YouTube announced today new measures it is taking to more prominently feature and broaden the range of content available on the site from studios including Crackle/Sony Pictures, CBS, MGM, Lionsgate, Starz, the BBC, Anime Network, Cinetic Rights Management, Current TV, Discovery, Documentary Channel, First Look Studios, IndieFlix, National Geographic. The site will now feature a new ‘Shows’ tab in the YouTube masthead, which will allow users to browse through television content by genre, network, title, and popularity (sounds like Hulu, doesn’t it?). The site now features thousands of full TV episodes, as well as hundreds of movies. Some videos will be available in HD.
At this point the majority of content will come from older TV shows and movies – series like ‘Party of Five’ and ‘Married With Children’, not the current seasons we’ve been seeing on Hulu. But more deals are in the works, and I suspect that barring a disastrous response to YouTube’s premium content we’ll be seeing newer show in the next few months. The site is also refining its search options, making it easier to separate the new premium content from the user-generate videos the site has become famous for.
Finally, the site is announcing a new advertising product called “Google TV Ads Online”. The product allows advertisers to place TV-like commercials within the new premium content offerings on the site. This is a significant addition, because it gives advertisers who are used to traditional TV advertising through Google’s TV Ads product a way to easily post the same ads online – they effectively just have to click a box saying they’d like to distribute their ads across all forms of a television program, included those streamed in YouTube. From the press release:
We’re excited to announce the beta launch of Google TV Ads Online. This is a new feature of Google TV Ads that lets advertisers place commercials into the ad breaks of TV programs watched online. It works in the same way as Google TV Ads: advertisers can target specific programs and select their cost-per-thousand (CPM) bid. Based on their targets, budget and bid, ads are inserted in the same program breaks that were designed for advertising when the programs first aired. (Ads may also be shown “pre-roll”, before the program begins, or after the online presentation of the program “post-roll.”) And like Google TV ads, we provide advertisers with measurement tools that give greater insight into how their ads perform with users.
Heard it here first: YouTube is now and will forever be a stupid joke site! Google — you will NEVER get me to think about YouTube as a serious property.
Google’s free pirating philosophy should fail. Misleading paid clicks model is bound to die.
Good because Hulu don’t work north of the 49th parallel.
hope it works up north. but pretty sure content will be blocked for canada..
looks like it’s blocked. wtf? and people wonder why there are torrnet sites. stupid, just stupid and shows that they are more interested in advertising dollars rather than ending piracy.
Advertising on Web 2.0 sites is normally not positive news for the community and the users of the sites.
Especially, because users don’t need advertising!
What YouTube should really do is to apply more “twitter like” features and put pictures next to the comments etc
Also they should open new categories like “business” etc
The great news is that YouTube will get more content and therefore attract even more visitors and momentum
Lasse
“Especially, because users don’t need advertising!”..
Yeah right. Speak for yourself. I will gladly sit through some commercials if it is going to bring me the movie for free. It is better than no movie at all. Hope you realize that advertisements keep a lot of stuff free for the end users. Learn to be a bit annoyed for free stuff.
hmm. So basically Hulu is ahead in content that advertisers are actually interested in?
not for long.
Who knows? Hulu is really phenomenal when it comes to the included content. Techcrunch and Google mocked Hulu incessentantly as “clown co,” but now, as you stipulate Hulu has a strong advantage.
My guess is Google can continue to buy their way into the market, but I’m sure Microsoft will begin to bid these contracts up in value as well — both for a video site and for silverlight plug-ins.
In other words, this shows it is back about content and not so much about technology (and current audience) — and that is not good for Youtube.
I think it’s nice that YouTube is trying something different, but it shouldn’t forget that UGC is what made YouTube what it is today.
I think they should separate off in to three differently branded sections to satisfy everyone;
1. YouTube (Regular UGC, links at the top prominently feature the other two YouTube sites as tabs to switch between)
2. YouTube:Vevo (Features Music)
3. YouTube:Hulu (Obviously not hulu, but whatever they want to call it. This would have videos)
The three sites should also be coloured differently. YouTube – the usual grey; YouTube: Vevo – Red; YouTube:Hulu – Green or other.
Just a thought…
By videos on YouTube:Hulu i meant TV Shows, obviously
I don’t think Youtube can be better than Hulu for this.
This was just bound to happen. Maybe YouTube might gain some revenue through this avenue.
*shrugs*
of course, having them cut into 10 minute sections will be annoying (j/k)
Do you know if it will be available to watch in U.S. only?
very likely given the typical license deals for tv shows.
just get a proxy :/
youtube is a pain with all the cr@p on the page, hulu is cleaner. youtube content is poor quality.
You guys can say what you want, but I think YouTube will always be bigger and more popular than Hulu. It’s YOUTUBE!
Just wait, after a few months You Tube will be the video site of choice. It’s not even a match in my opinion.
I can not see that in the UK
””’???
I don’t understand why it’s called “Party of five”. Every damn episode somebody was crying…what kind of party is that?
youtube needs a deal like this since it is very hard and risky to try to monetize user generated content.
Partnering with content providers is a good way to bring in some revenue. I believe youtube makes most of its money through advertisements along partnered content and this deal will expand it.
Hulu is only available to US because hulu and the content providers want to give advertisers a more focused target market. These media companies will more than likely ask youtube to do the same thing.
