Google has recently released a new YouTube app that’s
designed to keep children entertained.
The new app called YouTube Kids will launch next week,
February 23 and as you might have guessed it, deliver kid-friendly content. As
such, the app has been tailor-made for little fingers, with a customized UI
designed using large tiles and voice-activated search functions.
The comments section per video has also been removed and
there’s a built-in viewing timer where videos will be disabled and a password
will be required before the child can watch more videos.
UPDATE: The app is now available on both iOS and Android
Android: http://goo.gl/SsDTHh
iOS: http://goo.gl/P0cikI
UPDATE: The app is now available on both iOS and Android
Android: http://goo.gl/SsDTHh
iOS: http://goo.gl/P0cikI
YouTube is slowly finding other means to earn revenue apart
from its traditional pre-roll ad-delivery system. The Google-owned video
streaming service is already offering paid subscriptions since May of last year
for videos, but this week, it’s expanding its paid-subscription service into
music with Music Key.
Just like its main competitor – Spotify, Music Key will
eliminate ads in a user’s playlist and allows for background music playback,
offline music and endless playlists. Those who are subscribed to Google Play
Music will automatically get free passes to Music Key. The service will also
make music recommendations based on what a user listens to on YouTube.
Unfortunately, Music Key is currently on a beta invite-only
stage in certain countries including the United States, Spain, Italy, Portugal,
Finland and the UK. Subscription fee is at $10 per month for the said markets with
an international launch slated next year.
YouTube is reportedly launching a paid subscription service
called Music Pass in the coming months that will deliver ad-free videos from
artists from various record labels.
According to a report by The Financial Times, YouTube has
confirmed that it will indeed roll out a paid music service in cooperation with
a huger percentage of record labels already delivering videos on the platform. The
service is expected to help the music industry by becoming an additional
revenue stream for music companies as well as the artists signed under their
label.
Unfortunately, there are a few who will be hit with the
service’s new terms and conditions. According to YouTube’s head of content
Robert Kyncl, recording companies who fail to comply with the new T&Cs will
be removed from the video platform in a
matter of days. This move has caused a lot of negative comments especially
from those who are affected with allegations that YouTube is using its dominant
position to influence and control the market.
YouTube’s Music Pass is scheduled to arrive in a few weeks,
so for now, we’ll have to wait and see how the service will fair.
YouTube has recently announced some new additions to its
service that will greatly benefit channel managers and content creators for the
video platform.
Called Creator Preview,
the new additions to YouTube are said to have been inspired by feedback from
channel owners. There will be a new dedicated mobile app that will allow
content creators to manage their channels.
Moreover, content producers will be able to get funding for
their projects through a crowd-funding feature that will come to the video
platform in the future. And for video creators outside the US, YouTube will
soon provide support for crowd-sourced localization of content.
Lastly, Channel managers will also get more support from
YouTube in terms of learning and trainings through the Creator Academy, a new
comment management system, and additional revenue streams through ads.
YouTube hasn’t announced yet when these features will be
available but we’ll certainly keep our ears and eyes open for their official
roll out.
Yahoo is once again planning a bold move in the tech space
as recent reports suggest that the company might be planning to put up its own
video platform to rival that of Google’s YouTube.
According to source of recode.net, the company is planning
to build its own video platform and it plans to accomplish this by pirating
YouTube content providers by offering larger monetary incentives and bigger ad
revenues for their videos. There are even reports saying that Yahoo is
promising content providers a chance to feature select videos on the company’s
home page.
The supposed video platform will reportedly be exclusive to
those video content providers handpicked by Yahoo. Ordinary consumers will have
to wait after a year before they are given access to the platform, by that time
Yahoo would have put up its own content management system or bought an existing
video service such as Vimeo.
Of course, these are all hearsay and there’s no guarantee
that a video platform is in the pipeline, so we do recommend taking this news
with a handful of salt. And in case we get more juicy details about this issue,
we’ll keep our blog updated as soon as we can.
YouTube has recently announced that
beginning November, their mobile apps will allow users to watch videos even
when they’re offline.
The feature will let users add videos to
their devices and watch them for a short period of time when they are not
connected to the internet. Unfortunately, YouTube hasn’t revealed yet how long
the downloaded videos will be. So we might have to wait until November for that
information to be available.
At present, downloading videos from the
site is a violation of YouTube’s terms of service, although there are a number
of third-party apps and browser extensions that allow users to do so.
YouTube has finally launched its paid music subscription
service this week. The service has a little over 50 channels which offers exclusive
content after paying an apparently variable subscription fee starting at $0.99
per month.
Popular channels include UFC, National Geographic Kids, TNA
and Sesame Street. Moreover, some channels will offer yearly discounts and will
come in with a 14-day free trial. YouTube is currently calling the service as a
“Pilot Program” and will soon expand the channel line-up as they will be
rolling out the service in the coming weeks to qualified content partners.
Related Story: YouTube
Subscriptions Coming This Week
The paid subscription service is YouTube’s way of enticing
content makers to its platform aside from offering built-in advertising. At
present the available channels offered by the service are mostly unavailable to
most countries and are not that popular in contrast to those offered by other
forms of subscriptions.
But if YouTube plays its cards well, the service will not
only drive content to its platform but can even be used to combat piracy. If
the service can pull in big names in the television and video industry and sell
their content at a reasonable price, there might be chance that users won’t
have to illegally download TV series or other forms of video elsewhere on the
internet.
What do you think? Do you see yourself subscribing to a paid
YouTube channel anytime soon? Please do tell us by leaving a comment below.
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