YouTube Red is here

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For ten years, you’ve made YouTube an incredible place---a global community of over 1 billion people that gives anyone the power to create something that everyone can watch. The good news is, that isn’t changing. The free, ad-supported YouTube isn’t going anywhere.

And we've got some more good news. Starting today, YouTube Red goes live in the U.S., giving you a new way to watch YouTube, while still supporting your favorite creators.

With a YouTube Red membership, you’ll experience YouTube without video ads, be able to save videos to watch offline, and play videos in the background on your mobile device, all for $9.99 a month. And just like with our advertising revenue, the majority of revenue we get from YouTube Red memberships will go to our creator community.

Your Red membership works anywhere you sign into YouTube, whether it’s across mobile devices, desktop, connected TVs, or on our recently launched Gaming app or our upcoming Music app. And as a special bonus, YouTube Red comes with Google Play Music, so subscribe to one and automatically get access to the other. Starting early next year, YouTube Red will get even better with access to new, original series and movies from some of your favorite creators.

And just to give you a feel for an uninterrupted YouTube experience, anyone in the U.S. can sign up for a free 30-day trial. You can learn more at youtube.com/red.

Soon, you’ll be watching what you want, when you want, on any device you want, uninterrupted.

Matt Leske, Senior Product Manager, recently watched “Bali Road Trip in 4K! - #onedayoffline.”

Introducing YouTube Red Original Series and Movies from your favorite stars

10:29:00 AM Add Comment
Last year, we announced an initiative to invest in the creativity of our top YouTube stars. We wanted to give them an opportunity to realize some of their long-held creative ambitions by developing new content for YouTube. Today, we’re announcing some of the original series and movies we’ll be debuting with YouTube Red.

YouTube Red is the experience fans have been asking for. For just $9.99 a month, you’ll be able to enjoy videos across all of YouTube without ads, save videos to watch offline on your phone or tablet and play videos in the background.

But we’re not stopping there. Starting next year, YouTube Red members will get access to new, original series and movies from some of YouTube’s biggest creators. We’re excited to announce some of them today, with more to come:


  • Scare PewDiePie: In this reality-adventure series from the creator and executive producers of The Walking Dead at Skybound Entertainment and Maker Studios, experience thrills, chills and laughter as PewDiePie encounters terrifying situations inspired by his favorite video games.
  • Sing It!: From Fine Brothers Entertainment and Mandeville Films comes SING IT!, a scripted comedy that lovingly satirizes the reality singing competitions that have become a centerpiece of pop culture.
  • Lazer Team: In this feature-length action-comedy from Rooster Teeth and Fullscreen Films, four small-town losers stumble upon an alien ship carrying a mysterious cargo, leading to a battle to save Earth from an all-powerful enemy.
  • A Trip to Unicorn Island: From the team at Astronauts Wanted, this feature-length movie gives fans an extraordinary look inside the life and journey of Lilly Singh as she embarks on a challenging 26-city global tour where she has to remember to practice what she preaches: happiness is the only thing worth fighting for.
  • Untitled Joey Graceffa project: In this all-new reality adventure series, Joey Graceffa brings together an ensemble of top YouTubers for a murder mystery they'll never forget. They'll form alliances to survive, but little do they know that most won't make it out alive.
  • 360 Project from MatPat of Game Theory: YouTube educator and pop culture expert MatPat from The Game Theorists invites the audience to come along for the ride in an innovative new series and 360 VR experience. In each episode Matt explores the real-life science behind popular video games by throwing gamers into the high-stakes scenarios they play through every day, from water jetpacks to haunted pizzerias.
  • Single by 30: In this romantic drama series from Wong Fu Productions and New Form Digital, two high school best friends make a promise to get married if they’re still single at 30. A decade later, with 30 quickly approaching, their attempt at upholding their vow unfolds in unexpected ways. Starring Harry Shum, Jr. and Kina Grannis.
  • Untitled CollegeHumor project: Written by and starring the cast of CollegeHumor, along with special guests, this new anthology series will take a dark and comedic look at the absurdity of Internet culture.
  • Fight of the Living Dead: In an unprecedented social experiment reality show from Alpine Labs, Fight of the Living Dead takes popular YouTube talent and traps them in a frighteningly realistic zombie apocalypse. They must use their instincts and gaming skills to survive as they battle the elements for the ultimate prize of survival.
  • I Am Tobuscus: From the mind of Toby Turner, this scripted comedy explores the world of a self-involved YouTube creator pursuing bigger stardom. The show features original music, and satirizes the hilarious details of being an eccentric, new-age celebrity.


