The CNN/YouTube Debate: How Did They Do?

Did you see it? Last night's CNN/YouTube Debate was easily the most exciting debate of the presidential primary season. With your questions driving the debate, and with the presidential primaries just weeks away, the Republican candidates sparred on important issues like the economy, Iraq and immigration. It was a lively discussion and you can see all the clips here.



We also had some stellar YouTube users in attendance who provided a great behind-the-scenes look at what took place. Check out some of their videos in this playlist.







But you didn't have to be at the debate in order to offer your opinions on what happened. Upload your post-debate thoughts, ideas, analyses or rants to our special post debate page and tell the candidates how you think they did!



Yours,



Steve aka Citizentube

YouTube News & Politics

More about → The CNN/YouTube Debate: How Did They Do?

Tonight: The CNN/YouTube Republican Debate!

Tonight is the night of the much-anticipated CNN/YouTube Republican Debate. At 8 PM ET, live on CNN, the eight Republican candidates on our You Choose '08 platform will stand on a stage at the Mahaffey Theatre in St. Petersburg, Florida, peer up at an enormous video screen hanging from the ceiling, and watch video questions that you've submitted right here on YouTube.



Take a quick peek at what the debate set looks like:







You submitted almost 5,000 questions for the candidates (um, 4,927 to be exact), which is almost 2,000 more than for our first CNN/YouTube debate with the Democratic candidates. Make sure to tune in tonight to see how the candidates handle your questions, and then log on to YouTube and go to our You Choose '08 platform to let the candidates know how you think they did.



Tell your friends and enjoy the show!



Steve aka Citizentube

YouTube News and Politics

More about → Tonight: The CNN/YouTube Republican Debate!

Fantasy Football Crunch Time

If you're one of the millions of fans out there with a fantasy football team, the next few weeks are crucial: every point, every yard, every tackle can make all the difference in the final rankings. It's time to get your lineups ready: who are you going to start and who are you going to sit? Ultimately, it's up to you, but there's no shortage of fantasy sports experts on our site with timely tips and advice. Here's a few armchair experts:



* Not sure how to construct your roster in these final weeks? The crew behind the Fantasy Football Show pride themselves on personally answering email questions:







* Fantasy Fanatics Rob Shaw and Rob Nucatola from SHPORTSTALK offer an overview of the NFL and key insight into who's performing and who's not, week in and week out.



* David from ABTFantasyFootball scours the waiver wire so you don't have to.



* Whom to pick up and whom to dump? The Fantasy Sports Girls have indispensable advice as you're making the playoff push.



* Reporting live from his kitchen, Geno from statbeastsports weighs in with his picks and analysis.



* With the stated goal of dropping kick-ass fantasy football insight in an entertaining and creative way, the fellas at Testosterone Sports bring the noise every week.



* Last but certainly not least, CBS Sports has weekly tips for fantasy owners from Amber Wilson and Jamey Eisenberg.



If your team is hopelessly out of the running, you can still play spoiler with some shrewd moves. And, hey, there's plenty of time to put together a team for fantasy basketball and hockey.



Good luck,

Andrew B. aka playactionpass

YouTube Sports

More about → Fantasy Football Crunch Time

Project Direct: Go Vote!

In October, we announced Project Direct, YouTube's first film competition for aspiring directors.



The response was overwhelming. We were blown away by the number of exceptional films that were submitted – both from experienced filmmakers and first-timers.



After reviewing the entries, Jason Reitman, the award-winning director of Thank You For Smoking and the upcoming film Juno, and a panel of industry experts selected 20 finalists.



Now it's up to you to decide which filmmaker is ready for the big time. Check out this video to see exactly what's at stake (well, almost exactly -- our first, second and third place winners also walk away with cash debit cards).







We hope you enjoy these entertaining and thought-provoking films as much as we have. And stay tuned to YouTube's Film & Animation category to see spotlights on some of the excellent entries that may not have made the top 20 but certainly deserve your attention.



Happy voting,


Sara P. aka TheStoryBoard


YouTube Film

More about → Project Direct: Go Vote!

