YouTube Launches 10-Foot Interface for its Video-Sharing Service

In a posting on YouTube's corporate blog, Tuesday, the company's platforms product manager, Kuan Yong, announced YouTube XL (youtube.com/xl), a new browser-based interface optimized for watching YouTube videos on a TV screen. Key features of the new interface include a design that offers large text and simplified navigation (and that omits comments and other YouTube social features), and that is thus suitable for a 10-foot, "lean-back" viewing experience; HD support; the ability to view videos in full-screen mode; and a "continuous play" feature that lets users search for a topic on YouTube and then press "play" once to watch all of the videos on that topic sequentially. In addition, the new interface is billed as enabling viewers to get from one video to another with "just a few clicks," and as allowing viewers to control it with a Bluetooth-enabled remote and with certain mobile phones (at launch, though, the Android is the only mobile to support this feature--via the Gmote application). At launch, much of YouTube's premium programming content is unavailable through the new interface, due to licensing/rights issues that the company says it is currently attempting to resolve. According to YouTube, the new interface builds on YouTube TV, a dedicated Web site for users looking to access YouTube videos through their Sony PS3 and Nintendo Wii games consoles, which was launched in January.