YouTube Australia Blog

First fan-voted ARIA Award for Best Video goes to Missy Higgins’ ‘Everyone’s Waiting’

Tuesday, 27 November 2012

We know the YouTube community loves its music videos, and yet even we were overwhelmed by the interest in the first ever fan-voted ARIA Award for Best Video, presented by ARIA and YouTube.

There were thousands upon thousands of votes, and last night Missy Higgins’ ‘Everyone’s Waiting’ was declared the winner.

The video’s director, Natasha Pincus, is no stranger to ARIA awards having won this Award last year for her now world-famous video, Gotye’s ‘Somebody That I Used To Know’.

Music videos have gone through a major renaissance in the last few years, and it’s wonderful to see our Australian artists embracing the medium and pushing creative boundaries. Last year's winner, Gotye, became one of the most viewed videos of all time on YouTube and it is a testament to the calibre of Australian recording artists and video producers that local talent continues to perform so well on YouTube globally.

Congratulations Missy and Natasha!

This line up of nominees for Best Video Award were:

Alex Weltlinger – 360 - Boys Like you
Luci Schroder – Alpine - Hands
Animal Logic – Hilltop Hoods - I Love It
Brent “Quincy” Buchanan – The Grindhouse – Jackson Firebird, Cock Rockin’
Emma Tomelty – Hermitude, from the album “Heperparadise”, Speak Of The Devil
Darcy Prendergast - Kate Miller-Heidke, I’ll Change Your Mind
Josh Logue - Lanie Lane – Oh Well, That’s What You Get Falling In Love With a Cowboy
Natasha Pincus- Missy Higgins, Everyone’s Waiting
Sam Bennetts – Bluejuice, Act Yr Age
Josh Logue -The Rubens, My Gun

Posted by Richard North, Content Partnership Manager, YouTube

Making it easier to watch YouTube videos on TV

Wednesday, 14 November 2012

Cross-posted from the Official YouTube Blog
What if you could send YouTube videos from your phone to your TV with a click of a button? It’s an idea we’ve been working on since 2010, and today we’re taking the next step.
We’re making it even easier to play videos from your phone or tablet on your TV, with a YouTube app update for Android and Google TV that automatically pairs your devices on the same WiFi. Just find a video on your YouTube app for Android — like the latest video from GoPro or H+ The Digital Series — click the TV icon that appears, and the video will play instantly on your Google TV. Like a remote control, you can pause, scroll or skip to the next video with your mobile device as it plays on your TV. Since your devices are connected in the cloud, you can also do things like find the next video to watch from your tablet or browse around the web on your phone, all while the video plays on TV. You can even connect multiple devices to the TV to have your friends add to the playlist. Stay tuned to see this feature coming to more devices and screens in the future. The next evolution of TV is in your hands. Timbo Drayson, Product Manager, recently watched all of H+ The Digital Series on his TV.

Have Your Say: 2012 ARIA Award for Best Video

Thursday, 1 November 2012

YouTube has become the world’s largest stage for up and coming musicians of all shapes & sizes (Gangnam anyone?). We’re proud to continue supporting Aussie music talent by giving you, the YouTube community, the chance to vote for the 2012 ARIA award for Best Video. Have a look at the nominees:

This year, Goyte’s musical sensation Somebody that I used to know has been viewed over 339 million times on YouTube, and that doesn’t include spin-offs and fan-uploaded videos that have been viewed over 260 million times. This group of five people on one guitar, and Wally’s own YouTube orchestra are two of our favourites.

To have your say, visit the official ARIA YouTube channel where you can watch all of the videos nominated for an ARIA this year, including the ten up for Best Video. Simply cast a thumbs up for who you think should win, and be sure to subscribe to the channel to find out who wins.

