We launched the Google News Initiative (GNI) earlier this year with three goals in mind: to elevate and strengthen quality journalism; evolve business models to drive sustainable growth; and empower news organizations through technological innovation. Since then, we’ve been working through partnerships to support investigative journalism, strengthen fact checking organizations, improve digital news literacy, and continue our collaboration with publishers.
Today, as part of our $300 million commitment towards the GNI goals, we’re announcing a $25 million investment to expand our work supporting the news ecosystem’s long-term success in online video—with a special focus on YouTube.
Supporting journalism with technology that allows online video to thrive
Through several programs, the GNI will help news organizations achieve success in online video. First, the GNI will establish a working group with news organizations from around the world to partner with us develop new online video product features and improve the news experience on YouTube. Second, the GNI/YouTube innovation fund will provide operational and capacity building grants in 20 global markets to support sustainable video operations, enhance production facilities and develop formats optimized for online video. Finally, we’re significantly expanding a team at YouTube focused on supporting news publishers. Based around the world, new team members will be tasked with supporting our partners with training, audience development, day-to-day platform operations, and sophisticated technical integrations.
Making authoritative sources readily accessible
When we announced the Google News Initiative, we also made a commitment to increase the integrity of the information we display during breaking news events. Today we announced several new YouTube features to prominently surface authoritative sources to viewers. To bridge the gap of time it takes to produce high-quality video when news breaks, in the United States, YouTube search will now include links to news article during breaking news cycles. In addition, we're rolling out the "Breaking News" section on YouTube's homepage and the "Top News" shelf in search results, which highlight videos from credible news organizations, to many more countries. And YouTube is expanding viewers’ access to local news—the most trusted source of news—across different markets in the U.S.
YouTube will also roll out a feature to give viewers more context on issues that have been subject to misinformation. When people search for or watch videos about well-established historical and scientific topics, like the moon landing or the Oklahoma City Bombing, YouTube will link to and show more information and context from trusted sources like Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica.
There is more work to do and we’re looking forward to continuing our cross-industry collaboration in the future. You can go in depth into all of today’s announcements on the YouTube blog. If you represent a news organization interested in more information about these efforts, you can sign up via this form.
Source: Building a better news experience on YouTube with the GNI