YouTube now lets you skip to the best parts!
A new YouTube feature has been introduced that adds a graph to the video slider that shows where earlier viewers spend most time. The higher the spike of the graph, the more that particular segment of footage was replayed.
How it works
The YouTube graph, which was announced and released on May 18, will make it much easier to navigate to a video’s highlights as assessed by other people.
A sports highlight film, for example, will likely peak at the dramatic play, whereas a how-to video on repairing a leaking tap will likely soar past the introductory preamble.
If the graph isn’t apparent enough, the YouTube community page’s example image also includes a “most replayed” thumbnails with a specific time. That way, you can easily identify and watch such moments, without having to skip through the movie in five-second chunks.
Rollout
Despite being accessible “today” on the web and on mobile, the functionality does not appear to be available on Android or iOS at time of writing. However, we anticipate that this visual shortcut will appear on your Android smartphone shortly.
Controversy
We’re still waiting to see how YouTubers react to this feature, which basically pushes viewers to skip through the bulk of their content. By assuring that viewers jump past commercial breaks to the substantive section of the program, this could impact YouTubers financially. Which could cause further problems for the companies relationship to its content creators.