Talk:YouTube/Archive 10

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Further Reading

you might want to include the following book, which is the first compilation of media scholars on youtube: Geert Lovink and Sabine Niederer (eds.), Video Vortex Reader: Responses to YouTube, Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures, 2008. ISBN: 978-90-78146-05-6 [1] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gastev (talk • contribs) 13:47, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Google CEO states 15 (not 13) hrs. of video uploaded per minute

In his short speech at a recent event, he said, in a list of new statistics, that:
"Every minute, 15 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube."
-Eric Schmidt, Google CEO, at the RTNDF 2009 First Amendment Awards Dinner, March 12, 2009.
And just as a reminder, Google owns YouTube, and is an extremely data-driven business, so this figure is not just a rough estimation. Thus, the estimated "13 hours" mentioned in the article, in the fourth paragraph of the "Company history" section, is now obsolete and needs to be updated.
At 4:43:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sukyLgwHjmA
Time-precise link--probably better for the citation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sukyLgwHjmA#t=4m43s
68.174.102.95 (talk) 09:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. The article has been updated with a text based citation from [2].--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 10:53, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Shouldn't the footnote include the date (January 30, 2009) of the referenced article, and not just the date on which it was retrieved? The time at which that statistic was first made publicly available--now 2 months ago--is of certain relevance, I think. Let me know.
68.174.102.95 (talk) 21:04, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I've added the publication date to the citation template.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 07:16, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

YouTube April Fool

This official April Fool comes from the YouTube website. It is not really notable enough for the main article, but let's not have a sense of humour failure.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 11:23, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree, I think we should have left it for the day. I mean not just in the talk page, but in the main article. Laurent (talk) 12:17, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Has YouTube axed H.263 videos?

Amid all the talk of fmt34 and fmt35 videos, a more pressing concern is whether the article is up to date on the issue of H.263 videos. There seems to be a transitional period at the moment, because since late last year YouTube has been introducing the fmt34 and fmt35 videos, which are based on H.264/MPEG-4 AVC. It seems that this is now the standard for newly uploaded videos, eg this current featured video. Also, Evolution of Dance is now in AVC format, even though it was uploaded in 2006. As usual, there are original research issues here, but the article now risks becoming out of date if it does not reflect the current situation.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 09:24, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I think it might be true. As an example look at this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDuHghTPGio

Then compare to the &fmt=5 link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDuHghTPGio&fmt=5

If you watch very carefully you'll notice that the the new default video looks better, but the framerate isn't as good as the old default format. By default they probably reduce the framerate to make the video's filesize smaller now too. ---- Akadewboy (talk) 22:07, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

video comment ordering

Does anyone know how the comments to a video are ordered after the first 2 pages?

It seems somewhat chronological but not continuous... and a comment I made which I expected to be at page 3 was found in page 13 ish... wondering whether it's a design decision or a mistake... --Immer in Bewegung (talk) 21:54, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Chapter on Scholarly Analysis

This chapter was added by Dr. Michael Strangelove, University of Ottawa, Canada. It acknowledges an important role that YouTube is playing in the development of a new field of study.

An established feature of encyclopedia is articles that acknowledge the development of a new field of study.

Also, it is not uncommon for encyclopedic articles to note the scholarly or scientific significance of a subject and summarize major fields of inquiry or theories related to the subject at hand (in this instance, YouTube).

This new chapter adds pedagogical value to the YouTube article by pointing to an bibliographic resource on the subject, written by an academic authority on the subject (manuscript forthcoming with the University of Toronto Press).

There is no legitimate basis for deleting this chapter as 'link spam', particularly given the appearance with YouTube of articles entirely devoted to a bibliographic review of a subject (for example, Harold Pinter), and given the standard feature of encyclopedic articles -- the use of 'further references/resources items' that enrich an entry for the study of the subject itself.

