Summary
- YouTube is experimenting with user-generated AI effects in Shorts.
- Some creators can design effects for other uploaders, with the potential for broader release.
- Google aims to enhance Shorts, perhaps without losing its unique identity.
YouTube has the potential to become Google’s poster child for ingenious applications of AI, and we’ve seen this popular entertainment app take on the responsibility quite seriously. Although most of the AI-powered additions have been limited-run experiments available to a handful of testers, new features are constantly streaming in. The latest one aims to test user-generated AI effects in Shorts with a handful of creators, for starters.
Google has tried several ways to incorporate AI on YouTube, such as with AI-generated green screens, AI Dream Tracks, and Jump Ahead. More recent experiments you can still try to include summarization of comments under Shorts videos using the button labeled ✨Topics. The company explicitly mentioned the role of AI when discussing the topical summarization of the comments. However, the new✨Effects button introduced today presumably uses AI too, although YouTube’s announcement doesn’t spell it out.
Effects for everyone
In this experiment, YouTube is giving a few creators the permission to design and publish their own effects for Shorts. With just this description, it sounds like YouTube is trying to imitate some version of Instagram’s user-generated filters, but with convenient assistance from AI.
While creation is limited to a handful, everyone uploading Shorts should see the new ✨Effects button show up, with some of those creator-made effects available for use immediately. Google is tight-lipped about all timelines for this feature, including the scope and duration of the experiment, but we reckon there’s no reason to hold it back from a stable release if the feature is well-received.
On the one hand, it could reduce the need to crosspost content from other platforms with a fleshed out library of effects and filters. However, the flipside risks making Shorts look a lot like Reels on Instagram. It should be interesting to see Google create these effects for Shorts in another attempt to get close to social media platforms. I just wish Shorts were spun off into a separate app, though.
