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Economy

‘YouTube to fuel next-gen creator economy’

The creator economy will continue to thrive as creation becomes frictionless, consumption becomes boundless and fandoms expands, he added….reports Asian Lite News

The next generation of creators are coming from all corners of India and the creator economy will continue to thrive as creation becomes frictionless, consumption becomes boundless and fandoms expands, Google-owned YouTube said here on Wednesday.

Commemorating its 15 years since its localised version launched in India, YouTube said that driven by an expansion of creation tools and increasing preference for personalised viewing, India’s creative entrepreneurs have explored and conquered new frontiers of creative expression.

“As more sophisticated creation tools continue to democratize creativity, we’re seeing the creator economy take a new shape in the country. The next-gen of creators are coming from all corners of the country. Subcultures are becoming mainstream. And, the intersection of creativity and fan-fuelled discovery and commerce will drive the next wave of success,” Ishan John Chatterjee, Director, India, YouTube, told IANS.

The creator economy will continue to thrive as creation becomes frictionless, consumption becomes boundless and fandoms expands, he added.

Around 69 per cent of Gen Z in India like when their favourite creators are creating in different formats (short form, long form, podcasts, live streams).

This creative expansion is helping breathe new life into popular, well-established genres such as gaming, tech, comedy or cooking, reviving interest in many niche topics and cultures and fuelling the emergence of new genres like science, facts or motivation, according to YouTube.

The platform has over 80 million premium users across the world. According to third-party estimates, YouTube users in India grew from 122 million in 2017 to around 567 million last year.

With 71 per cent of people watching videos about a specific topic that they are into in multiple different formats, consumption has become boundless and seamless in the country.

“We introduced our localized version of YouTube in India in 2008, offering not only a bigger window into pop culture but also allowed the viewers to imprint their own voice and culture. Since then, Indian creators have pushed the boundaries of their creative expression and triumphed in doing so. And, YouTube started evolving into a platform for entertainment, education, and enrichment,” Chatterjee informed.

A latest survey by Oxford Economics showed that in 2022, 80 per cent of creators in India, who earn money from YouTube, agree that YouTube provides an opportunity to create content and earn money that they wouldn’t get from traditional media.

“Audiences want personalized experiences, in different formats, to meet different needs. And, these evolving preferences are redefining entertainment and making consumption more participative,” said Pawan Agarwal, Director, Music Partnerships, India, YouTube.

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Tech Lite Technology

YouTube testing new ‘For You’ section on channel homepages

YouTube.

YouTube had started testing improvements to the channel page layout. The platform also announced that it was testing artificial intelligence (AI) auto-generated summaries…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned YouTube has announced that it is testing a new ‘For You’ section on channel homepages.

“We’re starting to test a way to make the channel homepage more personalised to individual viewers by adding a new ‘For You’ section that will recommend a mix of different content types from that channel based on the videos they’ve already watched,” the company said on the ‘YouTube test features and experiments’ page on Tuesday.

Creators cannot opt out during this experiment but when the company will roll this out to everyone, creators will be able to control whether the For You section will be shown on their channels and which content types will be shown.

Last week, the video-sharing platform had started testing improvements to the channel page layout. The platform also announced that it was testing artificial intelligence (AI) auto-generated summaries.

This feature will make it easier for users to read a quick summary about a video and decide whether it is the right fit for them. The company noted that these summaries do not replace video descriptions which are written by creators.

The Google-owned platform had also introduced new creation tools for short, vertical videos ‘YouTube Shorts’, including a Collab tool and Q&A sticker. While the Collab tool allows users to record a Short in a side-by-side format with other YouTube or Shorts videos, the Q&A sticker allows creators to ask their audience questions and get responses right in the comments.

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Tech Lite Technology

YouTube testing improvements to channel page layout

Another experimental feature the company announced provides bigger previews to users while seeking. This feature will be helpful as it makes it easier for users to find the exact moment in the video that they want to watch…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned YouTube has announced that it is testing improvements to the channel page layout. “We’re starting to test changes to creator channel pages where tabs like ‘Playlists’ won’t be shown in cases where those tabs have no content,” the company said on the ‘YouTube test features and experiments’ page.

“We’re also testing improved access to the information from the ‘About’ and ‘Channels’ tab by updating the look and feel of the channel page.”  The company is currently testing this with a limited number of viewers.

