Summer temperatures have been sizzling this week. While heat makes me a bit cranky, at least it makes my tomato plants happy. This week there is news and updates for YouTubers, webmasters, and much more.
- Reminder: Hangouts on Air are going away August 1st. If you have a HOA scheduled after that date, you’ll need to reschedule and use a different service.
- Google Photos now has more than one billion - 1,000,000,000+ - users . But it’s not for everyone. This week Google introduced a new app called “Gallery Go”, which can be used offline and is more lightweight than the Photos app for use on entry-level phones. It joins YouTube Go and the rest of the Android Go suite of apps, designed for Google’s “next billion users” who may have phones with limited storage, slow or unreliable internet connections and low processing power.
- If you are interested in a bit of history, Fast Company takes a look at how Google Photos got to where it is today, starting with its split from Google+. I think it’s pretty clear that Photos as a stand-alone product was a wise move. It wasn’t great for Google+ though, which was not well integrated with the separated Photos after it’s redesign in late 2015.
- The new Gallery Go app was announced at the Google for Nigeria event, along with updates to Google Lens so that it can read aloud and translate in Hausa, Yoruba, and Igbo; local launch of Bolo, an app to help kids learn to read in English; improved Google Maps navigation with a motorcycle travel mode; and a pledge from YouTube to support emerging Nigerian musicians.
- Creator Insider talked to the YouTube project manager who is responsible for Content ID about copyright and “fair use”. They bust some common myths and come to the bottom line, which is that fair use can only be determined by a judge. But there’s a lot more to it than that. Watch the video for all the details.
- YouTube Super Chat - viewer payments in live stream chat - are now available in 18 new countries in Europe, South America and Africa. That means creators in more than 50 countries, from Australia to Uruguay, are eligible for Super Chats.
- The Pew Research Center released an interesting study analyzing every video posted by high-subscriber channels on YouTube in the first week of 2019. Among their findings: videos featuring children under the age of 13 had triple the views of videos without kids(!); only 17% of the quarter million videos included in the analysis were fully in English; of those English videos, 18% were related to video games; and cross-promotion of videos with other social media channels was both widespread and associated with an increase in views. Read the full report for more. Of course it’s not clear whether these results apply to channels with fewer than 250,000 subscribers.
- “Patreon U” is a new website created by Patreon to help new (or not-so-new) Creators get set up and maximize your earnings.
- The Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism is a joint effort of YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft to work to disrupt the promotion of terrorism and violent extremist propaganda. This week they posted an update on their efforts, and their new work focused on crisis response to better respond to live events. They also supposedly launched a “cross-platform counter-violent extremist toolkit”, however the press release posted by all the coalition members links to a website builder landing page (oops!).
- Google Webmasters started a new video series #AskGoogleWebmasters where they answer questions from SEOs, webmasters and publishers. Tweet your question with the #AskGoogleWebmasters hashtag and it may be answered.
- Google is launching “Swipe to View” in Google Images on the mobile web. When someone views an image from your site, they can swipe up to instantly view the web page the image is from. This is powered by AMP, which prerenders the page. In the coming weeks, you’ll be able to view a new report in your Google Search Console showing “AMP on Image result” traffic so you can see how this is working for your site.
- Google My Business and local SEO expert Tim Capper has posted an overview of steps you can take to improve your business’s online visibility.
- If you use Google Maps Platform on your website or app, there are several improvements to the search Autocomplete feature that will make it easier for your users to find the business or location they are looking for.
- Is this the real life? Queen’s original Bohemian Rhapsody video has reached 1 billion views on YouTube. To celebrate, the original video has been remastered, and you can view the lyrics in 13 languages. If you are a musician, singer, dancer or visual artist, you can be a part of creating a new Queen music video. Check out the “You are the champions” site for details.
- Weekend entertainment: This weekend the Fuji rock festival is live on YouTube. There are two live streams, on Fuji Rock's official channels Channel 1 and Channel 2.
- Reminder: I’ve created a playlist of the videos I suggest in my weekly roundup link list. You can click the save playlist link
to save the playlist to your own YouTube account. I plan to add the latest videos each week. If you like it, let me know!
