Products & Services
YouTube on S60 – have you tried it yet?
By JBC on 24 March 2009
GLOBAL – It only popped out the other day, but I’ve just been playing with the new YouTube app for S60 and have to say, I’m mightily impressed. Slick user interface, new approach to scrolling through vids (sideways, instead of down) nice use of AJAX-style transitions and an all round top experience.
Functionality is kept pretty simple at the minute, with more features promised in the future. The app is a weighty download (2MB) so you might want to make sure you’re in a WiFi hotspot before you download it – that said, you should make sure you’re on an unlimited data plan, anyway, if you’re planning to watch videos on your device.
Fire up the app and you’re met a big search box and three buttons: Top Rated, Most Viewed and Most Recent. Flicking through the buttons is easy (just right or left scroll on an E71) and when you’ve selected one you do the same thing to scroll through the videos for that section (right or left scroll). I was using my home WiFi network to watch videos and it was very speedy, though I haven’t tried it on a 3G network yet. Video has been optimised, depending on how you’re accessing though, so it should perform just as well on a 3G network.
The videos look very good on my E71’s screen, which is the most important bit though the video controls are paired down to simple volume and play controls, the former can be manipulate through the d-pad (up and down) or your volume keys.
For me, this has probably changed how I use YouTube. I don’t get much time during the day to watch videos at my computer, but I do spend time on trains, waiting in line and various other places where Twitter doesn’t quite kill enough time. Will YouTube on my phone? It just might. How about you?
Here’s a video from the guys at YouTube showing off the new app on an N95 (as you can see, the buttons are arranged differently, depending on the screen orientation – mine were horizontal)
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March 24th, 2009 at 10:51 am
I tried one and its working great on my N81! ^_~
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March 24th, 2009 at 10:57 am
i tried one..tnx !
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March 24th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
Tried it but its not as good as Mobitubia. It streams videos faster on my N82 but the video quality is not good. Mobitubia also have the option to download stream videos.
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March 24th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
It’s great, but I wish they hadn’t lost all of the account-related features (e.g., Subscriptions). FWIW, subscriptions are the more powerful feature of YouTube, and it’s CONTINUALLY crippled by Google. No RSS or podcast, no client support, the only thing you can get is an email telling you to go to the site. Lame.
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March 24th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Whoops… that’s what I get for typing fast. :*)
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March 24th, 2009 at 9:53 pm
I haven’t tried it yet, but when I get closer to a WiFi spot I will do it. What do you think about the internet connection, is it as fast as the previous Youtube Mobile app, using RealPlayer?
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March 25th, 2009 at 10:52 am
best youtube app is ‘MOBITUBIA’. it is much faster,it plays videos in flv format n quality is great.
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March 28th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
Why oh WHY can we NOT login using this app?!
Why can’t we then see our favorites?
- I hate always searching for the same video I’ve already added as a favorite on my PC; to do on my E71. I already cannot stand this application.
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March 31st, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Download link..?
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March 31st, 2009 at 11:17 pm
A great application indeed !
It works fine on my N85.
AJAX-style transitions are nice and the interface is very successful while remaining easy to use.
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