Posted by Ernesto Soriano III, YouTube Australia, just watched Minecraft Style - A Parody of PSY’s Gangnam Style

Social shift sees Gillard go viral

Wednesday, 17 October 2012

[Guest Blog Post by Kieran Ricketts, ABC News Online - Cross posted from the Google Australia Blog]
How does a piece of powerful Australian political theatre that saw accusations of misogyny hurled across the political divide become watercooler social media buzz the world over?
As with many ‘overnight’ online successes, it’s the result of a long tail of strategic thinking. The video in question – whatever your view of the politics that surround it – is compelling, polemic and tense.

And it’s had an extraordinary response – over 1.5 million views in less than a week. It has been watched so much that totalling the amount of minutes viewed equates to over 14.5 years of eyeballing – and it has been ‘liked’ on YouTube 15,000 times.

There are no happy accidents involved. ABC Innovation and ABC News Online have been participating in YouTube Partner Events over the last few months and gained some key insights into how we use the platform better.

We know that what we were doing in the past – simply channelling video en masse through to YouTube – was not working. We know people want a selection of video that is ‘watercooler’ content – content worth sharing, content that generates discussion and debate, powerful words and pictures. So we’re looking for that content actively, and putting it where people are – on social media platforms – instead of waiting for them to come to our News website.

The traffic to the Gillard clip comes from a range of places. It was featured on the YouTube front page, embedded by a variety of international mastheads including The New Yorker and played back 57% of the time on mobile devices – a statistic that would have been jawdropping years ago, but is now the status quo. We’ve also been working with our international social media partner Storyful to make content like this available to major international media partners the minute it is available.

Ratio of likes to dislikes on the video by the countries that viewed it the most between 8 and 14 October (ordered by number of likes)
To get to this position, we not only hinged off the back of some vastly improved technical processes that get crisp, clean video out of ABC News television systems and onto third parties at lightning speed – but also built a YouTube experience that encourages users to find more related ABC News content right alongside what they’re currently watching. We also place it all on a consistently branded YouTube channel. We’re heartened too that more YouTube users have reacted by subscribing to our YouTube channel so they see more of our content the minute it’s delivered.

The raw Gillard vision was available to a number of media outlets. That the ABC has had such a strong reception to this content ahead of other broadcasters is a reflection of our ability to get it online, in the right place at the right speed – a competitive advantage our rolling news focus at ABC News Online and ABC News 24 enables us to really leverage. It’s a coming of age story for us, really.

Guest post by Kieran Ricketts, ABC News Online

Finding the next generation of talented video educators with YouTube Next EDU Guru

Friday, 14 September 2012

Crossposted from the Official YouTube Blog
Across the Northern Hemisphere, students and their teachers are heading back into the classroom for another year of reading, writing, and ‘rithmetic. While what we learn has broadly stayed the same for years, how we learn is changing rapidly as technology advances. The rise of online educational videos is giving learners access to the world’s greatest thinkers and teachers, leveling the playing field for all.We believe that inspiring online educators can come from all walks of life, and we want to find the next generation of educational YouTube stars - people with a talent for explaining tough concepts in compelling ways, and the passion and drive to assemble a global classroom of students. YouTube educational channels like Khan Academy,CrashCourse, Veritasium, Numberphile, MinutePhysics and Ted-Ed have grown to millions of views and subscribers - could you be next?Today we’re teaming up with Khan Academy to start a search for the Next EDU Gurus--10 super talented and engaging content creators who we’ll support with training, promotion, and a $1000 B&H gift card for production equipment, so they can take the next step in their YouTube - and education - careers.Do you set historical events to music? Doodle your geometry? Sing your Shakespeare? We’re looking for content creators who create all kinds of curriculum-related videos, from grammar to geography, history to histograms. You can submit any style of video as long as it’s educational and family-friendly--just bear in mind that we’re looking for content creators who can take people on a journey through a topic, so if you could imagine making ten, twenty, or fifty more videos on the topic in the future, all the better!The 10 YouTube Next EDU Gurus will be selected by a panel from the YouTube Education team and the Khan Academy. One of these 10 will also be awarded the Khan Academy EDU Guru Prize. The program is open to creators in the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand; it opens today and closes on October 1.Our new EDU Gurus will help meet the growing demand for great educational content on YouTube. In the last year, you all spent 50% more time learning from YouTube Education’s 700,000 videos, and the number of subscribers to YouTube’s educational channels more than doubled. Check out the YouTube.com homepage today for the latest videos from some of our most engaging educational creators. You can also see a playlist of their latest and greatest below. If you’re an educator, visit youtube.com/teachers to view more than 300 playlists curated by teachers to align with common education topics. And if you’re looking for inspiration about incorporating YouTube in your school curriculum, see how one school from Kent, WA uses YouTube to experience the world beyond the walls of their classroom. Angela Lin, YouTube Education team, recently watched “Capitalism and Socialism: Crash Course World History #33.”