Last month, the platform had introduced an experimental feature that allows users to easily watch videos at 2x speed. With this feature, users can long press anywhere on the player while watching a video to automatically bump the playback speed to 2x.

Another experimental feature the company announced provides bigger previews to users while seeking. This feature will be helpful as it makes it easier for users to find the exact moment in the video that they want to watch.

The company also tested a lock screen feature, which allowed testers to disable touch input while watching a video on Android and iOS. Last week, the video-sharing platform had announced that it was testing artificial intelligence (AI) auto-generated summaries.

This feature will make it easier for users to read a quick summary about a video and decide whether it is the right fit for them. The company noted that these summaries do not replace video descriptions which are written by creators.

ALSO READ-YouTube testing viewer-created Shorts featuring comments

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Social Media Tech Lite

YouTube testing viewer-created Shorts featuring comments

Earlier, the video-sharing platform had announced that it was testing a new feature that allows users to long press anywhere on the player while watching a video to automatically bump the playback speed to 2x…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned YouTube has announced that it is testing a feature that enables mobile viewers to create Shorts featuring comments posted on videos they’re watching.

“While creators are already able to reply to comments (posted on their own content) with a Short, we want to explore offering viewers the opportunity to create content from comments as well,” the company said in a support page. The Short will appear in the Shorts feed and on the viewers’ channel page.

“Viewer-created Shorts won’t send notifications to the creator whose video the comment is on, nor the comment author,” it added. Moreover, the creators can’t prohibit their comments from being featured in a Short, unless comments on their videos are disabled. This experiment is currently available to a small percentage of viewers on Android and iOS mobile devices across the globe.

Earlier, the video-sharing platform had announced that it was testing a new feature that allows users to long press anywhere on the player while watching a video to automatically bump the playback speed to 2x.

The company was also testing a feature that provides bigger previews to users while seeking. This feature will be helpful as it will make it easier for users to find the exact moment in the video that they want to watch. Moreover, the platform was testing a lock screen feature, which allows users to disable touch input while watching a video. It will help prevent accidental taps causing pause, skip or disruption of the video.

Last month, the video-sharing platform had said that it was testing a three-strikes policy for people using ad blockers. The company also provided details on how the policy works, while noting that “ad blockers violate YouTube’s Terms of Service”.

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Business Social Media Tech Lite

YouTube opens its official shopping channel in South Korea

YouTube.

This is the first time YouTube is opening an official shopping channel in any country in the world…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned YouTube will launch its official shopping channel in South Korea for live commerce later this month for the first time in the world, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.

The new channel, set to open on June 30, will provide a live commerce platform to companies and plans to livestream shopping content with about 30 brands at launch, according to the people.

This is the first time YouTube is opening an official shopping channel in any country in the world.

“YouTube is committed to building an engaging, informative and entertaining shopping experience for all users, including in Korea. To do this, we may experiment with a variety of YouTube Shopping features from time to time as we continue to work hard to optimize and deliver the best experience for our users,” a YouTube official told Yonhap News Agency, without providing details.

Last year, YouTube rolled out a new shopping tab in its Explore section, allowing eligible creators to tag products in their livestreams or list products under their videos, and viewers to purchase those products.

During Alphabet’s fourth quarter 2022 earnings call, Philipp Schindler, the chief business officer of the company, said Alphabet will focus on making YouTube more “shoppable,” as part of efforts to foster more creators, which will lead to more content and viewers, and ultimately more opportunities for advertisers. Alphabet is the parent company of Google and YouTube.

“It’s still nascent, but we see lots of potential and making it easier for people to shop from the creators, brands and content they love,” Schindler said.

YouTube saw its revenue from ads falling 2.6 per cent (year-on-year) in the March quarter — third quarter in a row that its ad revenue has decreased.

YouTube logged $6.69 billion in advertising revenue for the quarter that ended March 31, compared to $6.87 billion during the same period last year.

The company, however, is seeing growth in Shorts as watch time and monetisation is “progressing nicely”.

“People are engaging and converting on ads across Shorts at increasing rates,” according to Schindler.

ALSO READ-YouTube stops removing fake US presidential poll fraud claims

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Social Media Tech Lite

YouTube stops removing fake US presidential poll fraud claims

Following the 2020 election, YouTube found that videos from authoritative sources like news outlets represented the most viewed and most recommended election videos on YouTube…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned YouTube has announced to stop removing content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches occurred in the 2020 and other past US presidential elections.

