A Tour of Mobile YouTube

I just threw away more Saturday, for you, dear reader, testing out Mobile Youtube which seems to have mysteriously soft launched. I used two 3G phones, the Helio Ocean and the Treo 755, both on Sprint’s EVDO network. Here’s what I found:

•No way to upload videos via the page, but you can still upload via SMS, as always.
•Not all videos on the main page are online, and there’s no discernible pattern to what you’ll find.
•The files come in .3gp streamed format. You can’t download them to save.
•The interface is HTML, and fairly rich, with links to other videos and detailed info on each. No way to vote for videos, though.
•Video res is downscaled compared to the main site, but impressive.
•Buffering takes about 10 seconds or so. These files aren’t small, and downloading them and playing them is likely to destroy your battery life. Such is the price for chuckles on the go.
•Sorry iPhone, these videos are too beefy for EDGE. You’ll have to use WiFi if you want to keep from going insane.

Test this on your phones. Tell me what you find. –Brian Lam
m.youtube.com [Youtube] [Gizmodo Theme Song by UberLAB from Helio]