YouTube

Last month, YouTube TV became available in the main YouTube app as a workaround for the Roku dispute. That integrated YouTube TV experience is now coming to newer Vizio SmartCast televisions.

In an update today, YouTube revealed that it paid $4 billion to the music industry over the last 12 months, while Premium and Music Premium subscriptions saw notable growth at the start of this year. 

YouTube on Android and iOS is now more widely rolling out the expanded video description UI that includes more prominent Likes and View counters alongside accurate upload date information within video overflow menus.

The experience of Casting YouTube to a Chromecast-connected TV has remained mostly unchanged for the past several years. Google now looks to be making a pseudo-YouTube app for Chromecast that takes after the Android TV version.

Google appears to be rolling out an A/B test to some Android TV users that updates the YouTube app with a new video player that can access the video description, adds new channel shortcuts, and more.

On the night of Google I/O 2021, a playback error is affecting many on YouTube with videos ceasing to play at random.

YouTube Shorts are aggressively being pushed to compete with TikTok. To drive content creation, Google is setting up a YouTube Shorts Fund to pay those that create the best short-form videos every month.

A week after Roku removed the YouTube TV app for new users, Google is countering by bringing the cord-cutting service to the main YouTube client. 

When listening to songs in the YouTube mobile client, Google will occasionally prompt users to open the YouTube Music app for a better experience. The main YouTube app is now testing a dedicated “Listening controls” experience for music.

YouTube this morning hosted its 2021 Brandcast Delivered for advertisers. It’s an annual opportunity for the Google company to share its upcoming Originals content lineup and new ad offerings in a star-studded manner.

The latest YouTube experiment looks to be trialling time-linked comments that will appear at the exact time you’re watching a video.

Google products have a large reach, and YouTube wants to use its platform to “encourage people to get informed about the vaccine.” YouTube’s COVID-19 vaccine info PSA is starting in the US and will expand to other countries.

YouTube TV is an excellent, though not cheap, option for cutting cable and instead streaming live TV, but it seems Roku users may soon lose access to the app as a negotiations battle goes on.

If you’re frustrated by the level of control offered by the YouTube mobile app with regard to video resolution, then the addition of even more precise options will be very welcome.

YouTube is now making it even easier to change your channel name without needing to make any sort of alterations to your associated Google account.

Back in March, Google hired an ex-Intel vice president to lead server chip design as part of a “doubling down” in custom compute. Google already has a history in the area, and this week detailed YouTube’s use of “Argos” Video Coding Units (VCUs) chips to massively aid transcoding.

A new YouTube experiment will occasionally play 15-second “media literacy” ads before videos to “prompt critical thinking.”

YouTube TV will now surface and let you watch the movies you’ve purchased across all Google services in its interface. Besides access, you can also search and buy/rent from one entertainment app.