Fantastic news for all the avid live-streamers out there! This week, YouTube announced that they are rolling out new tweaks to the live streaming service. It will make live broadcasts that much more fun and exciting for viewers.
So here are the things you should really know about:
The nifty little feature rolled out on Monday gives viewers the chance to watch the chat conversation that happens during a stream even after the stream has happened! Chat is often a great way to connect with creators and see what others think about the broadcast and Chat Replay will be sure to entertain and just make you feel like you’ve actually managed to join the stream at the time!
And because that isn’t enough, the Super Chat feature will also get an upgrade. From May, creators can now sync their channels with a service called If This Then That, which allows you to link apps and smart devices. This means that Super Chat can be used to trigger reactions on over 600 connected devices and do things like turn on lights or shooting confetti cannons, turning any live stream into a live event.
This new feature is ahead of its time. YouTube is one of the first major platforms that will be implemented in the coming weeks. What does this mean? For live video that had no captions provided, YouTube will now auto-generate these in English using LASR (Live Automatic Speech Recognition) technology. LASR was first used in 2009 and since then has been responsible for the translation of over 1 billion videos. Though not yet completely perfect, the captions will make the viewing experience more versatile and should allow more viewers to join the broadcast.
And last but not least, creators will now be able to add a location tag to their mobile live streams. This is a great opportunity to share favourite spots, restaurants and great sights. And by clicking on the tag, viewers will be able to explore all the other videos that have been tagged in the location.
If you want to know more about how to use these great features to grow your channel, get in touch!