Dr. Michael Strangelove —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mstrangelove (talk • contribs) 16:07, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Your own blog is not a WP:RELIABLE source. Laurent (talk) 16:36, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

And noting your message here, please see our conflict of interest policy. --ZimZalaBim ^talk 16:37, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

An entire section about this one area is way over the top. Writing about yourself is generally a non-starter in Wikipedia articles, due to the conflicts of interest involved. See also WP:EL.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 17:09, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Audio removed for copyright infringement

I've noticed at least 10 videos on youtube with completely removed audio because they were "unathorized". Often the audio in quesiton is a mere 10 seconds of a song yet the entire audio of the video(background noises and all) are removed. Why doesn't this article mention this? YVNP (talk) 05:49, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Audio blanking is one of the features of YouTube that has been causing controversy recently. [3]. If the audio track of a video matches something in YouTube's library of copyrighted third party content, the audio track will be blanked, but the video will remain online. This is not currently mentioned in the article due to WP:NOTHOWTO and notability issues, but it could be added with proper sourcing.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 08:14, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

FMT=6 format in the "Format and quality comparison table"

Can someone please verify the characteristics listed are correct?

I ran this through VLC and it seems to be identical to the normal quality stream. The stream bit rate never tops 500kbs, the Audio sampling rate is listed as 22050Hz, and the file in my cache is the same size as the normal quality file. The FMT=18 and FMT=22 match the values in the table, but to all intents and purposes FMT=6 seems to be identical to normal quality. I presume it's defaulting to the normal stream so has fmt 6 been discontinued? Betty Logan (talk) 23:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. YouTube has changed the system recently, and the "watch in high quality" option is now a red "HQ" in the bottom right hand corner of the player (eg here). Another change is that clicking the "HQ" option now seems to bring up the fmt18 version, not the fmt6 version, as happened when the high quality videos were introduced last year. When I attempted to force the fmt6 version to play by adding fmt6 to the web address, it played the normal quality version. So you may be right, and YouTube has indeed discontinued fmt6. YouTube is prone to changing its formats without telling anyone, although this does lead to some original research issues. This should be kept under review, and it would ideally need sourcing to say that YouTube has discontinued fmt6.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 12:44, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I was wondering the same thing,User:ianmacm; since format 6 is so inferior to to format 18, I wondered how much longer YouTube would keep it--in any event I thinkit would be prudent if user:Betty Logan did some further testing by going to a known "high quality" video and examining its stats in the cache when &fmt=18 is added and when the red "HQ" button is clicked; it could clear up, once and for all, if format 6 is dead or not....I realize it would bring up some original research issues, I think that this minor exception should be made.Fox P McCloud (talk) 00:13, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I've followed your suggestion Fox. My original experiment which caused me to query the table was on this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayUgvgnCUUk. This has a HD icon but no HQ icon. However, if you add "&fmt=18" it plays in fmt18 format (using the avc1/mp4a codecs) but also replaces the HD icon with a HQ icon which allows you to select/deselect the fmt18 format.

I then experimented with a video that has the HQ icon from the outset: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJ5ix-VHkLo. Selecting the HQ icon plays a video using (according to VLC) h264/mp4a codecs with a 640x360 resolution, 2 channel audio and a 44100Hz sampling rate. The file size in my cache is 3800KB. Manually appending &fmt=18 gives me a video using avc1/mp4a codecs with a 480x270 resolution, 2 channel audio and 44100hz sampling rate. The file size is 2545KB. Clearly these are different HQ formats. If you append &fmt=6 though you get a video using the FLV1/mp3 codecs with a resolution of 320x180, 1 channel audio rate and 22050Hz sampling rate and a file size of 1516KB. The fmt6 selection plays the same video as the normal version, so it certainly seems to indicate that the fmt6 selector has been removed. However what puzzles me are the differences in the 'HQ' version and the fmt18 version...

I certainly don't advocate changes to the article based off a few experiments on a couple of videos, but for my own curiosity I'd like to know what's going on. Betty Logan (talk) 08:42, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It definitely looks like fmt6 has been dropped, but the situation with the red HQ button is more complicated. The fmt18 versions were created in order to give compatibility with Apple's products, such as Apple TV and the iPod. Some of the new HQ videos use a format which is different. They still have MPEG4 video and AAC audio, but the picture size is different. However, on this video the HQ and fmt18 versions are the same. At the moment it is difficult to give hard and fast rules, because it is not practical to check millions of videos on YouTube.

