Creator Weekly: YouTube Viewer Features, Twitch Updates, Adobe AI Tools

This week’s Creator Weekly news is a double edition. This past week I was in London for the Google Product Expert Summit. I had a fantastic time seeing friends old and new, learning new things about Google products, and sightseeing. It was both exhilarating and exhausting.

If you are interested in seeing public photos of the event check out the #PESummit23 hashtag on X/Twitter and Instagram, and the Google Produce Expert Program YouTube channel.

Top news and updates the past two weeks

YouTube announced a whole bunch of updated viewer features. My faves? The automatically highlighted Subscribe button and rotating top comments.
It’s easier for monetized YouTube creators to tag products in videos.
YouTube introduced news topic watch pages
Multiple new features announced at TwitchCon, including for Stories, Featured Clips, Stream Together, moderator controls, and ad performance insights. Plus updates to Twitch Embeds, Off-Service Conduct Policy and more. Plus now it’s allowed to simulcast anywhere.
Google’s AI in Search now lets you generate images.
AdSense Publishers may need to submit their Ireland or Singapore tax residency information
Adobe announced new generative AI tools for images, video and audio

Read on for details and additional updates!

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Responses to the Israel-Hamas War

Google is announcing Israel-Hamas war: $8 million in relief, a focus on content moderation, and Meet in the classrooms.
TikTok shared how they are taking action “to protect the TikTok community during the Israel-Hamas war”.
Mea shared updates on actions taken on Facebook and Instagram.
Casey Newton at Platformer: “How the attacks in Israel are changing Threads (and X)”
David Gilbert at Wired: “The Israel-Hamas War Is Drowning X in Disinformation”
Politico Reports: Israel floods social media to shape opinion around the war

New for YouTube Viewers

YouTube announced a whole bunch of new features to make viewing better:

“Stable volume” automatically keeps volume levels the same from video to video. (Mobile only, Rolling out now)
When watching full screen or vertically, press and hold anywhere on the player to easily increase the playback speed to 2x. (Mobile, web and tablets) More information.
When you seek through a video there are bigger preview thumbnails, and it’s easy to jump back to the point in the video where you started seeking.
On mobile and tablets you can lock your screen while watching a video to prevent inadvertent taps. Learn more.
The new “You Tab” lets you switch accounts, go to your Google account, find your history, playlists, downloads, uploaded videos, clips, purchases, settings and more. To get there on mobile tap your profile icon. On desktop click the 3 line menu icon at top left and then select You.
Search for a song by humming, singing or playing. This is rolling out on Android devices over the next few weeks.
When a creator asks viewers to “Like” or “Subscribe” those buttons will be highlighted (and sparkle when someone clicks them). This is my favorite new feature!
Top comments on videos will automatically rotate so you can see more of them.
New uploads will show views and like counts in real time for the first 24 hours.
There is improved navigation in the YouTube app on Smart TVs.

Shopping! Tag products with time stamps in your YouTube Videos

If you are a monetizing creator on YouTube with Shopping enabled, you can now tag products in your videos with time stamps on your long form videos. This will make the shopping button appear automatically while people are watching.

This is especially useful now that the Product Shelf on video watch pages has been replaced by ads on mobile devices. Products are listed in the video description.

If your channel is eligible for the YouTube Shopping Affiliate program (at least 20K subscripbes, in the YouTube Partner Program, US only) you can now tag affiliate products in bulk and see details in Analytics on which products drive the most revenue.

Enable Shopping on your channel at studio.youtube.com/channel/UC/monetization/shopping

Learn more: Making it easier to tag products and earn revenue with YouTube Shopping this holiday season

News Watch Pages on YouTube

YouTube announced new ways they are working to display news stories.

News Watch Pages: News topics have new immersive watch pages with content from “authoritative sources” including regular video on demand, live streams, podcasts and Shorts.

Search for a news topic or find a relevant video on the YouTube home page and click the newspaper icon to open the related watch page.
Mobile only (desktop and TV coming)
Available in 40 countries

Learn more: News on YouTube

Shorts Innovation Program for News: YouTube is providing monetary grants and support to news organizations in 10 countries to help them “lean into short-form”.

