YouTube is already big time.
But now, YouTube wants to be a serious player in new media journalism, too, and that includes eyewitness news accounts.
On Thursday, YouTube announced the launch of its YouTube Newswire channel, committed to posting videos of the most newsworthy events daily.
A look at the YouTube Newswire as of Thursday morning shows "Mining the Social Web" as the main highlighted video on the channel's page, giving viewers an inside look at Storyful, the world's first social media news agency that YouTube has partnered with to launch Newswire.
"Everybody now is a storyteller ... but when everybody's telling a story, which stories are worth listening to?," YouTube posts as the description of its new channel. "Google News Lab took a behind-the-scenes look at Storyful and its team of editors as they sift through eyewitness media posted to social platforms like YouTube and find the most newsworthy social content of the day, using a unique blend of technology and expert journalism."
This totally makes sense and in some ways is long overdue. Who better to curate the day's top news stories using video journalism than YouTube? Newswire will break news around the world, as well as post verified eyewitness news accounts.
Perhaps unbeknownst to many is that Storyful has been working with YouTube long before Thursday's announcement. It has verified YouTube videos since 2010, vetting over 100,000 videos on the site to date.
Part of Thursday's announcement also included YouTube launching the Witmess Media Lab, which will highlight human-rights struggles with in-depth videos.