Introducing a new YouTube app for your iPhone and iPod touch

Tuesday, 11 September 2012

For all you diehard YouTube fans out there who can’t get enough YouTube on your mobile, we’ve got some great news: starting today, you can download the official YouTube app for iPhone and iPod touch from the App Store, bringing you more of the videos you love and more ways to share them with the people you care about.

The new app is built by YouTube engineers, to give our iPhone and iPod touch users the best mobile experience. Here’s what you’ll find:

Tens of thousands more videos: Watch official music videos like Taylor’s latest hit. New YouTube channel guide: Swipe your finger from the left edge of the screen to reveal a guide with your subscribed channels on YouTube, giving you instant access to everything from Alli Sports to YOMYOMF.

Find awesome videos faster: Get to videos like “Gangnam Style” faster with new search tools that give suggestions while you type, and let you sort through videos or channels. Flip through related videos, comments and more info, all while watching a video. More ways to share with the people you love: Share that incredible video you found on YouTube on Google+, Facebook or text message in the app, as well as from Twitter and email. There’s even more to explore with the new YouTube app for iPhone and iPod touch, available for download from the App Store today. We’re working on an optimized version of the YouTube app for iPad in the coming months, and stay tuned for more details.

You’ve already shown us you love YouTube on mobile—to the tune of 1 billion mobile views a day—so we can’t wait to see what you think about this new experience.

Andrey Doronichev, head of YouTube mobile, recently watched “One-Shot // Goodbye, beloved sister.”

YouTube’s next generation of creators and brand builders

Friday, 7 September 2012

Cross-posted from the Google Australia blog.
Rob Nixon, a former airport ground-crew worker from Perth turns his passion for cooking into a career and an audience of 100 million worldwide. Arlene Zelina, a 22-year-old singer-songwriter from Melbourne scores a record contract with a global pop superstar. Natalie Tran, a Sydney media and arts graduate, amasses an audience bigger than the Royal Wedding.

These are today’s media superstars. They’re using the sight, sound and motion of video to reach the 800 million people around the globe who tune into YouTube every month. They’ve become experts in building communities, inviting their audience in to participate in the creation of their content and brand.

The last few days successful Aussie YouTube partners came to Sydney to share their experience and knowledge with advertisers, media companies, other content creators and their fans at our series of YouTube Next events. At these events we’re also celebrating the seven-year evolution of YouTube and looking at the possibilities for our video platform in Australia.

Today, two thirds of online Australians are on YouTube every month and one in five say they now visit YouTube every day. And no surprise for smartphone loving Aussies, one in three Australian YouTube views happens on a mobile device, and this number is growing fast. We love watching Mighty Car Mods DIY car modification videos on our tablets in bed.

Click here or on the image below to check out some highlights from our YouTube NEXT kick-off event at Luna Park on Wednesday night.

Arlene Zelina performing at YouTube NEXT
We’re overwhelmed by the unlimited creativity and curiosity of the growing YouTube community and thanks to our collaboration with AFTRS we’re excited to offer a free, one-day workshop for young creatives like MGPactionsports at our Sydney office to learn how to become the next YouTube star.

We’re excited to see how Rob, Natalie, Arlene and the tens of thousands of other Australian YouTube partners will take it to the next level.

Lucinda Barlow, Head of Marketing Google Australia & New Zealand, recently watched How to order KFC like a boss

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