TwitchCon Updates: New Features and Updated Policies

Twitch announced a slew of new features and policy updates at TwitchCon in Las Vegas.

New features

Stories are getting the ability to upload and film short videos, tag other streamers, add links, gifs, and polls, and analytics.
Testing live channels in the newish Discovery Feed.
Making it easier to select Featured Clips.
Improved Clip Editor, including vertical clips in the Discovery Feed and editor access.
“Guest Star” is now “Stream Together”, which allows up to 6 streamers to collaborate while streaming to their own channels. There are new guest layouts, audio only guests, “drop in” guests, and (next year) shared viewership stats and merged chat.
Twitch Alerts will include custom animated emotes and be enabled for third-party actions (like tipping).
New insights in Ad Manager.
The Chat Countdown Timer for ads (that shows when an ad is coming) will be visible to moderators who can “snooze” an ad break.
AutoMod Smart Detection learns from a channel’s moderation actions (English only).

Policy Updates

You can now simulcast to any live streaming service, not just primarily short form platforms like TikTok and Instagram. There are a number of guidelines that must be followed:
Twitch users must have as good an experience as users on other platforms. That includes things like your engagement in chat.
You are not allowed to share links or direct your community on Twitch to another platform.
You are not allowed to use third party services that combine activity from other platforms, such as merging chat.
The Twitch Off-Service Conduct Policy now prohibits doxxing and swatting.
On November 15 Twitch will prohibit autoplay of embedded videos “where the embeddable content is not a substantive or meaningful component of the page.” If this affects your domain, you will see a warning when viewing the page in your browser’s Developer Tools. Learn more: Update Regarding Twitch Video Embed Autoplay Functionality

Generative AI in Google Search

Google’s AI in Search (SGE) can now create images. If you do a search like “draw a picture of a cat in a field of sunflowers” and that is exactly what it will do. You may also see a “Create something new” button when you perform an image search.

To get this option:

Opt in to Google Search Labs at labs.google.com/search/experiments
In the United States
In English
At least 18 years old
Generated images have metadata and embedded watermark labeling it as AI-generated.

AI tools announced at AdobeMAX

Adobe announced a number of AI-powered tools they are working on at Adobe MAX.

Adobe Firefly (firefly.adobe.com) got a big update:

Firefly Image 2 Model: generates more photorealistic images, uses Generative Match to generate images that match the style of reference images, improved text prompts, and the ability to easily share your work.
Firefly Vector Model: a beta in Illustrator that generates vector graphics. It includes Generative Match, gradients, vectorized patterns and precise geometry. Take a look.
Firefly Design Model: Editable professional designs with Text to Template in Adobe Express .

Here’s an overview of more experimental projects:

Project Stardust: an object-aware editor that lets you move, change or remove objects by clicking on them.
Project See Through: remove reflections from photos.
Project Fast Fill: Firefly generative AI for text to video.
Project Dub Dub Dub: automated audio dubbing
Project Scene Change: easily composite a subject and scene from two different videos.
Project Res Up: convert video from low resolution to high resolution
Project Poseable: AI-image generator that can interact with large 3D objects
Project Neo: incorporate 3D shapes into 2D design
Project Primrose: flexible textile displays.
Project Glyph Ease: AI-generated glyphs matching an input lettering style
Project Draw & Delight: a suite of generative AI tools that can transform doodles or scribbles into refined sketches.

Web Publishers

If your AdSense account is contracted through Google Ireland or Google Singapore, you may now be required to enter your Ireland or Singapore tax residency information. AdSense says “While there are no current legislative requirements to withhold or hold AdSense/ AdMob/ Ad Manager payments, it will be subject to change as regulations change.” Check your account for any requirements.

AdSense Auto ads now include a “related search” option which shows search terms related to the web page. Clicking one of those terms opens a search results page with AdSense for Search ads. You can turn this off in the Auto Ad settings in your AdSense account.

AdSense is updating their Rewarded Inventory Policy (now Policies for ad units that offer rewards) to allow some non-monetary items to be offered as rewards. Learn more.

AdSense is updating the Video Publisher Policy to allow non-in-stream ads that remain in a fixed location on the screen. Learn more. Note that this is not related to ads on YouTube videos.

