What is “You Tube”? YouTube is a video-sharing website on which users can upload, share, and view videos. In February 2005, three PayPal employees launched the beta test version of a Web site called YouTube. They designed the site to let people share videos with the rest of the world. In November 2005, Sequoia Capital invested more than $3 million in the site, and a month later YouTube emerged as a full-fledged Web destination. It didn’t take long for the site to become popular, and in November 2006, Internet search engine goliath Google purchased YouTube for $1.65 billion. In the early days of YouTube, you could find videos showing interesting locations, crazy stunts and hilarious pranks. Though you can still find that sort of content today, you may also see political debates, musical performances, instructional videos and political footage, etcetera. In the 2007 hotly contested presidential election campaigns, YouTube even provided members with a way to interact with potential United States presidential candidates. YouTube members submitted video questions, and CNN featured some of them in Democratic and Republican candidate debates. YouTube has become a centre for several controversies, one of which involved the publicized controversies involving copyright infringements. YouTube does not prescreen videos before they appear on the site because members upload thousands of videos every day. Sometimes, YouTube members will upload television shows or clips from movies to share with other people. If the YouTube member does not own the copyright to that material, there could be trouble. Another controversy is currently brewing in the YouTube community itself, the battles between the online community and corporations. YouTube has formed partnerships with major television studios like CBS, NBC and the BBC and with organizations like Universal Music etc. Notable celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Paris Hilton have also joined YouTube. Some YouTube members feel that these wealthy organizations and individuals are squeezing out the average contributor. They argue that average user videos are competing with people and organizations that have huge budgets and extensive resources, and some members suggest that these groups and celebrities are using underhanded methods to ensure their videos rise to the top of YouTube’s various video lists. YouTube accepts video files in Quicktime (.mov), Windows Media Video (.wmv), Audio Visual Interleave (.avi) and Moving Pictures Expert Group (.mgp) formats. Users upload video files in any of these formats and YouTube converts them into .flv. YouTube calls the period between uploading a file and the completion of conversion processing time, which varies depending on the size and format of the original file. YouTube says that processing time might only take a few minutes or could require several hours. If a video takes longer than eight hours to upload, YouTube suggests that the video’s creator remove the video and try uploading it again. eddie@afrowebs.com
