A space panda. How do they come up with this stuff?

– Copyright YouTube

Editor’s Note: The opinions and attitudes expressed by the author are those of the author and not necessarily of the publication’s editorial board. This segment is part of a series of opinions by Kevin Lee entitled “Kevin’s Treasure Trove.”

YouTube’s got a new layout, and it’s got a hip name too: Cosmic Panda. Yessir, after Mylo Xyloto, it looks like Treasure Trove’s got a thing for funny names. Not too sure why exactly they call it Cosmic Panda, but hey, pandas are cute and fluffy and everyone likes them, so not a bad name at all.

The video site previewed the new layout way back on July 7. You may have noticed the slick homepage that greets you now when you log in, with its Google+ and Facebook integration. It feels a lot more like a social network for my TV shows now, for better or for worse. I’ll be honest, I don’t ever really watch real TV anymore, just YouTube, and this new social feeling is yet another reason why YouTube > “real” TV.

The homepage now has a feed with updates on whenever my subscriptions “like” or comment on anything, and those highly trained monkeys over at YouTube headquarters (you know, the same ones that handle your “500 internal server errors”) have introduced the uber-popular infini-scroll like what you see on Tumblr or Facebook. You know, that thing that lets you scroll down your page indefinitely, usually just by pressing space or a “Load More” button. Plus, in a nod to Twitter (which, hey, also has a redesign), YouTube’s added in a “trending” feature too. It displays videos that are rising in popularity, which is something I’m really digging, especially since it was hard to find cool new content on the old YouTube and because Ray William Johnson’s face on the Most Viewed was getting a little annoying. No offense, Equals 3.

The channel page has also been snazzed up to feel more like it’s own individual page instead of just random users’ profiles. The change reflects YouTube’s move to the Partner-based business model and caters to these people specifically, allowing them to showcase themselves and be more creative with their channel pages. You’re offered four different page types: creator, blogger, network, and “everything”. Network’s the most interesting, allowing users to showcase other people’s videos.

Unfortunately, the lovely new homepage is not everyone’s piece of cake. Subscriptions show up in the sidebar, but only up to a handful at a time. For people like my friend Kyle Liu here who has 148+ subscriptions, that’s a little bit of a problem. With a new video being uploaded by his subscriptions close to once every 10 minutes, it’s hard for him to sift through the fluff to see all the recent videos sorted by subscription. See, he could go onto each subscription’s individual feed, but what if he wants to see all recent videos by subscription, like how you could in those (ugly-tastic) sidescrolling bars on the old layout? No es posible anymore, which is even more of a bummer than subscription boxes not working. Looks like Kyle’s just out of luck.

Playlists now show in long, rectangular panoramas in search and underneath videos, and while watching videos YouTube greys out the back portion of the page to enhance the brightness of the video. Google’s recent change to black and orange (or is that red?) shows itself everywhere, and I have to say, I’m loving the new layout. I still have to get used to the convenient button with the right angle on it that makes your video bigger disappearing. It was definitely my best friend because loading YouTube videos with 360p just doesn’t sound good at all (mono sound, yeck). 

So, yes, there are some annoying glitches with video sizing, and for some reason YouTube now thinks “full screen” means “full browser”, but all in all, it feels like someone at Apple took their graphic design and user interface skills and gave YouTube a much needed facelift. All the haters out there gon’ hate — it’s a new layout for one of the most visited sites, so people will treat it like new Facebook layouts and complain for a while, then realize it’s well, simply, pretty and useful. And pretty useful.

It does make one wonder though why YouTube/Google named it Cosmic Panda… sort of like how they name Android builds after delicious snacks (I’m looking at you, Ice Cream Sandwich).

Booty: Awesome graphic design, social network-esque feeds, new channel pages
Scurvy: Video sizing sometimes awks, full screen is now full browser, Kyle can’t see his subscriptions (super sadface)

Verdict: Not super great, but still fresh. Head over to YouTube.com/cosmicpanda and get it (if you don’t have a mountain of subscriptions).