YouTube is testing a new feature that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to auto-generate summaries of videos on its platform, allowing users to get a quick glance of what the video entails before they begin watching it.
“We’re starting to test AI auto-generated summaries on YouTube, so that it’s easier for you to read a quick summary about a video and decide whether it’s the right fit for you. To begin with, you may see these summaries on watch and search pages. While we hope these summaries are helpful and give you a quick overview of what a video is about, they do not replace video descriptions (which are written by creators!). This experiment is running only with a limited number of videos (en only) and viewers, so if you see the feature, let us know what you think by sending feedback!” — YouTube explained its support page, which was first spotted by Android Police.
Google has been ramping up its integration of AI into all of the company’s products and services from Search to Play Store to YouTube. For instance, in June, YouTube started testing a feature that will allow video creators to dub their videos in other languages using AI.
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Third-party AI services that used to provide similar functions will be impacted if YouTube decides to launch these features because their roles will become redundant.
“It’ll be interesting to see if the AI summaries impact how YouTube creators structure their videos. Every policy change and new feature introduced by the video platform can have wide-ranging effects on its content ecosystem, as creators attempt to please its all-seeing yet obscure recommendation algorithm. Who knows what will happen when creators have to make videos for both humans and Google’s AI to understand?” The Verge pointed out (emphasis ours).
Those who want to test out the new features on YouTube can sign up on youtube.com/new, but some features are only eligible for testing by YouTube Premium subscribers.
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