We’re excited to bring these original series and movies to YouTube Red members and give you even more for your membership beginning next year. Viewers in the U.S. can try YouTube Red for free with a one month trial starting on October 28.

Susanne Daniels, VP, Global Head of Original Programming, recently watched "If Google Was A Guy (Part 4)."

Meet YouTube Red, the ultimate YouTube experience

10:29:00 AM Add Comment
For years, YouTube’s fans have been telling us they want more—more choice when watching their favorite content, more ways to support their favorite creators and, above all, the option to watch their favorite videos uninterrupted.

On October 28, we’re giving fans exactly what they want. Introducing YouTube Red -- a new membership designed to provide you with the ultimate YouTube experience.

YouTube Red lets you enjoy videos across all of YouTube without ads, while also letting you save videos to watch offline on your phone or tablet and play videos in the background, all for $9.99 a month. Your membership extends across devices and anywhere you sign into YouTube, including our recently launched Gaming app and a brand new YouTube Music app we’re announcing today that will be available soon.

YouTube Music is designed to make discovering, watching and listening to music easier than ever. Any song or artist you choose on YouTube Music will start you on a personal journey through one of the richest music catalogs; just sign in, tap a track you love, and see where your music takes you. And as a special bonus - YouTube Red works with Google Play Music, so subscribe to one and automatically get access to the other.

And starting early next year, YouTube Red will get even better with member-only access to new, original shows and movies from some of YouTube’s biggest creators. You can read all about Originals coming to YouTube Red here.

We’re working to bring YouTube Red and our YouTube Music, Gaming and Kids apps to more countries soon. And don’t worry! The free, ad-supported version of YouTube we all know and love isn’t going anywhere. You’ll still be able to enjoy YouTube, along with the YouTube Kids, Gaming and Music apps free of charge. But with YouTube Red, you’ll be able to support the people who make your favorite videos while watching what you want, when you want, on any device you want, uninterrupted.

Viewers in the U.S. can try YouTube Red for free with a one month trial on October 28 and YouTube Music will be coming soon.

 

Matt Leske, Senior Product Manager, recently watched "The Juice Challenge."

Gamers and streamers - a winner is you!

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It’s you who makes YouTube the most watched platform for gamers—far and away. Every month gamers watch more than 144 billion minutes of gaming videos and live streams on YouTube. To put it into perspective, that’s like watching Let’s Plays for more than 270,000 years straight 24 hours a day—or beating Final Fantasy VII 1,900,000 times a day!

Today’s updates to YouTube Gaming are the next step in our quest to create the best place for gamers to come together to watch gaming videos, build communities, and live stream. We’ve listened to your feedback since September and have been working on some of the most requested new features and improvements.

Mobile Capture: Empowering streams of every shape and size
Every day, games are played while waiting for the bus, riding the subway, or lounging on the couch—but what about live streaming your mobile gameplay? You heard it from us at the Tokyo Game Show and now it’s here to stay. You can now record and live stream mobile gameplay on-the-go directly from Android devices using Mobile Capture on YouTube Gaming. You don’t need any additional hardware or software—just tap Go Live (or your avatar on a phone) in the YouTube Gaming app, turn on your selfie cam and record your commentary with your phone’s microphone.



Narrate and react to your gameplay using the phone’s microphone and a selfie-cam overlay. Entertain and interact with your audience via live chat. Go live and capture all Android games today! 

Sponsorships: Making it easy to back your favorite gamers
Support the live streams and videos you love with Fan Funding and Sponsorships, now in beta to a small group of creators. For a monthly payment, sponsors receive extra perks including a live chat badge chosen by the creator and access to exclusive chat sessions. We’ll continuously expand the list of beta channels, so keep your eyes peeled!



Other new and improved features
Here are some of the other requested changes we’ve made to date. Thanks for the feedback and keep it coming!

  • More easily see when there are live streams for games in your collection
  • Easier video bookmarking with Watch Later
  • Improved performance and a redesigned watch page on gaming.youtube.com
  • Better search navigation on iOS by remembering your previous searches
  • Import existing subscriptions anytime from YouTube via Settings

Go live today with the newly updated YouTube Gaming app available on Google Play and the App Store, for U.S. and U.K.

Barbara Macdonald, Product Manager, recently live streamed "Bad Piggies."

