It’s not like we are actually surprised. With every major tech company on the face of the world rolling out their own TikTok, you didn’t actually expect Google to stay quiet, did you? In case you missed the headline, to compete with Instagram Reels, and a banned TikTok in India, YouTube is launching its own TikTok like addition to the platform-YouTube Shorts. And just like every other major tech player, Youtube’s test bed for the app is India.
“Shorts is a new short-form video experience for creators and artists who want to shoot short, catchy videos using nothing but their mobile phones,” the company said, trying to come up with its best version of ‘TikTok replica.’
The feature will first debut in India, and will be an early build of the final product. That means that while the company is inviting you along for a ride, it is going to be a bumpy one, with a lot of changes coming to the feature before it is available to the entire globe.
However, at its core, YouTube Shorts is like every other TikTok-esque feature that has seen the light of the day on other platforms. The video’s length is limited to 15 seconds (like that’s original), with the basic framework centred around 3 main areas-Create, Get Discovered and Watch.
Creation is the first part of any content based platform, and thus, the company has announced some features to make it easy and fun to create Shorts. These include a multi-segment camera to string multiple video clips together, the option to record with music from a large library of songs that will continue to grow, speed controls that give you the flexibility to be creative in your performance, and a timer and countdown to easily record, hands-free.
Moreover, if you there’s any doubt that this is exactly another TikTok copy, the new ‘watch experience’ will let you swipe vertically to discover other similar short videos, bridging the last gap that was left between YouTube and TikTok.
Get ready to have the same feature on another platform that you really did not ask for.
