A YouTube Trifecta of News

Author: Don Martelli
Published: July 07, 2010 at 4:49 pm

Google's YouTube made quite the rounds today with three tidbits of news that are circulating around the blogosphere.

Mobile Face Lift
First, the company launched a newer version of their mobile website, featuring a redesigned interface, better touchscreen features and, most importantly, high quality (HQ) video streams.

The new mobile site provides updated navigation and a better user interface for easier browsing. The home screen features buttons to browse, look at favorites, review playlists, tweak settings and go back to the users home screen.

Lastly, the revamp includes better video streaming quality that is designed for today’s wireless networks.

YouTube In Your Living Room
Of course, mobile video is a nice play ground for YouTube, but the next frontier looks to be your living room. Today YouTube launched the beta version of YouTube Leanback, a made-for-TV version of YouTube that's part of Google Labs, or as the company calls, TestTube.

YouTube Leanback was actually announced back in May at the Google I/O conference and tied to their Google TV news.

RidleyTube
The last bit of YouTube's news is that they partnered with acclaimed movie producer Ridley Scott to create a project called Life in a Day, which attempts to document one day, July 24, seen through the camera lens of people around the world.

Ridley, the genius behind Blade Runner and Gladiator, will have some assistance from Kevin Macdonald, best known for directing films such as The Last King of Scotland and One Day in September. Macdonald will be the editor on the project.

The movie will premiere at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. If you are one of the luck dogs whose footage makes the final cut, you’ll be credited as a co-director. Twenty contributors will be selected to attend the premiere.

To submit footage, you need to capture July 24, 2010, on camera, and upload the footage to the Life in the Day channel sometime before July 31.

In terms of the type of content you should shoot, there are no limits. They ask that you try and be personal and shoot in high definition. A full set of guidelines are on the official channel.

What do you think of YouTube's trifecta of news?

Read comments on this article, and add some feedback of your own

About this article

Article Author: Don Martelli

Known on the social web as “BigGuyD,” Don Martelli is just a dad, moonlighting as a digital marketer, photog and civilian journalist. He's the executive editor for Technorati. Connect with him at www.donmartelli.com.

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