On October 28, 2015, the service was relaunched as YouTube Red, offering ad-free streaming of all videos and access to exclusive original content. By 2019, creators were having videos taken down or demonetized when Content ID identified even short segments of copyrighted music within a much longer video, with different levels of enforcement depending on the record label. As of May 2019update, videos were being uploaded to the platform at a rate of more than 500 hours of content per minute, and as of mid-2024update, there were approximately 14.8 billion videos in total. YouTube gives an option for copyright holders to locate and remove their videos or to have them continue running for revenue.
Enriching classrooms with music education on YouTube
YouTube Recap is available worldwide, but your location will determine how quickly you can access the feature. This will take you to your YouTube profile page, and just like on the mobile app, you should see a banner to watch your 2025 YouTube Recap. Alternatively, you can also access YouTube Recap from your desktop. Starting with the YouTube Android app, it takes just a second to locate the Recap feature.
Similar apps
In 2013, YouTube launched a pilot program for content providers to offer premium, subscription-based channels. Hurley announced that he would be stepping down as chief executive officer of YouTube to take an advisory role and that Salar Kamangar would take over as head of the company in October 2010. That year, the company again changed its interface and at the same time, introduced a new logo with a darker shade of red.
Copyright issues
In 2010, YouTube temporarily released a "TEXTp" mode which rendered video imagery into ASCII art letters "in order to reduce bandwidth costs by $1 per second." The next year, when clicking on a video on the main page, the whole page turned upside down, which YouTube claimed was a "new layout". Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov labeled the court decision as "symbolic" and warned Google that it "should not be restricting the actions of our broadcasters on its platform." In October 2024, a Russian court fined Google 2 undecillion rubles (equivalent to US$20 decillion) for restricting Russian state media channels on YouTube. Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, YouTube removed all channels funded by the Russian state. Should the uploader want to monetize the video again, they may remove the disputed audio in the "Video Manager".
- In early April 2017, the YouTube channel h3h3Productions presented evidence claiming that a Wall Street Journal article had fabricated screenshots showing major brand advertising on an offensive video containing Johnny Rebel music overlaid on a Chief Keef music video, citing that the video itself had not earned any ad revenue for the uploader.
- In 2022, YouTube launched an experiment where the company would show users who watched longer videos on TVs a long chain of short unskippable adverts, intending to consolidate all ads into the beginning of a video.
- Google’s acquisition launched newfound interest in video-sharing sites; IAC, which now owned Vimeo, focused on supporting the content creators to distinguish itself from YouTube.
- That year, the company simplified its interface to increase the time users would spend on the site.
- On April 6, 2017, YouTube announced that to „ensure revenue only flows to creators who are playing by the rules“, it would change its practices to require that a channel undergo a policy compliance review, and have at least 10,000-lifetime views, before they may join the YouTube Partner Program.
In 2013, YouTube teamed up with satirical newspaper company The Onion to claim in an uploaded video that the video-sharing website was launched as a contest which had finally come to an end, and would shut down for ten years before being re-launched in 2023, featuring only the winning video. YouTube expanded the removal of Russian content from its site to include channels described as 'pro-Russian'. Russia threatened to ban YouTube after the playjohnny casino bonus platform deleted two German RT channels in September 2021. Since April 2016, videos continue to be monetized while the dispute is in progress, and the money goes to whoever won the dispute.
App Functionality
In January 2024, YouTube had more than 2.7 billion monthly active users, who collectively watched more than one billion hours of videos every day. It’s a pretty robust recap feature, showing stats about your top interests, most-watched channels, how your viewing habits changed throughout the year, and more. One of the latest apps to join the recap bandwagon is YouTube. Music streamers like Spotify and Apple Music have offered this for a while, and now even apps like Google Photos have recap features. On March 20, 2019, Nintendo announced on Twitter that the company will end the Creators program.
- An independent test in 2009 uploaded multiple versions of the same song to YouTube and concluded that while the system was „surprisingly resilient“ in finding copyright violations in the audio tracks of videos, it was not infallible.
- On October 9, 2006, Google announced that they had acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion in Google stock.
- As of May 2019update, videos were being uploaded to the platform at a rate of more than 500 hours of content per minute, and as of mid-2024update, there were approximately 14.8 billion videos in total.
- Senate introduced a resolution condemning Joseph Kony 16 days after the „Kony 2012“ video was posted to YouTube, with resolution co-sponsor Senator Lindsey Graham remarking that the video „will do more to lead to (Kony’s) demise than all other action combined.“
- In December 2024, YouTube began testing a new multiplayer feature for that service, supporting multiplayer functionality across desktop and mobile devices.
- In January 2010, YouTube introduced a film rentals service, available in many countries, and TV shows can be bought in several countries.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt regarded this system as necessary for resolving lawsuits such as the one from Viacom, which alleged that YouTube profited from content that it did not have the right to distribute. In the 2011 case of Smith v. Summit Entertainment LLC, professional singer Matt Smith sued Summit Entertainment for the wrongful use of copyright takedown notices on YouTube. In August 2008, a US court ruled in Lenz v. Universal Music Corp. that copyright holders cannot order the removal of an online file without first determining whether the posting reflected fair use of the material.
YouTube's owner Google announced in November 2015 that they would help cover the legal cost in select cases where they believe fair use defenses apply. From 2007 to 2009 organizations including Viacom, Mediaset, and the English Premier League have filed lawsuits against YouTube, claiming that it has done too little to prevent the uploading of copyrighted material. YouTube has an estimated 14.8 billion videos with about 4% of those never having a view.
The platform was first tested in India and later expanded to other countries, including the United States in March 2021, with videos now able to be up to 1 minute long. In September 2020, YouTube announced that it would be launching a beta version of a new platform of 15-second videos, similar to TikTok, called YouTube Shorts. On November 1, 2022, YouTube launched Primetime Channels, a channel store platform offering third-party subscription streaming add-ons sold a la carte through the YouTube website and app, competing with similar subscription add-on stores operated by Apple, Prime Video and Roku. As part of YouTube Music, Universal and YouTube signed an agreement in 2017, which was followed by separate agreements other major labels, which gave the company the right to advertising revenue when its music was played on YouTube.
Besides helping to bolster ratings and long-term viewership for Saturday Night Live, "Lazy Sunday"'s status as an early viral video helped establish YouTube as an important website. YouTube was not the first video-sharing site on the Internet; Vimeo was founded in November 2004, though that site remained a side project of its developers from CollegeHumor. The site exited beta in December 2005, by which time the site was receiving 8 million views a day. Between November 2005 and April 2006, the company raised money from various investors, with Sequoia Capital and Artis Capital Management being the largest two. Karim could not easily find video clips of the incident and the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami online, which led to the idea of a video-sharing site. Karim said the inspiration for YouTube came from the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show controversy when Janet Jackson's breast was briefly exposed by Justin Timberlake during the halftime show.
M&S Money
The company stated the decision was in response to experiments which confirmed that smaller YouTube creators were more likely to be targeted in dislike brigading and harassment. That was disputed by Billboard, which said that the two billion views had been moved to Vevo, since the videos were no longer active on YouTube. On April 9, 2025, YouTube expressed support for the NO FAKES Act of 2025, introduced by Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) and Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), and announced an expansion of its pilot program that is designed to identify content generated by AI. On July 30, 2025, amid the implementation of the Online Safety Act 2023 in the United Kingdom, Google announced that it would begin to enforce "age assurance" policies for selected users in the United States as a trial.