YouTube goes (even more) global!

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If you’re watching a YouTube video today, chances are you’re not in the United States. More than 80 percent of YouTube’s billions of views each day come from fans in countries outside the U.S., and the videos and creators they’re watching are just as global.

We want to make sure the videos you see when you fire up YouTube are relevant to you, wherever you’re watching. That’s why we’re launching even more local country versions of YouTube, connecting fans with creators in their home countries and giving those creators a way to earn money from their popularity. With the addition of the Adriatics, Baltics, Bulgaria, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Belarus, YouTube now has local versions in 85 countries.

For fans in these countries, this means easily discovering local creators and content. In Kazakhstan, you’ll find local talent such as DynastyofCat, a hugely popular DIY and vlogging channel, or even local broadcasters like TheSevenChannel, right there on the homepage. In Belarus, you can find 17-year-old vlogger DimaErmuzevich who regularly reaches more than 400K fans; and the Serbian music channel Grand Production, which has grown a following throughout the Balkans and beyond with their folk music.

Local versions of YouTube are good news for creators, too. It opens up the opportunity for creators to become a partner, earn money from their channels, and gain access to tools and resources that can help them make the most of YouTube. Creators can access online lessons via the YouTube Creator Academy to get started and learn best practices, and the Creator Community gives creators a place to meet each other, find collaborations, and more. We hope that this will allow more creators to bring more of their ideas and talents to YouTube for all of us to enjoy.

So whether you’re viewing us from youtube.by, youtube.kz, or youtube.bg, you’ve now got your own YouTube that not only connects you with a community of a billion people, but helps you see the creativity going on right in your backyard.

Marenco Kemp, Head of EMEA Online Partnerships, recently watched "Top10Memes: Top 10 Facts - Lego."

Introducing Awesome Stuff Week: product reviews you’ll love from creators you trust

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We know how much time you spend surfing the web for the perfect look or the latest products whether that be Stephen Curry’s newest sneaker, fringe skirts for fall, or the newest hoverboard prototype.

But people aren’t just limiting their research to websites; they’re also watching videos on YouTube. Sixty-four percent of shoppers say that YouTube influences their purchase decisions.1 In fact, we’ve seen more than 40 percent growth year-over-year in viewership of product videos such as sneaker pickups, first impressions, and product reviews.2

To help you discover more of the latest and greatest products, we’re partnering with your favorite YouTube personalities to bring you Awesome Stuff Week: a series of week-long celebrations highlighting popular, trendy, undiscovered-but-cool products on YouTube. During each Awesome Stuff Week, creators such as GiGiGorgeous, iJustine, Jim Chapman, and UnboxTherapy, will share their views and reviews on products ranging from fashion to gadgets to holiday gifts.



We’re also making it easy for you to buy the products you want in the exact moment you want them. Scroll through the comments on any product video and you’re sure to find "where can I get those shoes or that skirt or that self-balancing scooter?" Why shouldn’t every product video be shoppable? Products featured during Awesome Stuff Week will be.

Like those brown Hudson boots from Jim Chapman in the below video? Now you can simply click on a product image on the right-hand side of the video, and be taken to that retailer’s website. It’s as easy as that.

Awesome Stuff Week - H By Hudson.gif

YouTube creator, Jim Chapman, shares his take on H by Hudson boots. Watch the video on YouTube.

This week - dedicated to fashion - is the first of several Awesome Stuff Weeks that we’ll be rolling out. New videos will appear daily from Monday through Friday, and each will feature a new theme related to fashion such as Must-have-Monday or Hundred-Dollar-Wednesday. In the coming weeks, we’ll introduce an Awesome Stuff Week featuring gadgets as well as holiday gifts to help you check off items on your shopping list.

To discover the latest shoppable videos, subscribe to the Awesome Stuff Week YouTube channel and stay tuned for more!

Vikram Tank, Product Marketing Manager, Art, Copy & Code, recently watched "What Do You Mean / Epic Segway Dance Cover @justinbieber."

1Source: When the Path to Purchase Becomes the-Path-to-Purpose, June 2014.
https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/articles/the-path-to-purpose.html

2Source: View count growth, Google Data, April 2015 vs. April 2014, U.S., classification was based on public data such as headlines, tags, etc., and may not account for every type of review video available on YouTube.
https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/articles/i-want-to-buy-moments.html

More for your family in the YouTube Kids app

10:30:00 AM Add Comment
It’s been a busy few months for YouTube Kids. In February, we released our app, designed especially for kids, to bring to life the best family-friendly content on YouTube. Since then, families have downloaded YouTube Kids more than 8 million times, consistently ranked YouTube Kids in the top 5 kids apps in the App Store, given an overall 4+ rating on Google Play and watched Stampy Cat explore the world of Minecraft more than 54 million times.

