Uploads Unplugged

Since the new iPhone hit stores this morning, we've seen thousands of videos uploaded to YouTube from the new device. (If you didn't know, now you can shoot and upload videos to YouTube directly from your iPhone.)



To see just how easy it is to share your iPhone 3G S videos with the world, check out this video we shot with -- what else -- our new iPhone 3G S.







Now go upload some videos!



Tom Bridgwater

Software Engineer

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An Update On What's Happening in Iran

It has been one week since Iran's contested presidential election, and YouTube has been flooded with footage from the streets of Tehran and other cities, documenting the civil unrest that is unfolding there. In the past few days, many Iranians have participated in violent demonstrations, held silent rallies to protest the elections, and grieved for those killed as a result of deadly clashes with the Basij, Iran's auxiliary police force. In the past 36 hours, the foreign media has all but been expelled from the country, making the role of Iranian citizens even more critical in shedding light on what is happening there.




Yesterday, opposing candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi called for a day of mourning to honor eight of his supporters who have died since the protests began. As you can see in this clip, a massive number of protesters gathered (some reports are in the hundreds of thousands), dressed in black, to peacefully pay their respects to the fallen and demonstrate their perseverance in seeking justice. A candlelight vigil was held on Thursday night, and Mousavi himself addressed the crowd and urged his supporters to stand up against corruption. Yet due to the Iranian government's crackdowns on foreign media, this speech received no airtime, inside or outside of Iran. The only clip we've seen of it on YouTube lasts just 20 seconds, but it illustrates the incredible power and energy of the crowd amassed.









In stark contrast to Mousavi's speech, Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei addressed the Iranian people today, insisting that they accept Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory. Khamenei told Iranians, "If there is any bloodshed, leaders of the protests will be held directly responsible." The speech was broadcast on national television, and footage is available here:









Continue to stay tuned for more... and don't forget to check out the Citizentube blog for regular updates.




Olivia Ma

YouTube News & Politics

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Release Notes: 6/18/09

Lately, the team has been pushing out features and fixes as they're ready in "mini-pushes" rather than waiting for the big, numbered releases that occur once a month. Here's what's gone out in the last few weeks:



* The Wonder of "Wonder Wheel": Next time you search for a video on YouTube you may notice a link on the right-hand side of the page labeled "Wonder Wheel." This is a new beta search option from Google.com, which we think has some cool potential as a way to navigate the vast range of videos on YouTube. You may have seen "also try" suggestions at the top of search results. Now we are letting you navigate across those suggestions graphically. Wonder Wheel displays searches related to the one you are searching like spokes on a wheel, allowing you to explore different search suggestions quickly. You can click on any of the wheel's spokes to see a new wheel with more related topics and browse new relevant video results to the right. Give it a try and let us know what you think!



* Improved Advanced Search: Let's say you want to narrow down your search for a video and be more precise about what you're looking for. Advanced Search allows you to specify many more details than our normal search, including when a video was uploaded, the location it came from, and its length. We've reworked Advanced Search to be easier to use and to better reflect the range of content on YouTube (lots of new stuff!).



* Remaining Time Display on Upload Progress Bar: In April, we launched the new progress bar with our Flash uploader. We added a small enhancement to the UI to show the estimated remaining time based on your file size and internet bandwidth. We hope this will give you a bit more info about the status of your upload.



* Download MP4 Files of Your Own Videos: Oh no! Your computer just crashed and you lost the original files of videos uploaded to YouTube. Don't panic. Find the video you want in "My Videos" and hit the "Download MP4" button to save the MP4 file of the video to your computer. You can download videos recorded with your webcam, too.



* A More TV-Like Experience: We recently launched a feature that hides the player control bar when you are in full screen for a more immersive, TV-like experience. (Speaking of which, read our blog post about YouTube XL for more about optimizing YouTube on large screens.) You can also "pop out" any video by clicking on the button in the top right corner, right above the video. The video will open in a new window, without any of the surrounding features or videos, for the simplest possible experience. (Please note: this feature won't work when embedding has been disabled by the uploader.)



* Mobile App in Six New Languages: A few months ago, we launched an all-new YouTube Mobile Application for fast, high-quality video streaming on Windows Mobile and Symbian Series 60 phones. Just two days ago, we released the App in French, UK English, Italian, Spanish, German and Dutch. To install it in your language, please visit m.youtube.com/app.



To comment on any of these features, leave a note below or head over to the Help Forum feedback and suggestions page.



Until next time,

The YouTube Team

More about → Release Notes: 6/18/09

More Footage from Protests in Iran on YouTube

Last Friday marked a long-anticipated Election Day in Iran to choose the next Iranian president. While the voting process itself ran smoothly, widespread violence has since broken out in protest of current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's claim to a decisive victory over challenger Mir-Hossein Mousavi. Mousavi supporters, who believe Ahmadinejad rigged the election results, refuse to accept the verdict and have been openly protesting since Saturday.

Video clips that capture the chaos and rioting in the streets of Iran's capital, Tehran, have been streaming into YouTube for the past four days. Even though YouTube appears to be blocked in Iran -- the site is experiencing a small fraction of the traffic levels it normally receives from Iran (around 10%) -- we continue to see videos being uploaded to the site that document city streets crowded with angry demonstrators, violent clashes between protesters and state police, and visceral scenes of mass unrest.

In essence, YouTube has become a citizen-fueled news bureau of video reports filed straight from the streets of Tehran, unfiltered. Because the Iranian government is cracking down on local and international media coverage, these citizen-generated videos are providing an exclusive look at the developing violence. Here's a collection of some of those videos. (Please use your discretion before viewing, as some of them contain disturbing images.)




We've noticed some claims going around that YouTube has been engaging in acts of censorship and removing some of these videos from the site. Unless a video clearly violates our Community Guidelines, we will not take it down. In general, we do not allow graphic or gratuitous violence on YouTube. However, we make exceptions for videos that have educational, documentary, or scientific value. The limitations being placed on mainstream media reporting from within Iran make it even more important that citizens in Iran be able to use YouTube to capture their experiences for the world to see. Given the critical role these videos are playing in reporting this story to the world, we are doing our best to leave as many of them up as we can. YouTube is, at its core, a global forum for free expression.

Take note that if you see a video that is unavailable on the site, it may be because the user decided to remove the video him or herself.

We're following what's happening in Iran on the Citizentube blog (www.citizentube.com), so stay tuned for the latest.


Yours,
Olivia Ma
YouTube News & Politics

More about → More Footage from Protests in Iran on YouTube