In June, YouTube will be saying goodbye to its Stories feature, which is a temporary post format. From June 26th onwards, users will lose the ability to create Stories, and any existing posts will automatically disappear after a week.
YouTube is urging creators to explore alternative ways of sharing content on the platform, with a particular emphasis on Community Posts and Shorts. These options have gained prominence as viable alternatives to the soon-to-be-discontinued Stories feature. YouTube has recently expanded the availability of Community Posts, allowing creators to share text-based updates that can have an expiration date.
Alongside text, creators can utilize Community Posts to share a variety of interactive elements such as polls, quizzes, images, and videos. All of these posts are displayed in a dedicated tab on the creator’s channel.
In addition, YouTube has recognized the rising popularity of short-form videos and responded by creating its own TikTok competitor called Shorts. The platform actively encourages creators who typically produce longer videos to explore the realm of shorter content. YouTube revamped its monetization strategy in February, allowing creators to earn ad revenue from Shorts.
Although the concept of temporary posts originated from Snapchat and has been adopted by various social media platforms, YouTube is not the first to discontinue its own version. Twitter’s Fleets, which were fleeting posts that disappeared within 24 hours, serve as a notable example.
As YouTube says goodbye to Stories, it is prioritizing the improvement of alternative content-sharing options for creators, namely Community Posts and Shorts.
The streaming giant launched its Stories feature in 2017 under the name Reels, restricting it to users with over 10,000 subscribers. Similar to Instagram and Snapchat, Stories provided creators with a means to share channel updates and exclusive behind-the-scenes content as a promotional tool.
However, it is evident that Stories did not achieve substantial popularity when examining the current YouTube landscape. The feature’s limited availability and infrequent use by creators resulted in minimal promotion, even from YouTube itself.
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Updated: 26 May 2023, 04:34 PM IST
