YouTube, the mass media giant and king of video sharing, has proven to be one of the fastest growing social media platforms on the web. From their founding in 2005, YouTube has grown under the wing of its parent company, Google, as well as through its own respective community. Instead of TV personalities, younger generations are growing up with YouTube personalities from many different categories: gaming, cooking, news, reactions, beauty and many others. My personal favorites include Philip DeFranco, his wife’s channel, TheDeFrancoFam, and the channels he helped found, SourceFed and SourceFedNerd.

Within the past few years, YouTube has grown to include YouTube Red, YouTube Music, the infamous YouTube Heroes and its newest addition, YouTube TV.

Announced on February 28, 2017, YouTube has labeled themselves as a new competitor among television live streaming.

YouTube TV will be the newest live streaming service for viewers’ television sets, for $35 a month. There will be no big contract attached, so users can cancel their subscription at any moment. YouTube TV can be shared by up to six accounts for that price (so your friends won’t be constantly bugging you for your Netflix password anymore), and will provide regular television channels such as ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox and even some local channels, as Youtube continues to partner with more networks.

One cool feature is the ability to personalize what channels you would like to have and therefore pay for. For example, if someone is a huge baseball fan, but has no interest in cooking, they can choose to pay for MLB and remove Food Network and Cooking Network from their account.

Another feature is the unlimited Cloud DVR, which will mimic the way one would subscribe to a YouTube channel. Once “subscribed” to the show you want to DVR, YouTube TV will record it, and the user will be able to watch the show whenever, as long as they are connected to the internet. On top of all this, regular features such as pause, rewind and fast-forward will be available. There will also be no ads on YouTube videos, and viewers will have full access to YouTube Red via a YouTube Red app within YouTube TV.

So what does this mean for you?

Well, to put it simply, it comes down to the picking game for consumers. I think YouTube TV essentially has the upper-hand. The competition is Direct TV Now, Sling TV and Playstation Vue, as well as the traditional cable providers such as AT&T, Cox, etc. Personally, I think services like Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go and Amazon TV are also competition. The hyperlinks provided link to the FAQs and rates that each provider will have/has.

However, YouTube TV has something that the other providers do not: a well established, online community. YouTube announced that although they have not established the exact features that will highlight their creator community, they see many opportunities to bring in new audiences, and promote shows and channels, through YouTube Red. For a more visual example of that, I highly suggest watching Philip DeFranco’s video on the matter.

Will you be joining the YouTube community through YouTube TV? How does this sound to you, compared to what services you already consume (i.e. Netflix, cable TV, etc.)? Let us know on KCR’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.