Another point to note is that the HQ version of Mark Selby is served a writ at the Snooker Welsh Open 2009 uses a Flash video (FLV) container. This is different from fmt18, which uses an MP4 container. This similar to the fmt34 and fmt35 videos that YouTube has been experimenting with. The Mark Selby video was uploaded on 20 February 2009, so it is fairly recent. YouTube does not publish lists of its formats, so there is inevitably going to be some original research here.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 09:45, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Downloadhelper on Firefox helps to clarify the situation somewhat. It gives me a choice of four videos to download on the Mark Selby video: 1) The normal flv1/mp3 1516KB version as above; 2) a [HQ18] version which is the avc1/mp4a 2545KB version as above; 3) a [HQ35] version which is the h264/mp4a 3800KB version as above; 4) another version h264/mp4a (2 channel 44100Hz) 320x180, 1391KB, with AAC extension SBR. So it seems the default HQ is the fmt35 version, at least on this video. The fourth format seems to be a low res version of fmt35. Betty Logan (talk) 11:22, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It is clear that YouTube is using fmt34 and fmt35 on some of the newer videos, and has been doing this since late last year. The pity is that there has been no mention of this so far in tech blogs like CNET. It is also likely that YouTube has dropped fmt6, since it is redundant when fmt34 and fmt35 are used. The article should be updated to reflect this, but there are still sourcing issues to be resolved.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 12:17, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It's truly unfortunate that YouTube doesn't publish their formats and their current strategy for their videos; it would certainly clear up some confusion for articles such as this, and it would allow user to pick the format that allowed for the highest quality of their own uploaded videos. In any event, Betty Logan it would definitely be nice to know more details on Format 34 and Format 35. Lastly, have you noticed any differences in FPS amongst the difference formats?

Updated: Interesting...I downloaded the format 34 version of a video--it was 0.02 megabytes smaller than a regular YouTube files.

Also, I take it format 35 is higher quality than format 18?Fox P McCloud (talk) 13:18, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the differences between fmt18 and fmt35 actually are, but in this particular instance (the Selby video) they have different resolutions. The normal version has a resolution of 320x180, so its vertical resolution is lower than the YouTube standard resolution (320x240). Presumably something to do with making YouTube widescreen? Fmt18 has resolution of 480x270 (as opposed to 480x360 as in the chart) and fmt35 has a resolution of 640x360 (so in this case the vertical resolution matches the HQ resolution in the chart). So in this case the fmt has 33% more lines. Maybe fmt35 is HQ for widescreen videos?? Betty Logan (talk) 08:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I make videos for YouTube and have investigated this for my own videos recently. YouTube has changed their transcoding system somewhat in the last few weeks. 4:3 resolutions are NQ (Normal Quality) (320x240), HQ (High Quality) (480x360) 16:9 resolutions are wide screen: NQ 320x180, NQ large format (480x270), HQ (640x360) The HD quality is unchanged. Two factors determine which format is choosen and they are original source video bit rate and resolution. Castaa (talk) 00:01, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

So, are you telling me that Format 18 is the high-quality version of regular 4:3 YouTube videos, and format 35 is the high-quality format of 16:9 YouTube videos? If that's the case, I can't see how that could be as I've found 4:3 videos where format 18 and format 35 both worked (but format 22 did not).

It makes me wonder if, one day, YouTube will just pad all 4:3 videos up to 16:9 (pillarboxing)...then we'd have the sizes Castaa mentioned...but that isn't the case, at least, I do not believe, yet......and 4:3 videos thrown into the mix seems to obfuscate things.