Leftover Perfection

With another Thanksgiving under our belts (literally), we're not quite sure what to do with our leftovers (besides eat them). Naturally, we turned to YouTube, where we found lots of inspiration, starting with the Culinary Institute of America. Their channel has some interesting recipes, including this helpful video about making turkey pot pie:









ChefMelissaTV isn't having any of it -- casseroles, sandwiches and pot pies, that is -- and promises a "fresh look at leftovers" in a special post-Thanksgiving edition of her cooking show:









Annietothemax also takes an unconventional approach to leftovers with this video about turning leftover mashed potatoes into gnocchi:









Finally, enot2 pontificates on what Thanksgiving leftovers could mean for our canine friends. It's a philosophical note on which to end the holiday:









We'll be back soon with more blog posts (and videos!) to serve all your holiday needs.


Cheers,


Sadia aka sublinx


YouTube HowTo & Style

More about → Leftover Perfection

Thanksgiving Rescue!

Here in the States, everyone’s mouths are watering at the thought of Thanksgiving. Chefs like Jolene Sugarbaker, Martha Stewart, and Jamie Oliver may have everything under control, but if you’re like us you haven’t even started shopping yet. But there’s no need to panic: our community of gurus is here to help with recipes and tips to make your holiday dinner super scrumptious. These videos reveal the secrets that make the classic dishes work, including how to cook a turkey, make mashed potatoes and concoct cranberry sauce to die for:









So create that grocery list, go to your 24-hour market, and make Thanksgiving magic. Then, when the tryptophan sets in and you can’t get off the couch, we have just the thing that can help with that too…




Gobble, gobble,


The YouTube Team

More about → Thanksgiving Rescue!

CNN/YouTube Debate: Submit Your Question Now!

There's just one week left to upload your video question for the next CNN/YouTube Debate, which takes place on November 28, in St. Petersburg, Florida. All eight Republican candidates on the You Choose '08 platform will be there to answer your questions, so what are you going to ask them?



Chris Nandor, aka pudgenet, just posted the following song about the debate. If you ask me, it's an instant classic in YouTube politics:







To see some other great examples of questions from the YouTube community, check out this playlist.



So flip on those web cams and fire up those camcorders -- the deadline to upload your video is November 25th at 11:59 p.m. Pacific time. Click here to submit your question today!



Yours,

Steve aka Citizentube


YouTube News & Politics

More about → CNN/YouTube Debate: Submit Your Question Now!

New Video Category and Tag Choices

Just a quick post to update you on some new choices available for "Video Category" and "Tags" on the video uploading and editing pages in your account.



SUGGESTED TAGS



You can choose from a set of new "suggested tags" when you upload or edit a video, in case you need some ideas for how to best represent your content. The more descriptive your tags, the easier it will be for folks interested in your videos to find them.



Just choose the best Category for your video, then click on any of the suggested tags to automatically add them to the "Tags" field.



EDITED CATEGORIES



A few changes made to existing video categories:



- Travel & Events (previously "Travel & Places")

- Howto & Style (was "Howto + DIY")

- Gadgets and Games (now part of "Entertainment")



NEW CATEGORIES



The following new categories are now available when you upload or edit your videos:



- Education

- Nonprofits & Activism

- Science & Technology



Since these categories are brand new, we need your help to populate them by uploading new videos or editing any of your current videos which are relevant to these topics. Once these categories fill up with all of your awesome content they'll be searchable on the Videos tab (a few of the above changes are already reflected on the Videos page).



More categories changes are on the way, so stay tuned!



The YouTube Team

More about → New Video Category and Tag Choices

Coming Soon: The CNN/YouTube Republican Debate

First it was the Democrats; now it's the Republicans' turn. In just
over two weeks, the second CNN/YouTube Debate will feature all
eight Republican candidates on the You Choose '08 platform. Every
question asked in the debate will come from your videos, which will be
broadcast and answered in the live, prime-time event in St.
Petersburg, Florida, on November 28.



The first debate put
citizens' concerns squarely at the center of the political process.
Stephen Sixta's question on whether the
candidates would speak directly to foreign dictators spurned a dialog
between Senators Clinton and Obama that made headlines for weeks --
and has remained a central issue on which these candidates differ.



Our Republican debate already looks very promising. Almost href="http://youtube.com/contest/RepublicanDebate ">3,000 questions
have been submitted so far, including the great ones like these.



The submission deadline to send in your question is November 25 --
three days before the actual event -- so make sure to submit your videos soon. With your
help, we'll have another lively and compelling debate in which
you drive the discussion between the candidates vying for the
Republican nomination.



