If you have a YouTube channel with more than a thousand subscribers and fancy doing a live broadcast on the site, you now have the chance.
The Google-owned video streaming site announced in a blog post on Wednesday that it’s expanding its YouTube Live service to producers of all channels “in good standing” (ie. no copyright or terms of service strikes), so long as they have over a thousand subscribers.
“Live streaming can bring great experiences to your viewers, create deeper engagement with your fans and build a hyper-engaged audience for your channel,” YouTube product manager Satyajeet Salgar said in the post. “Over the last year, many YouTube creators have used our live streaming to make their channels a destination for Emmy-winning sports events, amazing music, immersive gaming, engaging talk shows and so much more.”
Channel producers interested in braving the potential pitfalls of live broadcasting can find out if they’re eligible by going to their Account Features page. If the channel fits the criteria, you’ll see an Enable button. Click on it to sign up and in a few weeks you’ll have the opportunity to conduct your very first live broadcast.
YouTube promises “great streaming quality and instant scalability and reliability” with its live stream service, at the same time pointing out key features such as real-time transcoding in the cloud. This means you’ll only need to send your highest quality stream, which YouTube will make immediately available in all resolutions and device formats. Multiple camera angles will also be possible, and viewers will be able to skip back and forth in the live stream too.
YouTube launched its live video feature in April 2011, though until now only select partners have been able to make use of it. Wednesday’s announcement opens it to a whole new bunch of creators and will doubtless have competitors in the live streaming space – think Ustream and Livestream – taking a keen interest in developments.