ActivityPub is now available for all WordPress.com plans, including free accounts. This lets you use your WordPress blog as your profile for the fediverse (including Mastodon), so people can engage with your posts there.

The new WordPress Paywall block lets you add a paywall to any post or page.

Social Media

Instagram’s Broadcast Channels (one-to-many announcements) are coming to Facebook Pages.

Your Meta Accounts Center now lets you download your data from both Facebook and Instagram, and has added new privacy controls.

Meta is cross-promoting Threads posts on Instagram and Facebook.

Threads users can mention Instagram accounts that are not yet using Threads.

Threads has implemented post editing and voice notes.

LinkedIn has updated Collaborative Articles (experts sharing their experience with an AI-generated summary) with new badges for top contributors, broader reach, more emphasis on contributors, improved browsing and more. You can explore collaborative articles at linkedin.com/advice.

LinkedIn has extended their free identity verification option to users in Mexico. Earlier this year, ID verification was opened to users in the US and Canada. A government-issued ID is used for verification with CLEAR.

Discord is introducing a new Warning System, with warnings for lesser rules violations and more information about which policy or community guideline was violated.

Snapchat now allows all public creators to tag branded content as a Paid Promotion, and there is a new Creator Discovery tool that lets creators share their stats with third party partners and brands.

What’s the impact of leaving Twitter/X? Nieman Lab reports that for NPR it’s been negligible. “A memo circulated to NPR staff says traffic has dropped by only a single percentage point as a result of leaving Twitter… though traffic from the platform was small already and accounted for just under two percent of traffic before the posting stopped.”

X is testing a requirement for new accounts to pay $1 to post. This trial is currently running in the Philippines and New Zealand. It is ostensibly meant to deter creation of spammer bot accounts, but it seems likely that most regular folks wouldn’t bother to pay.

X CEO Linda Yaccarino has been touting Communities, which now allow admins to require people to answer a question to join, are pinnable to your Home timeline and are now available in Japan.

Bluesky now lets you change and verify your account email, prioritize people you follow in user search and will label potentially misleading content.

Privacy and Security

Google is pushing passkeys as the default sign-in method for your personal Google account. Instead of entering a password, you instead unlock your mobile device that has the passkey set up. Learn more about Passkeys.

More AI Updates

Google explained “How to build a secure foundation for American leadership in AI” and “Our responsible approach to building guardrails for generative AI”. That includes “protecting Google Cloud and Google Workspace customers with generative AI indemnification”.

Rest of World demonstrates Generative AI like Midjourney creates images full of stereotypes.

Vox asks What will stop AI from flooding the internet with fake images? Which looks at how Google, Microsoft, Adobe and other companies are “trying new ways to label content generated by AI”.

Communication and Collaboration

Portrait Touchup in Google Meet lets you improve your appearance with “subtle” or “smoothing” automated touchups in the mobile app.

Google Meet now offers full HD 1080p video for group meetings. 1080p video is only sent when at least one participant pins that user on a screen large enough to render the 1080p video feed. Users with personal Google accounts will only have this option with a Google Workspace Individual subscription or a Google One plan with at least 2TB storage.

Chrome’s address bar is getting smarter: autocompletion of URLs based on any word (not just the beginning), automatic spelling correction, search your bookmark folders, and suggestions for popular sites.

Chrome on Android now lets you erase the last 15 minutes of your browsing history.

Gmail now lets you add an emoji reaction to emails using your personal Google account. And you can add emoji reactions to comments in Google Slides.

Smart Chips in Google Sheets now include ratings. Just enter “rating” and click the chip to select zero to five stars.

Google Calendar events will be doing a better job showing invitee names, rather than email addresses.

Smart Replies are now available in Google Chat group conversations and spaces.

Katie Notopoulos writes for MIT Technology Review “How to fix the internet”. The problem? The attention economy, advertising and centralized platforms.

That’s all the updates for this week. Subscribe to get the Weekly Update in your email inbox or favorite feed reader every week. Miss last week’s update? Get the October 8 edition here.

Cover Image: via Canva. Free for commercial use.

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