Linking to or embedding a YouTube video from your website.

I've created the Speed Camera Locations site which can be found at www.SpeedCameraLocations.com.au. Basically the Speed Camera Locations site aims to document the location of red light cameras and speed cameras so if people get fined they can investigate the location more easily. Many of us get fined without even realising we've done something wrong and by investigating further, we can realise what we did wrong and hopefully improve our skills and minimise the chances of getting fined again, or at least until next time at a different location.

Over the past couple of years I've filmed nearly all the red light speed cameras around Victoria and these videos can be accessed from the details page for each of the red light speed cameras. You can tell if a camera has a video as the camera icon on the map has a red lens instead of a white lens.

Whilst it is comparatively easy for me to film the videos around Melbourne and even Victoria, it's not so easy to film cameras in other states. So that people can see the red light speed cameras in other states other than Victoria, I provide links to other people's videos and start the video around 30 seconds before the speed camera. People can review the location and even watch earlier or later in the video and that let's them see all the related speed signage and road conditions.

For me this helps make my system more complete and thus useful for people reaching my site. For other YouTube creators their videos are promoted free of charge. The YouTube creator still gets the traffic to their channel, credit for their video, people can subscribe to their channel and any revenue if available. This is a standard feature of YouTube. I'm not downloading, copying any creators material, just linking to or using the embedding code provided by YouTube. Creators gain a wider audience and people get to find what they're looking for more easily. If YouTube creators aren't happy with this feature in YouTube they can easily stop others embedding their videos by turning off the option "Allow others to embed videos".

One of the best things that can happen for a YouTube creator is for a video to go viral. The ability to share a link to a video or embed a video in web page to the original video provides a mechanism for this to happen.

How then do you link to or embed to a creators YouTube video.

On every YouTube video is the option to Share. Click on the Share option and you'll see a number of services listed.

You can simply click on COPY and then paste the link into you blog post and this is how the following link was created.

https://youtu.be/ihoFHGdGmUc

You can click on email or any of the services (Blogger, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter and more) and easily share the video using one of your social media accounts. The Embed option provides the following code you can add to you site, so people can watch the video from within your site but the creator still gets the full benefit of every person who watches their video.

Here is an example of the Embed code for my Please Subscribe video.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ihoFHGdGmUc" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

NOTE: Keep in mind an embedded video by default starts and is muted. That's great as it doesn't affect people around you when you watch the video.

Those with a little more skill can use the Developer API to provide greater flexibility in adding the embedded video to their site.

Whilst I've not had any issue in embedding videos from others, except for the time it takes to explain what I'm doing, I've written the following benefits section to highlight possible things to think about. To me, if someone doesn't want you to link to their video it's no big deal. It's just one video. Both of you end up with a small potential loss but you haven't lost anything if you've never had it. To me it's polite to ask.

Benefits of linking for other YouTube creators

• Wider audience, greater views.
• All credit, views, watch hours, income goes to creator.
• Others promoting your videos and thus your channel at no additional cost or effort.

Benefit of embedding videos from other YouTube creators

• The embedded code does not show comments. If people want to read or add comments they need to click on the option to show in YouTube.
• Embedded videos can be zoomed, something you can't do in YouTube. This is using the browser to zoom the screen not zoom into the video where there's potentially more data.
• You get to use material from others at no monetary cost which may benefit your site.

Why you may not want to link to a creator's videos.

In general I'm happy to link to someone else's video if it helps in some way. There may be some reasons not to.

• My views clash with the creators views and may cause conflict in the future.
• The creator doesn't actively monitor comments and thus directing people to their videos may impact my audience.

Why a creator may not want to you link to or embed a their videos.

First a creator can't really stop anyone sharing a link to their video. If they're not happy all they can do is restrict the audience or delete the video. In terms of embedding a creator can turn off embedding on a video by video basis.

• A creator may not agree with your views which may cause conflict.
• A creator ends up with more views, a larger audience and that's not their desire.

Finally I'd like to thank the YouTube creators who have been happy for me to embed their videos for the Speed Camera Locations site.

Kelvin Eldridge
www.SpeedCameraLocations.com.au