Articles about YouTube

There are countless ways to waste time online, and scrolling your way through a never-ending selection of Shorts on YouTube is one of them. If you are someone who has found you have lost hours to the content served up by the platform, there is some good news.

A new digital well-being tool is starting to roll out that lets users set a time limit for the daily viewing of YouTube Shorts. While far from perfect, it may prove helpful for anyone who tends to lose track of time.

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In an age of fragmented news, deepfakes present a real problem. YouTube is taking action to stop AI-generated videos being used to impersonate people.

The company has revealed details of its new Likeness Detection tool. For now, YouTube is targeting creators, giving them access to the tool – not only because creators are among those likely to be deepfaked, but also because the company will be hoping to be able to use their influence to hype up Likeness Detection.

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Google has announced a series of updates and changes for YouTube, kicking off with a new-look user interface. The updated UI sees various buttons and control elements getting a visual refresh, but there are changes beyond the aesthetic.

An addition that will please many YouTube users is threaded replies. It is now not only possible to reply to comments on a video, but also to reply to those replies and have these comments visible in a tree structure. But there is still more.

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There is a lot to feel frustrated about in relation to YouTube, but Google has announced a change that helps to squash one of its annoyances.

While in-video ads are becoming increasingly difficult to avoid – short of paying for the privilege – there is now a way to hide “end screens”. These short snippets at the end of the video you have just watched are a form of advertising used by creators to promote their other content.

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It was inevitable that it would happen one day, and that day appears to have arrived. YouTube is getting stricter about how a Premium Family plan can be used.

The rules that apply to YouTube Family Premium are not changing, but YouTube is now seemingly enforcing restrictions that it was previously happy to turn a blind eye to.

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Many people turn to AI to improve their writing, their photos, or their videos. YouTube has been doing the same, quietly enhancing the look of users’ uploaded videos through the use of artificial intelligence.

So, what is the problem? Many creators are upset not so much that their videos have been “enhanced” (although there is debate over whether what YouTube has done can actually be seen as an improvement) but that it was done without consent.

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Google has announced that it is expanding the availability of the recently added cheaper tier of YouTube Premium. The YouTube Premium Lite package costs a little over half the price of the regular YouTube Premium subscription which should serve as a lure to potential customers who have been sitting on the fence.

The lower price, inevitably, means having to make some compromises, but YouTube Premium Lite delivers what most people will be looking for – a broadly ad-free experience on YouTube.

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Following the lead of just about every website and social platform, YouTube is introducing comment threading. But before you get too excited about gaining the ability to view nested replies and being able to follow conversations more easily, there are a couple of quirks.

Firstly, this is – for now, at least – limited to the iOS and Android apps, so if you access YouTube via a web browser, you are out of luck. Secondly, this is an experiment so try not to get too attached to it.

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YouTube has become overrun with mass-produced content generated by artificial intelligence. Known as AI slop, such content has spread cancerously across the video platform as pseudo creators seek to make a quick buck.

Now Google has had enough. Seeking to de-incentivize the creation of such content, it is updating YouTube policies so that it will be much more difficult to make money from AI slop.

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Google-owned YouTube started testing a new “AI-powered search results carousel” to help users find what they are looking for faster. 

The new feature is only available on the mobile apps (iOS and Android) and only in English. Only a small, randomly selected group of YouTube Premium members in the United States who opt in through the YouTube Labs page will have access to this new feature.

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Unless you can count yourself among those who have a premium subscription, using YouTube means having to endure ads. This is annoying, but it could be getting a whole lot worse.

And things are getting worse because of artificial intelligence. Google has announced Peak Points, a Gemini ai-powered feature that gives advertisers way to hit you with ads when you are most engaged with a video.

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YouTube is finally rolling out Premium Lite in the USA (coming soon to Thailand, Germany, and Australia). For the princely sum of $7.99 per month, Google is promising subscribers a mostly ad-free experience.

Although Premium Lite offers an official way to remove ads, it won't hide those baked directly into videos by creators. That’s right, even if you shell out for this plan, you’ll still have to sit through sponsored segments for VPNs, meal kits, and mobile games, because YouTube can’t really do anything about those. Quite frankly, that just doesn’t seem fair.

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I now pay $82.99 a month for YouTube TV, yet when it comes to watching the biggest football game of the year in 4K, I’m using Tubi -- for free. Let that sink in, folks. A completely free streaming service is giving me the Super Bowl in 4K quality, while YouTube TV is hiding it behind an additional paywall. At this point, why am I even paying for this damn subscription?

Look, YouTube TV is not cheap. It was supposed to be a cable alternative, but with the way prices keep climbing, it’s starting to make me sick. And the kicker (no pun intended)? If I actually wanted to stream the Super Bowl in 4K on YouTube TV, I’d have to cough up another $9.99 for the 4K Plus add-on, bringing my February total to $92.98! Meanwhile, Tubi (yes, the free ad-supported service owned by Fox) lets me watch it in 4K without spending a penny.

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YouTube has announced a partnership with Repurpose.io designed to make multi-platform publishing easier than ever. An automated system makes it possible to repost TikTok content, as well as Instagram Reels, as YouTube Shorts.

The uncertain future of TikTok in the US has shaken creators who have built up substantial and lucrative followings on the Chinese-owned social platform. YouTube is eager to make the most of this uncertainty, and is clearly hoping that the new Repurpose.io partnership will help it to steal TikTok users.

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Black History Month is officially here, and Google is kicking things off with a major celebration of Black creators, artists, and innovators across its platforms. From YouTube and Google TV to the Play Store and Chrome, the search giant is making it easier than ever to explore Black culture all month long.

On YouTube, Google is shining a spotlight on rising Black stars and legendary voices in music, TV, and social media. YouTube Music is serving up playlists dedicated to regional dance genres like Chicago House and NOLA Bounce, while artwork from Stonie Blue will bring even more energy to the platform throughout February.

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