YouTube gets its biggest makeover ever

YouTube

(Mashable) -- We already knew about YouTube's redesign, which tech-savvy readers have been enabling for the past 10 days. As of now, however, the new YouTube is available to everyone.

Unlike parent company Google, which tends to roll out redesigns over a period of days, YouTube pressed the button and switched the homepage for every user worldwide at 4:30 p.m. ET Thursday.

So what's the change all about? One word: channels. The world's most popular online video service now sees itself as a descendent of cable TV, with millions of channels rather than hundreds -- and it's doing its darndest to encourage you to use it that way.

The first new thing you'll see is an "add channels" button in the top left-hand corner of the page. Under that you'll find your top 10 favorite channels, which you can "pin" to the top of the page.

"The future of the YouTube experience has channels at the center of it," says Margaret Stewart, director of User Experience at YouTube's headquarters in San Bruno, California. "It's a container for all the world's video, and it needs to be the best home for that."

YouTube is also tweaking the colors of its logo and adding a soft gray background to the videos. In a sign that the service is becoming more integrated with its parent company -- and that more employees are going back and forth between San Bruno and the Googleplex in Mountain View -- Stewart says the redesign includes "subtle alignments with Google's visual style."

Part of that process, naturally, includes integration with the Google+ social network. But YouTube is also making it easier to post videos on Facebook and Twitter, too. And the channel change also came to YouTube apps on platforms other than the web. For example, it just became a lot easier to access YouTube channels on your Xbox.

There are four new channel templates that content creators can use, including one template designed for networks (with prominent featured content) and one for bloggers (with the most recent content first). Executives and designers at the company emphasize that this just the beginning of the redesign; more channel-focused changes and channel templates are coming soon.

Read up on the new YouTube user manual, and let us know in the comments: Has the strategy worked? Will this make you use YouTube channels more?

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Google launches music service

Google Music

(Reuters) - Google Inc has turned on the music at its new online store, aiming to wrest the lead from Apple Inc and Amazon.com Inc in audio entertainment distribution despite the absence of a major record label.

Google Music, with more 13 million songs, will be integrated with Android Market, the company's online store for smartphone apps and videos as it plays catch-up with its rivals. Apple, Amazon and Facebook have to varying degrees integrated music into their core online and mobile products.

Google Music will allow the Web search leader to do the same by letting consumers access music from various Internet-connected devices and easily share tracks with friends.

But analysts said the lack of soundtracks from Warner Music - a major label whose artists include Led Zeppelin and Prince, among others - will limit the appeal of Google Music.

"They've got to get that catalog filled pretty quickly," said Mike McGuire, an analyst at industry research firm Gartner. "It's a launch, but it's kind of like a work-in-progress."

Google Music was unveiled at a splashy event at the Mr. Brainwash Studios in Hollywood, California on Wednesday.

Google has negotiated U.S. deals with three of the four major music companies: Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group; Sony Corp's Sony Music Entertainment; and EMI. It has also signed deals with the increasingly influential independent label group Merlin and London-based Beggar's Banquet label group, home to the year's biggest selling artist, Adele.

Analysts say selling online music is unlikely to provide much of a lift to Google's revenue. But they say Google needs to be in the market to ensure that its Android-based mobile efforts can match offerings from competitors.

Android is the world's No. 1 smartphone operating system, powering about 200 million devices worldwide. But without a music service, Android-based smartphones and tablets may not be as attractive to consumers seeking a product that offers a seamless media experience.

And with music storage increasingly moving to remote Internet servers in "the cloud" rather than on the device itself, companies like Google and Apple have a way to keep users locked in to their respective mobile services, said BGC Partners analyst Colin Gillis.

"Everyone is using music and media as a jail. Ultimately, this stuff is going to be stored in the cloud and it becomes harder and harder to switch systems," he said.

To help jump-start the new music store, Google said it will offer one free song for consumers to download every day.

Google will also allow consumers to share purchased songs with friends on the Google+ social network. The feature will give users of Google+ a "free, full-play" of songs purchased by their friends.

"Recommendations from friends are the single most important way that people discover music and we think that this feature has the potential to really transform purchasing behavior," said Zahavah Levine, Google's director of content partnerships for Android, at Wednesday's event.

Music executives said that even though sales have struggled in recent years, music usage has never been more popular on different types of formats like social networks and mobile devices.

Facebook, the world's largest social network, unveiled a tab in September through which music services like Spotify, Rdio and MOG enable Facebook users to share music. Amazon has also long been a major music retailer and has a music locker service

Earlier this year, Google unveiled the Google Music beta, which allowed users to upload their music to Google servers, and access the music from multiple devices.

Shares of Google, which finished Wednesday's regular session at $611.47, were up 72 cents in after-hours trading.

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Google upgrades its Google TV

Google tv

AFP - Google Internet group said Friday the new generation of its television system connected to the Internet, Google TV, which led to various problems postpone the originally scheduled launch in Europe this year. The second generation of software for Google TV offers simplified controls, better integration with the YouTube video site and an option to add external applications. "This is another step on a road that will be long," said an official from Google TV, Chris Dale. "We are committed to the product and we improve."

Google is one of the companies that have bet the future, we watch movies and videos mainly via Internet connections. A year ago, the group launched its Google TV, loaded on Sony TVs and accessories Logitech: This is a system that works with Android's browser Chrome, with easy access to the Internet on their television, for example, to download movies, free or paid. However, Sony and Logitech had to cut prices in the face of disappointing sales, and delay the launch outside the United States. The system was considered too complex to appeal to the general public, which led Google to provide an update of the system supposed to make it more intuitive.

The devices will be equipped with Sony next week, those of Logitech "shortly after," said Google. Google told AFP that other electronics manufacturers were interested in integrating their system. Click here to find out more!

Google Blows Away 3Q Earnings Expectations

Google blasted Wall Street’s expectations for the third quarter, as earnings and revenue came in well ahead of estimates.

The tech behemoth weighed in with net income of $2.73 billion, or $8.33 a share, up from year-ago profit of $2.17 billion, or $6.72 per share. On an adjusted basis, net income improved to $3.63 billion, or $9.72 cents a share, compared with profit of $2.93 billion, or $7.64 a share, in the third quarter of 2010.

Revenue rose 33% to $9.72 billion. Net revenue, or revenue without traffic acquisition costs, increased to $7.51 billion from $5.48 billion in the year-ago quarter.

The results easily topped estimates. The Street had predicted adjusted earnings of $8.74 a share on net revenue of $7.2 billion. Google also topped the whisper number, or unofficial expectation for earnings of $8.74 per share, in-line with consensus estimates, according to WhisperNumber.com

"We had a great quarter," said Larry Page, CEO of Google, in a statement. "Revenue was up 33% year on year and our quarterly revenue was just short of $10 billion.”

Page also went on to boast that the company’s social networking site, Google+, recently saw its number of users surpass the 40 million mark.

Aggregate paid clicks rose 28% in the third quarter, compared with 13% in the second quarter of 2011, while the average cost-per-click increased 5%, compared to a 5% decrease in the previous quarter.

The company is also adding to its headcount; as of Sept. 30, the company employed 31,353 full-time workers, up from 28,768 full-time employees on June 30.

Shares of Google rose $10.49 or nearly 2% in Thursday’s trading session, finishing the day at $558.99 a share. In after-hours trading, the stock was up more than 5%, or $29 a share.

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