The platform instituted elections misinformation policy focused on the integrity of past US Presidential elections in December 2020.

Two years, tens of thousands of video removals, and one election cycle later, “we recognised it was time to reevaluate the effects of this policy in today’s changed landscape”, the company said in a statement.

In the current environment, “we find that while removing this content does curb some misinformation, it could also have the unintended effect of curtailing political speech without meaningfully reducing the risk of violence or other real-world harm”.

YouTube said that the “ability to openly debate political ideas, even those that are controversial or based on disproven assumptions, is core to a functioning democratic society — especially in the midst of election season. As with any update to our policies, we carefully deliberated this change,” it added.

This specific aspect of our elections misinformation policy represents just one piece of a broad, holistic approach towards supporting elections on YouTube. Here’s what isn’t changing:

Following the 2020 election, YouTube found that videos from authoritative sources like news outlets represented the most viewed and most recommended election videos on YouTube.

“All of our election misinformation policies remain in place, including those that disallow content aiming to mislead voters about the time, place, means, or eligibility requirements for voting; false claims that could materially discourage voting, including those disputing the validity of voting by mail; and content that encourages others to interfere with democratic processes,” said the company.

“We’ll have more details to share about our approach towards the 2024 election in the months to come,” it added.

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Social Media Tech Lite

YouTube rolls out ‘sleep timer’ in Music app

YouTube.

The feature is currently available to some YouTube Music subscribers who have reported, however, it’s not widely available to every user…reports Asian Lite News

Google-owned Youtube has started to roll out a ‘sleep timer’ feature to its music streaming service YouTube Music. The feature is now appearing for songs at the bottom of the Now Playing overflow menu in the app, according to 9to5Google.

The sleep timer feature could be useful for those who like to fall asleep while listening to music.

The benefit of the sleep timer feature is that the music player can automatically stop playing after a while so that users do not have to worry about the continuous playback of music on the earphones or speakers when falling asleep.

The report said that the feature has not been rolled out widely and is currently available only to a limited number of users. Meanwhile, YouTube has started to roll out the ‘real-time lyrics’ feature to its music streaming service YouTube Music on Android and iOS.

The feature is currently available to some YouTube Music subscribers who have reported, however, it’s not widely available to every user.

It is similar to the real-time lyrics feature that is available on other music streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music.

YouTube Music rolls out ‘real-time lyrics’ on Android, iOS

Google-owned YouTube has started to roll out the ‘real-time lyrics’ feature to its music streaming service YouTube Music on Android and iOS.

The feature is currently available to some YouTube Music subscribers who have reported, however, it’s not widely available to every user, reports 9to5Google.

It is similar to the real-time lyrics feature that is available on other music streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music.

With real-time lyrics, users can sing along to their favourite songs while following the lyrics in real-time, which can enhance their listening experience.

YouTube Music currently displays static lyrics when users drag up the middle tab at the bottom of Now Playing, the report said.

The feature has already been enabled by several users, who have posted screenshots and their experiences on Reddit.

Users can use this functionality by opening the YouTube Music app and selecting a song to play. In addition, they can manually enable the real-time lyrics function once the song begins playing by tapping on the ‘lyrics’ tab at the bottom of the screen.

Meanwhile, YouTube has rolled out song and album credits to its Music app. With this new feature, users will be able to see song and album credits when listening to their favourite music.

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India News Social Media

India govt blocked 110 YouTube channels since December 2021

In response to a separate question, the union minister said the Fact Check Unit of the Press Information Bureau has busted more than 1,160 fake news…reports Asian Lite News

The central government has issued directions for blocking 110 YouTube-based news channels and 248 URLs since December, 2021 for carrying content against the sovereignty of the country, Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur said.

In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Parliament, Thakur also said the National Crime Records Bureau did not maintain any separate data on journalists.

The minister was responding to a question put by Congress member Pradyut Bordoloi who had sought details and the number of journalists arrested under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act (UAPA), Indian Penal Code and other penal laws during the last five years and the current year, news agency PTI reported.

YouTube.

Thakur said that ‘Police’ and ‘Public Order’ are state subjects under the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India and state governments are responsible for prevention, detection and investigation of crimes and for prosecuting the criminals through their law enforcement agencies.

He said the Ministry has issued directions for blocking access of 110 YouTube-based news channels and 248 user generated URLs, including webpages, websites, posts/accounts on social media platforms, podcasts, and apps for carrying content referred to section 69A of the IT Act, 2000.