Yours,

Steve aka Citizentube

YouTube News & Politics

More about → Coming Soon: The CNN/YouTube Republican Debate

Multi-Video Upload Arrives

Have a hard drive full of new videos? With the YouTube Uploader, we've
now made it easier to get them all live on the site. This small piece
of software lets you upload multiple videos to YouTube at the same
time; each video can be up to 10 minutes in length and up to 1GB in
size. That's right, no more compressing to 100MB - we want your big
files!



Right now the YouTube Uploader is only available for Windows PCs but
we're cooking up a Mac version too. To get started, just go to the
installer webpage and download the software. Then you'll be able to
access the Multifile Upload page and start your, well, uploading.
These videos will be available in My Videos after they have finished
processing. (Note: it may take 30 minutes or more for extremely large
files to appear on your page.) We link to the Multifile Upload page
from today's single file upload page so you can always find your way
back.



Happy Uploading!

The YouTube Team

More about → Multi-Video Upload Arrives

Improvements to Video Flagging System

Greetings from your friendly YouTube admins. We've been listening to
your feedback and we've been working hard to make the video flagging
system consistent, fair and less mysterious.



When users flag a video, it is reviewed by real-life humans at YouTube
who check to see if the video should be removed, age-restricted or
left alone.



Today we made some changes to the video flagging options:



* Clarified the top-level category names and added one for spam

* Added 17 sub-categories

* Added ability to enter additional information for some flags

* Some flagging reasons redirect to the appropriate Help Center form



These changes are aimed at making it clear to users what should be
flagged, and allows users to provide us with more information so that
the less obvious violations can become more obvious to us. This will
help us be more efficient and consistent, which should hopefully
provide a better experience for everyone.



So let us know what you think of the new menus. In the meantime, we'll
keep working on adding abuse and safety content to the Community
Guidelines and the Help Center so that the rules are more transparent.



Thanks,

The YouTube Team

More about → Improvements to Video Flagging System

Meet the Inaugural Community Council

Today marks the first day of a new project aimed at better
understanding the needs and wants of our users. The "YouTube Community
Council" consists of a handful of volunteers (who will rotate every
six months) eager to share their opinions about the site and the
community with us on a consistent basis. They're kicking off their
tenure by visiting us in San Bruno over the next few days, giving
feedback directly to the team that makes it happen behind the scenes.



You can approach any of our councilors with your thoughts, gripes --
anything at all -- over the next six months, and they will fast-track
your feedback to us. Here's a quick video to introduce you to the
team…







…and their channels:



bgirl5

bradofarrell

sarrycrey

tlg847

visiblemode



As with anything new to YouTube, we are open to your feedback on this
endeavor, and don't forget to let us know if you're interested in
being on future editions of the Council.



Best,

The YouTube Team

More about → Meet the Inaugural Community Council

Updated Preview of New Videos Page (Begone, Red!)

Thanks to everyone who checked out our first preview of the new video
browsing page and for letting us know your thoughts. Based on your
responses, we're tweaking a few things in this updated version of the
Videos tab.



- Tab menu color is now gray, as opposed to red.

- Font size has been adjusted.

- Video categories menu now appears only when you hover over the small
triangle, next to the word "Videos" on that tab.



We got such a kick out of the more "unique" messages some users sent
to us that we couldn't resist sharing those with you. If we had a
YouTube Feedback Hall of Fame, these quotes would be high in the
ranks:



- "Wow, doesn't that look like crap...that color red absolutely sucks.
Who thought blood read would be good when someone comes home from work
and wants to veg out at some stupid meager web videos and find this
vibrant blood red that shocks the eyes into a panic attack resulting
in a deadly heart attack. To all the Youtube CEO's, talk to a
psychiatrist, they can tell you what calm and soothing colors are."



- "The preview is about as ugly as your present look, which I always
assumed was designed by a room full of engineers without access to
photoshop. "



- "When the new layout loaded, i literally jerked away from the screen
because of how unattractive it is! I then thought it might be a
hacker's joke."



- "it looks like you went back to youtube 1.0."



- "dude, this seriously looks like crap...wtf.. lol we are not blind dude."



- "Ack! My eyes! My eyes, they're burning!"



-"Nice, but how about a little more red?"



-"Ugly as ****."



Please feel free to send us more feedback on the new version.



Thanks again,

The YouTube Team

More about → Updated Preview of New Videos Page (Begone, Red!)