Also, how are you checking the resolutions on these videos (and their bitrates, FPS, etc) without directly downloading them? I'd like to do some research on my own. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fox P McCloud (talk • contribs) 02:29, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

The resolutions Castaa talks about seem to tally at least with the Mark Selby video I was experimenting on which was a widescreen source. The files will load into your browser cache regardless of whether you 'download' them or not, and it depends on your browser where that is. In Internet Explorer you can access your Youtube files through Tools->Options->Browsing History settings->view files. If you order your cache by date and time the file will be much easier to find and it will be much bigger than the others. Copy the file to a normal directory. If you use Firefox you'd have to find your profile and then go into the cache, so it's best to stick to IE for this to keep life simple. I then opened the file with VLC player and you can get the file details through Tools->Media Information. The Codec tabs will tell you all about the codecs used and the stats tab about the bitrates. Betty Logan (talk) 08:08, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the information...sorry to turn this into a bit of a forums, but I really would like to investigate this myself...anyways; thanks for the information, I'll post my findings with 4:3 and 16:9 videos later.Fox P McCloud (talk) 20:15, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I've downloaded every single video format from YouTube to get my information. I don't know the corresponding fmt tags. But currently any new video uploaded to YouTube will be transcoded to one of formats I've described above. If you want audio and video bit rates just ask. Although those vary somewhat depending on the original uploaded source video. Also who has rights to edit this table? It's out of date given the current changes.Castaa (talk) 22:59, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried it with a 4:3 source video? Thus far, I've found 1 that works with &fmt=35 (I have a video that is 4:3 and &fmt=35 works, but it's a false 4:3 as it's been padded up to 16:9). Also I tried your method for view YouTube videos, to no avail. Ahh well, I have a plug-in to download videos directly, I'm sure I can use FLV player on those. In any event, I'll try that tonight or tomorrow.

as for the table, I have no idea.Fox P McCloud (talk) 03:21, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

One correction to my info supplied above. There is a NQ 480x360 version and a HQ 480x360. The video bit rate is much higher and the audio is somewhat higher. ~225 kpbs, 64 kbps/22khz verses ~700 kbps, 96 kbps/44.1khz respectively Castaa (talk) 21:33, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Well this is interesting... download and look at fmt=35 for this video: Quake 2 Online Deathmatch The fmt=35 version is 658x480 @ 54.96 MB while fmt=18 is only 35.7 MB @ 480x350. Notice that fmt=35's width IS ABOVE 640 PIXELS. Maybe this means it will be able to support true widescreen 480p? Nintendo Maniac 64 (talk) 05:11, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Localization

Any idea where pop.youtube.com is located? Search on Google for "pop.youtube.com" brings up a long list but connection cannot be established; domain name cannot be resolved on DNS. Is this done by internal routing by YouTube? 88.97.164.254 (talk) 04:11, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

At the moment, pop.youtube.com produces a 404 error and does not seem to be a recognized part of the YouTube domain. More details and sourcing would be necessary for a mention in the article.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 15:11, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Dates

The infobox says that YouTube was created in Nov. of '05. The article says that it was created in Feb. of '06. Since Fred, atleast according to his YouTube account, created his username in Oct. of '05, YouTube must have allowed users to created usernames before the "launch date", whatever that means. When did YouTube allow usernames to be created?Pisharov (talk) 03:08, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Unlike a ship, YouTube never had a formal launch. The domain name www.youtube.com was registered in February 2005, and the site was on beta test for much of the year. The lauch date of November 2005 was more of an official rollout period, and it is hard to say exactly when the site was launched. This type of rollout period is common in the hi-tech industry.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 09:23, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Peabody award

I had added the following text to the article's Social impact section (since it cites YouTubes role in promoting democracy):

Youtube was awarded a 2008 George Foster Peabody Award and cited for being "a 'Speakers' Corner,' where Internet users can upload, view and share clips, is an ever-expanding archive-cum-bulletin board that both embodies and promotes democracy."

with citations:

• "Complete List of 2008 Peabody Award Winners". Peabody Awards, University of Georgia. 2009-04-01. Retrieved 2009-04-01.
• Ho, Rodney (20009-04-02). "Peabody honors CNN, TMC". Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved 2009-04-14. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)