In response to a separate question, the union minister said the Fact Check Unit of the Press Information Bureau has busted more than 1,160 fake news, it was reported.

The minister said the Fact Check Union takes cognizance of news both suo-motu and by way of queries sent by citizens, the report added.

Abusive content

Thakur on Sunday indicated that the government has taken a serious note of rising complaints about increasing abusive and obscene content shown on over the top (OTT) platforms and if need arises, it may change rules governing them.

Addressing a press conference in Nagpur, Thakur said: “Abusive language in the name of creativity will not be tolerated. The government is serious about the complaints of increasing abusive and obscene content on OTT platforms. If there is a need to make any changes in the rules regarding this, the ministry is willing to consider that.”

He further said that “these platforms were given freedom for creativity, not obscenity”.

“Whatever necessary action needs to be taken on this, the government will not back down from it,” he said.

“The process so far is that the producer has to resolve the received complaints at the first level. Around 90 per cent to 92 per cent of the complaints are resolved by them by making necessary changes. The next level of complaint resolution is at the level of their association, where most of the complaints are resolved. At the last level, it comes to the level of the government, where action is taken at the departmental committee level, according to the rules that are in place.

“… but complaints have started increasing in the last few days and the department is taking it very seriously. If there is a need to make a change, we are willing to consider it seriously,” Thakur said.

ALSO READ-YouTube TV’s ‘multiview’ feature rolling out to all users

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Social Media Tech Lite

YouTube TV’s ‘multiview’ feature rolling out to all users

YouTube TV's 'multiview' feature rolling out to all users.

Commenting on the announcement, one user asked, “Any chance it’ll ever be more than two screens? I have only ever seen that since yesterday.”..reports Asian Lite News

Video-sharing platform YouTube on Saturday announced that it is rolling out its streaming television service’s new “multiview” feature to all usersAthat allows subscribers to watch up to four different programs at the same time.

The company tweeted from its YouTube TV account: “Wow! We hear ya! We’re rolling out multiview streams to ALL users for the rest of the tournament.”

“We didn’t plan to release this beyond our test group so soon. Please be patient while we fine tune and fix known issues. Enjoy multiview early as we prep for a biiig fall.”

Commenting on the announcement, one user asked, “Any chance it’ll ever be more than two screens? I have only ever seen that since yesterday.”

To this, the platform replied, “since this is a pilot feature, we’re still figuring out the best configurations. you may see anywhere from 2 to 4 streams shown together based on the timing of when games are scheduled to begin and end.”

Earlier this week, the company had announced the “multiview” feature andAsaid that early access to multiview will roll out to all YouTube TV members over the next few months.

ALSO READ-UK govt to look into Youtube gathering child data  

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UK govt to look into Youtube gathering child data  

YouTube.

Britain’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) said it would consider the complaint carefully…reports Asian Lite News

Britain’s information regulator said on Wednesday it would look into an official complaint accusing Alphabet Inc’s YouTube of illegally collecting data from millions of children.

The complaint lodged by father-of-three Duncan McCann, who is leading the campaign and supported by his employer the advocacy group 5Rights, said the video-streaming platform had broken the newly implemented law by gathering “the location, viewing habits and preferences” of up to 5 million children.

Countries have been wrestling to strike the right balance with legislation that protects social media users, particularly children, from harmful content without damaging free speech.

McCann said in a statement that YouTube should change the design of its platform and delete data it had been gathering.

“It is a massive, unlicensed, social experiment on our children with uncertain consequences,” McCann said.

A spokesperson for YouTube said it had taken steps to bolster child privacy with more protective default settings, and made investments to protect children and families by launching a dedicated kids app and introducing new data practices.

“We remain committed to continuing our engagement with the ICO on this priority work, and with other key stakeholders including children, parents and child protection experts,” the YouTube spokesperson said in a statement.

Britain’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) said it would consider the complaint carefully.

“The Children’s code makes clear that children are not like adults online, and their data needs meaningful protections,” the ICO’s Deputy Commissioner, Regulatory Supervision, Stephen Bonner said in a statement.

Britain’s Children’s code requires providers to meet 15 design and privacy standards to protect children, including limiting collection of their location and other personal data.

In 2019, YouTube was fined $170 million by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to settle allegations that it broke federal law by collecting personal information about children.

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