With 1.9bn users, YouTube streams 180 mn hours to TV screens daily
San Francisco, July 23: Over 1.9 billion users are logging into Google-owned YouTube each month and on average, users now watch over 180 million hours of YouTube on TV screens every day, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has said.
"Our overall interactions, such as likes, comments and chats, grew by more than 60 per cent year over year. More and more creators are building their businesses and discovering that they can shape the global conversation with just a phone and an Internet connection," Wojcicki said in a mid-year update over the weekend.
"We made a conscious effort to respond on social media, and we answered 600 per cent more tweets through our official handles (@TeamYouTube, @YTCreators and @YouTube) in 2018 than in 2017 and grew our reach by 30 per cent," Wojcicki informed.
YouTube has built a new feature that enables it to deliver relevant information in YouTube Studio (formerly known as Creator Studio).
"In February, we began testing a new dashboard with a small group of creators. The dashboard, which was launched for all English channels, will soon be available in an additional 76 languages in the next two weeks," she noted.
When it comes to channel membership, viewers pay a monthly recurring fee of $4.99 to get unique badges, new emojis, Members-only posts in the Community tab, and access to unique custom perks offered by creators.
"We worked with a small group of creators to develop this service and are expanding it to eligible channels with more than 100,000 subscribers and even more creators in the coming months," the YouTube CEO said.
Every day, over 60 million users click into or engage with YouTube Community posts.
"Live Streaming continues to be an area of growth for creators, with watchtime of livestreams increasing by 10X over the last three years," Wojcicki added.
With the increasing penetration of smartphones, data becoming affordable and ever-growing availability of content, 80 per cent of internet users across all age-groups in the country are accessing YouTube, Google India said on Friday.
YouTube's monthly user base has touched 225 million in India, reaches 80 per cent of the Internet population.
The platform recently announced a "Copyright Match" tool, which uses the matching power of Content ID to help creators find copies of content when it's been uploaded by other channels.
With this tool, after a new video is uploaded, YouTube would run a scan to see if there is any other video that resembles the uploaded video very much or is the same and if there is a "match", it would appear on the "matches" tab.
"We've been testing this tool with a thousand creators over the last year to tailor it to your specific needs and is a great complement to the range of copyright tools we provide," Wojcicki said.
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345 Indian fishermen stranded in Iran return home via Armenia
New Delhi (PTI): A group of 345 Indian fishermen, who were stranded in Iran amid escalating regional tensions, returned to India via Armenia on Saturday, officials said.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar thanked his Armenian counterpart Ararat Mirzoyan for assistance in return of the Indian nationals.
The Indian nationals arrived in Chennai this evening, the officials cited above said.
The circumstances that led to them being stranded in Iran were not immediately known.
"Thank FM @AraratMirzoyan and the Government of Armenia for facilitating the evacuation of Indian fishermen today from Iran, through Armenia to India," Jaishankar said on social media.
Over 1,500 Indian nationals have left Iran through land border crossings in Armenia and Azerbaijan since the start of the West Asia conflict over a month ago.
"A group of Indian fishermen, stranded in Iran, are returning home via Armenia today; their flight is expected to reach India this evening," a government statement said.
It said the Ministry of External Affairs continues to closely monitor the evolving situation in the West Asian region, with the safety, security and welfare of the Indian community being accorded the highest priority.
It also made a mention of five Indians being injured in Abu Dhabi on Friday.
According to Abu Dhabi authorities, the Indian nationals were among the 12 people injured by debris from an intercepted missile.
"In an attack in Abu Dhabi, five Indian nationals were injured; four have been discharged, one remains under treatment," the Indian government's statement said.
It said the Indian mission in Abu Dhabi is extending "full" assistance and coordinating with local authorities, adding that their flight is expected to reach India this evening.
