YouTube is going through a period of change. Recently, the woman who had been CEO of the company for 25 years, Susan Wojcicki, left her position to “focus on her family, health and personal projects”. Her replacement, Neal Mohan, was the company’s former CPO, and this week he has already shown what his main priorities will be as CEO of YouTube in the run-up to 2023.
In a letter posted on YouTube’s blog and echoed by The Verge, Mohan expresses his intention to prioritize content creators above all else and advances that the company is currently developing generative AI tools for creators to make use of.
As he explains in his letter, “Content creators will be able to expand their storytelling and increase their production value, from virtually changing outfits to creating a fantastic cinematic scenario thanks to the generative capabilities of AI. We are taking the time to develop these features with thoughtful protections.”
The AI tools would be launched, according to Mohan, “in the coming months”, although no further details are known about how they will work beyond that protections will be put in place to ensure that this technology is not used for fraudulent or improper purposes, as has already happened with other art generation tools. “AI offers incredible creative opportunities, but it must be balanced with responsible management,” said YouTube’s CEO.
In the publication, Mohan also took the opportunity to talk about the future of its short videos: YouTube Shorts, the company’s bid to capture the audience of the popular TikTok. “Inspired” by the famous Duets of its rival, YouTube plans to launch a feature that allows you to create a Short in response to another user’s Short, putting one video next to the other. A very popular feature on TikTok with which YouTube could further enhance YouTube Shorts, which is gaining more and more relevance on the platform.
