websites on a daily basis. Although there are thousands of different types of these products, there are a few that stand out as the most popular, one of which is YouTube. For this discussion, I will be presenting a review of the YouTube app and making recommendations on what I consider to be opportunities for improvement.
YouTube is an online video sharing and social media platform used by millions of people around the world. It was initially launched in 2005 and has skyrocketed in popularity over the last 10 years or so. YouTube enables users to upload videos and share them on its website and app. Many people upload videos ranging from personal thoughts, documentaries, reviews on products, to full-length films.
When accessing YouTube via their website, users will notice a list of videos ready to watch. After creating an account and logging in, these videos will change based on the users watch history. The algorithm will pay attention to what you watch and then starting suggesting other videos that it thinks you will like. In addition to watching material, users can click a ‘Thumbs up’ or ‘Thumbs down’ button to indicate if they enjoyed or liked the video they watched, or if they did not. This gives the algorithm more information on videos the user may or may not like to view.
Although YouTube is free to use, advertisements will play at times before or during a video. YouTube makes most of its money based on these advertisements. You can disable advertisements by paying for a subscription to YouTube Premium, which also gives you access to other features that free users cannot use.
YouTube makes it easy to become a content creator after logging into your account, clicking on the ‘Your channel’ button will take you to a page where you can upload your own videos. The ease of this makes becoming a video creator a simple and straightforward process. Not only can you have fun with YouTube, using the ‘Monetize’ feature will allow YouTube to add advertisements to your videos and potentially help you earn money based on the number of views. Many content creators use YouTube exclusively to upload their content and have made a career based on the communities that they organize.
Clicking the ‘Subscribe’ button underneath a video will subscribe you to the content creator’s material and, should you choose to enable it, will give you the option to turn on ‘Notifications’, which sends a message to notify you when the creator has uploaded new content. This allows a user to stay up to date on the latest videos the creator has submitted.
In addition to subscribing to a creator, users can comment on videos to add their own take on it or communicate with other subscribed members. Sometimes the creator’s themselves will respond to comments themselves. This gives YouTube the status of a social media platform, as entire communities can be created and maintained utilizing the YouTube website or app.
Overall, YouTube makes it easy and fun to watch videos and subscribe to content creators. Although YouTube has thought of a lot of different features to add that make the website and app an enjoyable experience, I believe it has a few opportunities. I believe YouTube should make their app and website more customizable. To be able to move videos, features, and lists to different parts of the site or remove them entirely, could make YouTube somewhat less confusing to navigate at times. Going along with this, I would suggest that YouTube allow customizable search terms that, although the algorithm has not been made aware of it, allow the user to receive a list of videos based on these terms. Lastly, YouTube should include a group subscription option that allows creators to band together in a group and allow the user to subscribe to all of them at the same time. This allows a community to connect more easily and will give the creators more exposure.
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