I just dont get Google these days
Well, they are not doing a good job of it. Gives me an HTTP 500!
Good design very clean, no significant change in turms of the business model, still hamstrung by licensing walled gardens, but a step in the right direction should see YT positioned well in the entertainment flux of things, to take advantage of change as it unfolds.
It keeps coming back to that word,…Monetization!
When I go to “shows” it says:
500 Internal Server Error
Sorry, something went wrong.
A team of highly trained monkeys has been dispatched to deal with this situation.
Also, please include the following information in your error report:
YouTube was supposed to be about YOU not the corporations.
User submitted content, though it may be crap, is what made YouTube what it is. Illegal uploaded content made YouTube what it is.
YouTube is not Hulu.
That said, YouTube could become more like Hulu but there will be consequences..
Oh well…
youtube has really crossed the line
http://www.youtube.com/bbc
more than a quarter of the videos on this channel
are this video is not available in your country
the United States of America, americans are being censored out of youtube content, on our website
now this, BBC???
I don’t look at youtube anymore, cause if it goes all tv shit there will be more videos not available to americans , it is censoring, americans have a
right to view all content on an american website
has youtube google moved?
It doesn’t work on Apple TV.
Shows are not showed as part of the search results.
I’m trying it out right now, but the video is choppy.
that’s a great news, very usefull for people leaving in europe or just out if the US, can’t watch hulu from the old world, and it’s just too slow with a proxy.
Just found out, it doesn’t work yet for Germany, but from what I’ve read they made the promise to give access to international Users!
If YouTube gets all the old stuff and Hulu only has new episodes (like they have done in the past), I’d say YouTUbe might win this war. I love catching up on stuff I missed more than watching new stuff just coming out. No cliff hangers that way. No waiting for the new season at all. FTR-The BBC channel works fine for me and I’m from America too.
Hello Mark
http://www.yout...bbcteethgrinder
this can be added to the list of video content
that’s not available to Americans, on a American website no doubt
There are more channels to come
And so ya know, if you looked and clicked and got
this video is not available in your country
You are now a censored american
Welcome to the club
Chill, man. Websites and businesses like YouTube are not nation bound. Some content is. So far.
http://www.aclu.org/
wrong, I live in America, which means I can see ALL, no matter what the content is
It is a bonehead messege it gives off in the first place – this video is not available in your country – I can see a thumbnail, I can the the view count, it is there, no?
Secondly, the bbc says it is to poor to provide all video content? Then it should not be there until the broke bbc can afford to
What’s the excuse here
http://www.yout...bbcteethgrinder
it’s the internet, and I know I have a right to see
everything…
so this where it begins, where does it end up?
More to follow, it’s wrong to be censored out of content on an American website, there are all kinds, freedom of speech, freedom of expression,
Americans cannot post a comment to these videos
either, it’s just a matter of time
bbc will have to either make these videos available or remove them, youtube should suspend the account, breaking federall laws
http://www.yout...com/beijing2008
enjoy
more to follow
LOL
Law enforcement, the military, the cia
I know maybe this stuff should be shared with
the president and his family, oop
if his ass is in America, they can’t see
I’m not getting in this, I know it’s wrong
I just don’t do youtube or google for that matter
I don’t wanna see, keep it
http://www.aclu.org
wrong, it’s the internet, and I know I have a right to see everything
http://www.yout...com/beijing2008
my other post was deleted I wonder why
enjoy
Michael,
You should really address the threat posed by common carriers to the video dreams of Hulu and YouTube.
ISPs (many of whom are cable providers) can refuse to carry this programming. And they’re doing so by throttling bandwidth and experimenting with metered charges for video consumers.
Cable providers are not going to allow sites like Hulu to make it possible for people to cancel their cable television, and this threat will hobble anything that Hulu and YouTube attempt.
so let me get this straight….one simple question.
does this mean that the every day ‘joe the plumbers’ can upload they’re recorded video content w/out yougootube getting their panties in a bunch and removing the videos?
or does it mean that YouGooTube will be the ones uploaded the video content and banking big time?
video sharing…bad if the public does it
not so bad if google does it….
a comment about cable (pssst cable companies….listen up….you might wanna read this) you might think you’re losing business because of sites like hulu…but your wrong.
i do not have cable…. no… i subscribe to the dish network instead.
so do about 60% percent of the residents of my apartment complex…..well, they don’t ALL have dish network….some have dish and others have direct tv…
why?
interesting question.
about 4 years ago, i called my cable company and asked them why they #1 didn’t offer more programming and #2 why they didn’t offer more international channels (besides the 500 spanish channels the currently have)…
you see, companies like dish network provide international programming for folks like me who happen to speak more than one langauge. for example, i happen to speak arabic…. the dish network has about 10+ channels from the middle east. They also offer french programming, asian programming, you name it.
well, i called my cable company and asked the simple question….’if the dish network can offer this service to me, why can’t you’…
do you know what happened? I got the rudest son of a bitch on the line to say, ‘well….we don’t have many people that request this kind of service, so if you’re unhappy with us, you can just leave’
well…i did leave… and now some 4 years later hundreds of other unhappy customers have left cable as well…. i think back then, cable was king of the hill….so satisfying one customer didn’t mean much at the time….but 1, 10, 100, 1000, 100000 unhappy customers? well….now you’ve got a problem…
my point is this…..sites like hulu and the net isn’t killing cable…. cable is killing cable…