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Image: Cherry tomatoes by Hans Braxmeier from Pixabay
Upcoming
YouTube and Video Creation
- All you want to know about FAIR USE! (Creator Insider)
- Five New Merch Aggregators, 1:1 Preview Launch, Community Guidelines Reminder in Comments! (Creator Insider)
- Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism: An update on our progress (YouTube)
- A Week in the Life of Popular YouTube Channels (Pew Research Center)
Go Live
- YouTube Super Chat is now available in more countries (BarbaraEMac)
- Twitch has to figure out what to do with its biggest stars (the Verge)
Social Media: Facebook and Instagram
- Young Instagram Users Give Up Privacy in Search of Metrics (Bloomberg)
- Facebook's alleged growth is largely coming from countries where Facebook says it has a fake account problem (BoingBoing)
- Facebook will have to monitor its own privacy rules — and that’s likely not enough (The Verge)
- FTC Agreement Brings Rigorous New Standards for Protecting Your Privacy (Facebook)
- What the FTC Agreement Means for Developers (Facebook)
- Cleaning Up Data Access for Partners (Facebook)
- Facebook design flaw let thousands of kids join chats with unauthorized users (The Verge)
- Facebook And Instagram Ban User Posts Selling Alcohol And Tobacco (Tubefilter)
Social Media: Twitter
- The Man Who Built The Retweet: “We Handed A Loaded Weapon To 4-Year-Olds” (Buzzfeed News)
- Twitter Bookmarks now available on desktop (Twitter)
Other Social Media
- Introducing Reddit Community Awards (reddit)
- Introducing Pinterest Ads on the Go (Pinterest)
Google Photos and Photo Sharing
- Gallery Go: a fast, helpful way to organize your photos offline (Google)
- How Google Photos joined the billion-user club (Fast Company)
Google for Businesses
- Local SEO Steps to Improving Your Businesses Online Visibility (Online Ownership)
- Google Updates As Yet Unannounced Scroll Pack with Stronger CTA (Mike Blumenthal)
- Google Confirms Cause of Missing GMB Reviews – Will They Ever Come Back? - Search Engine Journal (Search Engine Journal)
Bloggers and Webmasters
- Helping publishers and users get more out of visual searches on Google Images with AMP (Google Webmasters)
- New Autocomplete features in Google Maps Platform help your users make faster decisions (Google Cloud)
- Inside The World Of Stay-At-Home Moms Who Blog For Profit (BuzzFeed News)
- Linking Out: Good for SEO? #AskGoogleWebmasters (Google Webmasters)
- Google Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout (July 23) (Google Webmasters)
- Google Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout (July 26) (Google Webmasters)
AdSense and Advertising
Made by Google, Android, Google Fi
- With Sound Amplifier, more people can hear clearly (Android)
- Google reveals the Pixel 3a doubled its phone sales last quarter, because people like cheaper phones (Android Police)
- T-Mobile and Sprint merger approved by Justice Department (The Verge)
Productivity
- More controls and customizations for headers and footers in Google Docs (G Suite Updates)
- Google Maps 101: how we map the world (Google)
- Welcome to Patreon U (Patreon)
- Google for Nigeria: making our products more helpful to more people (Google)
Privacy and Security
- Project Strobe: Updates to Our User Data Policy (Chromium Blog)
Once again everything in your post is important and a couple of subjects very important to me and my business. You made me watch at least a dozen Queen videos beginning with the remaster. Thanks for that, Peggy. I needed the interruption in today's world. Now back to reading the business stuff refreshed and with a new attitude. Queen rules. :D
ReplyDeleteI put on Queen when I need something rousing. We are the champions!
DeleteI'm surprised that there are black bars on the Queen video. I guess it's mostly the music that is remastered.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure why that is, now that YouTube should adjust to different video sizes.
DeleteI know that kids in videos bring in a lot of views. My best performing videos have kids in them.
ReplyDeleteIt's really a great and helpful piece of info. I'm glad that you just shared this useful information with us. Please keep us up to date like this. Thank you for sharing.
ReplyDelete