Wisconsin protests spread nationally via YouTube

Union protests that began in Wisconsin last week against Governor Scott Walker's bill are still in full effect, with protesters uploading footage regularly to YouTube. Here's a look at the Wisconsin State capitol from yesterday's deafening round of protests:



And what began in Wisconsin is rapidly spreading to other states. This video, uploaded yesterday, depicts a large protest at the Indiana State House:



Citizens from around the United States are also joining this movement and voicing their support for the protesters in Wisconsin - often, in song. In the first video, a Wisconsin public middle-school student sings his original protest song, and in the second, people gather at the Washington State Capitol to offer a rousing rendition of "On Wisconsin" and show their solidarity.








However, we've also seen voices on the other side of the issue, on YouTube. In this video, shot at a government building, members of the Texas Tea Party movement chant, "we support Walker!"

Violent Footage from Bahrain

UPDATED

As protests continue this week in the Middle East and Northern Africa, CitizenTube is curating the footage coming in from that region in partnership with Storyful. Earlier today, videos surfaced of reported violence in the small island nation of Bahrain, where major demonstrations have taken place at the city's center and soldiers reportedly opened fire on protesters.

WARNING: SOME OF THESE IMAGES ARE GRAPHIC.

Reportedly from today:
Said to be from a downtown hospital on Thursday:

See all the curated videos from this week's protests at youtube.com/citizentube.

Update: New dramatic footage has surfaced of an incident purported to be from earlier today in Bahrain. It can be viewed here. WARNING: GRAPHIC.

This was cross-posted from the YouTube Trends blog.

What could you do with $3.73 trillion?

Congressman Patrick McHenry (NC-10) takes a creative approach to demonstrate the size of Obama's budget in more 'human' terms. Even though it's a relatively simple video, the message comes across loud and clear -- $3.73 trillion is a LOT of money.

Chile uses YouTube to Expand and Engage on the 2010 Government Achievements

This post was written by Pedro Less Andrade, Public Policy and Government Relations, Google Latin America.

With a view to public transparency, the Government of Chile has made a series of public presentations, in which President Sebastián Piñera and his 22 ministers spoke of the achievements of 2010 and goals for 2011.

All of these presentations were made between Monday, December 20, 2010 and January 13, 2011 in La Moneda Palace and are live at youtube.com/LaMoneda as well as the official website of the Chilean government.

This is the first time that an initiative with this level of public participation and proximity has been undertaken in Chile. Each public account was attended by an audience consisting of members of the public, social organizations, experts in sectoral issues, congressmen, leaders of opinion and the media.

The videos of these events were posted entirety on the official Youtube channel of the Government of Chile (www.youtube.com/LAMONEDA) where they can be viewed by anyone who wishes to see and comment on them.

These methods were used with a view to making the activities accessible to as many people as possible.

Video Posted from Protests in Bahrain

This week, through partnership with Storyful -- we're curating video from demonstrations in Iran, Bahrain, Yemen, and Algeria. In the past week, we've seen over 2,000 videos associated with the term "Bahrain" (in English or Arabic) appear, with around 700 in the past 24 hours.

New footage surfaced today of clashes and large gatherings of protesters in the streets of the island nation, which has an estimated population of just 738,000. Posted below are some dramatic video from Bahrain included in the CitizenTube curation:

This post is cross-posted from YouTube Trends.

At 100, “The Great Communicator” lives on via YouTube

This is cross-posted from the official YouTube blog

This Sunday marks what would have been the 100th birthday of Ronald Reagan, America’s 40th President. Although his Presidency ended 20 years ago, his legacy as a transformational politician has lived on, with Democrats and Republicans alike trying to adopt his mantle of change and openness.

President Reagan, widely referred to as “The Great Communicator,” is also a particularly interesting study of the President as Orator-in-Chief. It would have been interesting to witness President Reagan, a former actor and spokesman, campaign and govern during the YouTube-era. Many of his iconic speeches, such as his message to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev (below), can be found on YouTube today.



To celebrate President Reagan’s 100th birthday the Ronald Reagan Foundation has created a host of retrospective videos paying tribute to the former President which will be featured on the YouTube homepage today. The first video, a tribute narrated by former Senator Fred Thompson, shows speech clips that showcase Reagan’s wit, storytelling abilities and impeccable timing.



For more information on the series of events surrounding Reagan’s 100th birthday celebrations, please visit the Reagan Centennial website.

YouTube interviews YouTube

Well, not exactly, but in the interesting clip below Shira Lazar, from the Partners Project, a popular YouTube interview show, interviews a bonafide YouTube star, Cenk Uygar, host of The Young Turks. Cenk speaks about how The Young Turks came to be the biggest online news show in the world, what his ambitions are now that he's working at MSNBC, and his take on future innovations in news.

Movements.Org - Empowering Citizen Activism

Recent events across the Middle East have once again showcased the tremendous power of engaged citizen activists to leverage social media to affect positive change. We've already written on this blog about the wealth of informative and poignant footage posted on YouTube from Egyptian protests, but we also wanted to let you know about a great new site that helps empower citizen activists.

Movements.Org, launched officially yesterday, is a hub for politically-engaged citizens to connect as well as a place to learn all of the tools in the activist toolkit. Check out the great video explaining the organization's mission below, and visit the site to learn more.

Egyptian Protest Footage on YouTube

This is cross-posted from the official YouTube blog

It’s been hard to open a laptop or turn on the television over the last week without hearing news of the unrest in Egypt. On YouTube, thousands of videos of the protests have poured in, whether as unfiltered footage from the demonstrations themselves, or as news reports from our media partners around the globe.

We understand how closely the world is following these events, and want to help people access and share this information quickly and easily on YouTube. We’re helping people do this in three ways:

• Highlighting the latest footage on CitizenTube, our news and politics channel, and inviting people to submit video they’ve come across.
• Pointing our users directly to these videos through banners at the top of YouTube pages, and through links alongside YouTube videos.
• Streaming live coverage of Al Jazeera’s broadcasts about the unfolding events, on both their Arabic and English YouTube channels.

And our Google colleagues have also turned on a speak-to-tweet service to help people in Egypt stay connected at this difficult time.

Here’s a playlist of videos that have come in:



YouTube has used similar tools and live streaming technologies in the past to give our users access to information on major world news events, such as the Haiti earthquake and the protests in Iran. We hope this footage provides a unique window into the events unfolding in the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and many other cities across Egypt.

Olivia Ma, YouTube News and Politics, recently watched “28th Jan. 2011 - Storyful - Kasr Al Nile Bridge clashes.”

Behind the scenes at the White House: YouTube Interview with President Obama

We put together a short reel of some behind the scenes footage from the White House last week, before and after our YouTube Interview with President Obama. To see the full interview, click here.



(thanks to Arun Chaudhary for the footage from inside the White House Diplomatic Room)