The possibilities are endless. Learn more about the exciting new features in this release from
our engineers
or visit
Google Code
to get started now. We can't wait to see what you create.
Enjoy,
Jim Patterson, Product Management
The YouTube Team
Site Update
Monday, 3 March 2008
The following features are now appearing on YouTube. Check out the goods...
CHARACTER COUNTER FOR VIDEO COMMENTS
The visual counter lets you know exactly how many characters you have left before approaching the limit. Now you will always know how many words you can fit in before hitting 'submit'.
CONTEXTUAL HELP IN MY ACCOUNT
You'll notice some new help icons next to features on your
account
. To see instructions and helpful information related to managing things like your
channel design
and
videos
, just hover over the " ? " icons. Click the "read more" link to go directly to the full article related to that particular feature in our Help Centre.
EXPERIMENTAL PERSONALISED HOMEPAGE BETA
We just launched a new experimental personalised YouTube homepage. Check out all the details in our
previous blog post
before you opt in to the beta by clicking
here
.
And now, we grace you with the stylings of
pzottolo
in the latest edition of YouTube News:
Best,
The YouTube Team
Invitation to Test Our New Homepage Beta
Friday, 29 February 2008
We mentioned the upcoming limited release of a New Experimental Personalised Homepage on our blog a few days ago. As of today, the page is now available to a small, randomly selected group of users. But even if you're not in this group, you can still give it a whirl. You only need to login to your YouTube account and click
this link
to opt in to the experiment.
We want to know what you think about this new personalised YouTube experience. The more feedback we receive the better, so don't forget to leave your comments here. We'll be watching!
The YouTube Team
New Experimental Personalised Homepage
Tuesday, 26 February 2008
Something we talk a lot about here at YouTube are ways to make it even easier to discover great videos that you'll find interesting. That's why, in the coming days, we will be making an experimental version of a new YouTube homepage available to a small group of users chosen at random. If you're not in the initial group that tests the experimental homepage, but want to give it a whirl, you'll be able to in the near future. We'll post another blog with a link to give everyone access.
What will this homepage look like? Glad you asked!
Alongside homepage regulars like Featured and Most Popular videos, the experimental homepage will include personalised recommendations, the latest videos from your subscriptions and an easier way to see what your friends are uploading, making their favourites and rating. Here's a bit more information on what this means:
Recommendations:
With tens of millions of videos on YouTube, finding the perfect video to watch can sometimes be challenging. That's why, based on what you've viewed and favourited in the past, you'll see an algorithmically-selected set of videos that you otherwise may never have discovered.
Latest From Your Subscriptions:
It's no secret that many people jump for joy when their favourite video creators upload new material. To help you keep track of the most current activity, we've changed the layout that displays newly added videos from your subscriptions. You'll be able to see videos from your three most recently updated subscriptions.
Friend Activity:
The experimental YouTube homepage includes a "Friend Activity" feature to make it easier to stay in the loop on all the great vids your buddies are buzzing about. If you already display your favourites, ratings, or uploaded videos on your channel, then your
existing, confirmed friends
will receive a feed of updates when you favourite, rate, or upload. Remember, you control your list of friends on YouTube. You also control the activities that appear to others on your channel and now in your friends' feeds. Just click on the
"Channel Design"
link once you've clicked on the
"Account"
link at the top of any page to turn on features or turn off features you don't wish to share publicly or in your friends' feeds.
In addition, we include a dashboard that places stats about your
Inbox
and information about your videos front and centre. The new display also showcases stats such as your uploads, total views, number of honours and more.
The goal with all of this is to gauge people's interest in having a YouTube that's tailored to the individual. Ultimately, we want to get you one step closer to the videos you'll enjoy every time you come to the site. We're excited to hear your thoughts on the personalised YouTube experience and we welcome your feedback.
Again, when the link to the new experimental homepage is available, we'll let you know so keep your eyes on the blog!
The YouTube Team
The Berlinale Talent Campus on YouTube
Saturday, 16 February 2008
This weekend, the 58th annual Berlin International Film Festival wraps
up and, with it, the sixth annual
href="http://www.youtube.com/BerlinaleTC">Berlinale Talent Campus, a
summit for 350 young filmmakers to attend lectures, classes and panel
discussions and to work on their own projects in hands-on workshops.
For the second year, the
href="http://www.youtube.com/BerlinaleTC">Talent Campus also
featured a special program called the Garage Studio, a production
platform for four lucky filmmakers to shoot and edit a short film for
the Internet under the tutelage of master filmmakers and using amazing
production resources. (Mike Figgis, the award-winning director of
Leaving Las Vegas
and
Internal Affairs
, was one such mentor.)
The best part? You can see the final four films, plus behind-the-scenes
footage from the
href="http://www.youtube.com/BerlinaleTC">Campus, right here:
value='http://www.youtube.com/cp/vjVQa1PpcFOljzJBKCaf_tiqk9PPQ-BBkmAovRawBHA='
>
name='wmode' value='transparent'>
src='http://www.youtube.com/cp/vjVQa1PpcFOljzJBKCaf_tiqk9PPQ-BBkmAovRawBHA='
type='application/x-shockwave-flash' wmode='transparent' width='500'
height='430'>
For more information on the
href="http://www.youtube.com/BerlinaleTC">Talent Campus, visit the
website
and
think about applying next year - for any aspiring filmmaker, it is an
opportunity not to be missed!
Happy viewing,
Sara P.
YouTube Film
New Face, No Significant Increase in Hair
Friday, 1 February 2008
Hi YouTubers,
I'm very excited to introduce myself. I'm your new Comedy Manager, Mark Day. Some of you might know me as a bald guy ranting in front of a yellow wall, in what some believe to be "a pretend Scottish accent." But given the countless number of users on the site, I'll be a new name to many of you. Either way, I'll be doing everything I can to bring you the full range of comedy available on YouTube today -- from the best sketch groups and the latest movie parodies to up-and-coming stand-up comedians and the kind of videobloggers who love to make their subscribers laugh.
I've been a YouTube user since March of '06, and I've been lucky enough to meet and even collaborate with many talented people since then. I know just how much work people put into creating original content, and I'm looking forward to helping our finest comedic talent find the spotlight to shine.
Now that I'm part of the YouTube team, you won't be seeing much of my big bald head any more (which is, perhaps, a blessing). But I do want to thank everyone who made it fun for me to get in front of a video camera in the first place. Now I hope I do my part to encourage more users to post their own rants, skits and amusing opinions. As for my yellow wall, it's currently hoping to film its own sitcom pilot as soon as the writers' strike is over.
Cheers,
Mark D.
YouTube Comedy
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