However the text has been removed by User:Ianmacm twice, with the latest edit summary being, "move to external links section, mainly news based item". I think this is the very opposite of the recommended norm on wikipedia, where we attempt to add information to the article, instead of simply providing an external link. See for example, WP:EL, which says, "If the website or page to which you want to link includes information that is not yet a part of the article, consider using it as a source for the article, and citing it."
Can Ianmacm or others comment on if and why they they think mentioning the Peabody award is (in)appropriate ? Abecedare (talk) 19:04, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

The main concern here was WP:RECENTISM. Sometimes stories about YouTube are covered in the media, such as the YouTube Symphony Orchestra, which has been receiving a lot of publicity today.[4] It is not always practical for the article to mention every media story about YouTube, as there are so many. Since the Peabody Award has received some media coverage, the full text of the previous edit is now in Social impact of YouTube.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 19:26, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree that we have to be careful to keep recent trivia out of the article. However the Peabody award is the only bit of sourced information in the Social impact that would not qualify as such. The rest of the section is unsourced (1st paragraph) or contains bits about videos that were popular at some point of time (2nd paragraph). So I fail to see how a prestigious award given to YouTube for its social impact is not relevant to the section. Can you please clarify ? Abecedare (talk) 19:33, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

The wording that was removed tended to read like a recent news story about YouTube. I would welcome other comments about whether it was too strict to remove this.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 20:04, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I am not sure what you mean by "tended to read like a recent news story". Are you objecting to the content or the grammar ? I am sure that I can find sentences of the form, "X was awarded the Y prize in xxxx and cited for his work on ..." in any standard encyclopedia, so I don't see the problem on either front. But if you wish to rephrase, I have absolutely no objection. Abecedare (talk) 20:29, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

A look at pages that link[5] to Peabody Award shows that hundreds, maybe over a thousand, articles on Wikipedia consider the Peabody award quite notable (no matter how recent). It's certainly more notable than everything else covered in the Social Impact section here. And it's notable enough for the Carl Sagan, South Park, The Simpsons, Frank Sinatra, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Minnesota Public Radio, and hundreds of other articles. Definitely a keeper, no question. Priyanath ^talk 22:59, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

"Hulu" Tube

I'm not sure if this should be mentioned in the article, but there's this "HuluTube" which everybody thinks might put YouTube out of business. We do not know for sure about this. There was no official press release statement from the YouTube press reguarding this situation. If anybody knows more about this situation, and would like to cite a source (must be an official YouTube Press Release statement), please do so.--70.240.240.71 (talk) 21:06, 17 April 2009 (UTC)Chris

There is no HuluTube its just YouTube now has a page for TV shows[6] and a page for movies.[7] Here's some sources.[8][9] Powergate92Talk 21:21, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

YouTube has revamped its interface to offer some separate pages for premium content. Some people have been saying that this marks the beginning of the end for user generated videos on YouTube, but this is an overreaction for the time being.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:53, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

You're right. I have posted a video response to clarify that YouTube is NOT being merged into this "Hulu Tube."--70.240.181.236 (talk) 16:54, 19 April 2009 (UTC)Chris

I think that this is worth mentioning the video campaign called "Hulu Tube the Phasing Out of Youtube" in which about a thousand videos of it got copied and mirrored and another thousand or so videos were posted as a response I think its notable enough for a small section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gatorade379 (talk • contribs) 05:11, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

The video referred to here is Hulu Tube - Phasing out of Youtube. Some people believe that YouTube is going down the Hulu road towards premium content only, but there is no evidence of this as yet. What is happening is that YouTube needs to generate more advertising revenue to compete with sites like Hulu. It should be pointed out that YouTube's premium content is currently available in North America only, and clicking on it outside this area will produce the message "This video is not available in your country". The claim that YouTube is being phased out to create a Hulu-style service lacks reliable sourcing at the moment, and is outside the scope of the article.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 15:09, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

For everybody's info, I have made this video here, "Hulu Tube" clarification, to clarify that YouTube is NOT merging into this "Hulu Tube". Rest assured.--70.240.181.236 (talk) 17:06, 19 April 2009 (UTC)Chris