Not bad for a seven-month old.

When we announced the app, we said YouTube Kids was our first step in reimagining YouTube for families. And we’re always looking for ways to make it even better. So today we’re sharing some new ways we're helping parents and kids enjoy the family content they love:

Discover new videos and watch in new ways
  • Watch YouTube Kids on the big screen: Want to enjoy your favorite videos as a family? Now you can, using Chromecast, Apple TV, game consoles or a smartTV.
  • Explore new videos with guest-curated playlists: Have a budding scientist or eager explorer on your hands? Find out what videos educators, celebs and other parents recommend with guest-created playlists. Playlists from National Geographic Kids, Kid President, and a girl power-themed playlist from Academy Award®-winning actor Geena Davis are already live—and more are coming soon from YouTube creators including Vsauce and Amy Poehler's Smart Girls.
  • Enjoy new shows: New videos are produced and uploaded to YouTube Kids every day—including exciting original shows and series from HooplaKidz, TuTiTu, SciShow Kids, DreamWorksTV and more.



Features just for parents
  • Learn how the app works: We also want to make it easier to get started using the app. When parents open YouTube Kids, we’ll explain upfront how our systems choose and recommend content and how to flag videos. We’ll also prompt you to make a choice about how broadly you want your child to explore—turn search on to access millions of family-friendly videos, or turn search off to restrict your child’s experience to a more limited set. Either way, parents decide the right experience for their family from the get-go. This will roll out on the app in the coming weeks.
  • Customize your passcode: We’ve also heard some parents prefer a personal passcode, rather than a spelled-out code, so we’ve added this option to access parental controls.



We always try to make the videos available in the app family-friendly, but no system is perfect. So if you ever find a video you’re concerned about, please flag it. This helps make YouTube Kids better for everyone.

In fact, many of these updates are a result of the great feedback you’ve given us. As you explore YouTube’s library, from "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to learning about the solar system, we’re growing with you. And we’re always excited to hear how we can better help your family explore, learn and sing along.

Posted by Shimrit Ben-Yair, mother of two and YouTube Kids Director of Product Management, who recently enjoyed learning about volcanoes on SciShow Kids and relaxing with Cosmic Kids Yoga’s Calming Playlist with her kids.

YouTube Space Paris: a new home for French creators

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Paris. The city is synonymous with culture, cuisine, art and architecture. The creative passion of Paris has also given rise to one of the world’s most vibrant YouTube communities. French creators of all kinds are building global followings on YouTube, such as Cyprien, whose comedy shorts have been viewed nearly 1 billion times, and e-penser, who regularly entertains half a million fans with educational videos on subjects such as general relativity and time travel. And the audience loves what they are doing— viewers are watching 60 percent more YouTube than last year.

Given all the creativity coming out of the French capital, it was a no-brainer to open a YouTube Space in the heart of Paris—a cutting-edge production facility located at Google Paris Headquarters.

 

This is the seventh YouTube Space we have opened in cultural centers around the world. Joining Los Angeles, London, Berlin, Tokyo, New York and Sao Paolo, the Paris Space will provide emerging and established YouTube creators with a physical space to do everything from take a class on YouTube best practices, meet with fellow artists, or just use the studio’s latest audio, visual and editing equipment to create great videos. All for free.

YT_logo_space_PARIS.jpg

YouTube Space Paris (1).jpg


Internationally, creators have used the YouTube Spaces to unleash the limits of their imagination: whether that’s filming live streaming music acts, collaborating with celebrities, creating a viral public service announcement, or even learning how to teleport on a specially created superhero set. And in Europe, more than 25,000 creators of all kinds, from emerging comedians to established TV stations, have visited London and Berlin Spaces to produce over 1,500 original videos. These videos have been viewed over 225 million times and watched by their fans for a cumulative 16 million hours. We’re excited to see what creators in Paris will do next!

Find more creator resources at youtube.com/creators and learn more about the YouTube Spaces at youtube.com/space.

David Ripert, Head of YouTube Space EMEA, recently watched "[360 Music Video] This Summer - Roomie (Maroon 5 Cover)" - partly shot in the Spaces.