Beginning in the month of June, YouTube will no longer provide its Stories feature, which allows users to create transitory content. Beginning on June 26th, users will no longer be able to upload Stories, and all previously published stories will be removed within a week.
Stories were first made accessible to consumers in 2017 and were given the moniker Reels at that time. At that time, there were over 10,000 members. YouTube Stories functioned in a manner very similar to Instagram Stories (which, in turn, borrowed the idea from Snapchat), in that they vanished after a certain length of time.
Creators may use YouTube Stories to publish behind-the-scenes material or updates to promote their channel. However, based on what can be seen now, it does not seem to have been popular: access was restricted, only a small number of content producers appear to routinely post to Stories, and the feature does not get any marketing from YouTube itself.
YouTube closes storybook: Time for a new chapter
YouTube would prefer that content producers publish videos to other areas of the site, such as Community Posts and Shorts, now that the Stories feature has been discontinued. Recently, the firm increased users’ access to Community postings, a text-based updates tool, and provided the option to make postings disappear from the community after a certain amount of time. Community Posts are a kind of content that may be shared by creators on their channels. These posts can include photographs, videos, polls, and quizzes.
YouTube has also been attempting to entice conventional long-form video artists to start producing shorter material in addition to striving to channel the popularity of short-form video into its TikTok rival, Shorts.
In February, as part of an updated monetization strategy, YouTube started giving creators a portion of the advertising money generated from their Shorts videos.
YouTube is not the first site to remove its version of the story format, which was made famous by Snapchat and has now been adapted by several other platforms. You may remember Fleets, which were short-lived tweets on Twitter that disappeared after a single year.
YouTube Shorts is essentially a carbon copy of the app TikTok and is Google’s latest love affair. This format is designed specifically for use on mobile devices and has bite-sized videos that are very engaging to swipe through.
This one is still going strong, and it seems that Google is prepared to take swift action if government efforts to prohibit TikTok ever become more widespread. Today’s Shorts are somewhat similar to Stories in many respects; users have access to a wide variety of text and filter options; however, Shorts do not run out of time on their own.
Also, If you are having difficulties using your favorite video streaming platform, or just want to add some customization, check out our guides on how to hide your subscriber count on Youtube.
