Bookmark Vlog Blog
Jul
31
YouTube Cleans Up Its Act
Filed Under Video Sharing Sites
Continuing on yesterday’s theme of taking the ugly out of your vlogs (How to Get and Keep More Viewers), it looks like YouTube is trying to take some of the ugly out of their site.
In terms of style and looks, YouTube has always been the MySpace of video sharing sites (which is to say ugly and cluttered looking). Granted, they aren’t as bad as many MySpace pages, but if you compare them directly to other sites like blip.tv or revver.com, their clutter really stands out.
If you haven’t noticed, however, YouTube has gotten a slight makeover. Well, at this point, you actually have to choose to see the new makeover by clicking the link above the info box on the right hand side of a video page. It says, “Try out the NEW (beta) version of this page!”
As they chose to capitalize the word NEW and included an exciting exclamation point at the end of the invitation, I was expecting a major overhaul. Suffice to say, no major overhaul took place, but the newer version does seem cleaner and less cluttered. There is also a little bit of new functionality added as well.
The Old Design:
The New Design:
Below is a quick rundown of the changes.
Design Changes:
- There were really two design changes that helped to clear up the clutter. One was taking the boxes of code (”url” and “embed”) off of the area just to the right of the video. The other was eliminating the preview of “Director Videos” that ran down the right hand side of the page.
- This second change took the layout from three columns down to two and open up the page to allow it some breathing room. It also allowed the video pane to actually be enlarged a little.
- The “Save to Favorites” and host of other links directly below the video has been cleaned up and redesigned.
- Colors have been slightly modified in places - sometimes switching the gray areas for white areas and vice-versa.
- A channel icon (or user picture) now appears on the right hand side as well.
- In the “related videos” section, it now runs three across instead of one, but by taking out a lot of the text previously associated with the thumbnails, it actually looks cleaner.
Added Functionality:
- Add videos to a quick list from the preview thumbnail.
- In the old version clicking on “Share Video” gave you a pop up window to send an email. In the new version, the “Share” button first gives you a row of social bookmarking icons from Digg, del.icio.us, furl, reddit, and StumbleUpon - as well the pop-up email option. You also need to click this “Share” button if you want to get the “embed” code that used to reside on the right hand side.
- It looks like the url code has been taken out completely (maybe because it’s right up there in the address bar anyway).
- Next to the embed code box, there is also now a option to “customize embed.” This allows you to include or exclude “related videos.” The include option is the default.
- A new feature is now placed directly under these options for embedding and is called “Also Watching Now.” This give you a list of other users who are also the same video at the same time you are.
Overall, while not a major overhaul, the changes are a definite improvement.