YouTube Launches in South Africa

YouTube has just celebrated its fifth birthday, but there’s no time to stop enjoying it. The site is growing as fast as ever and is trying to expand into new areas and markets. YouTube has now made its first foray into Africa with the launch of YouTube South Africa. It’s more than just a localized version, the site says, YouTube has partnered with local broadcasters and has several plans to bring in more local content.

“Today a new territory is added to the list of YouTube locations: South Africa. This is the first domain launch on the African continent,” a recent entry on the YouTube blog read.

“In practice, this means that South Africa-based channels like Freshlyground and Khayav should enjoy more profile locally, and at the same time should also find it easier to identify other local users. From now on when users in South Africa visit the localized site they will see, for example, the Most Popular and Most Viewed videos in South Africa along with local content that closely matches their interests,” it added.

South Africa is now the 27th localized version of the site and the first one for the African continent. Some countries from all other continents, except Antarctica of course, already had their own YouTube. For the average South African user, this will mean that YouTube will feel more like home. More local content will be promoted and recommended items will be more finely tuned.

But it goes beyond that. YouTube says it has partnered with local broadcasters, like the South African Broadcasting Corporation and e.tv, to upload more professional clips to the site. It has also teamed up with journalism schools in the country, like the Rhodes Journalism School and the Wits Journalism School, to help students promote their works online. Users will notice South Africa on the list of supported countries if they click on the Location tab at the bottom of the page.