No more skipping through YouTube videos and rewinding to remember the last bit, with Bard’s super quick summaries.

Bard are launching an update to their YouTube extension to make your life even easier. Google’s AI ‘Bard’ will explore a video to pull out the information you’re after, saving you a long watch and making it easier to reference.

This is fantastic for instructions, tutorials, and recipe content. For example, ask Bard to summarise a cooking video for you to get a simple rundown of the ingredients, measurements, and steps without constant pausing and turning back the video.

Users can ask Bard a specific question or command about the video to extract exactly what it is they’re looking for. It’s a hugely convenient tool that is really easy to use.

In the update notes, YouTube wrote: “We’ve heard you want deeper engagement with YouTube videos. So we’re expanding the YouTube Extension to understand some video content so you can have a richer conversation with Bard about it.”

Bard’s YouTube extension is currently in an experimental phase and is not yet open to the public.

Is AI good for creators on YouTube?

This update has clear benefits to users, but it raises a question. Is this devaluing the creator content on YouTube? Losing a view is the loss of ad revenue for that creator. A quick, text snapshot also detracts from any time spent on the recording, editing, and creative choices within the video.

The tool isn’t perfect at the moment, and is unlikely to have a major impact on videos at large. A lot of content just isn’t relevant for a tool like Bard; the value being in watching the video itself. It’s not going to replace visual comedy, that’s for sure.

It is a step that may change certain genres of content though. For example, cooking videos as referenced above may lose a lot of traction as viewers look for an easier solution to getting stuck in straight away. It’s an active benefit for viewers. This may see a shift in how certain content is developed.

YouTube – like Google, owned by Alphabet – recently announced the launch of an AI Tool. Dream Track lets users create song snippets entirely generated by AI using popular artists’ voices. 9 artists have signed up so far.

But it begins to blur the boundaries of content and raises the question of how we value human creation. When YouTube Shorts are filled with songs that don’t exist by computer-generated versions of artists, where does that leave the real artists?

Musicians have been campaigning for protective legislation across the world. AI is an unavoidable part of our future. They wish to ensure that it is used correctly, and that there are protections in place for the human side.

The UK government began discussion over AI’s place in the creative industry this month. Artists and organisations representing them have been taking the discussion to Congress in the US.

How do you feel about a future that involves AI in the creative industries like music and video content creation? And what do you think about Bard’s new tool? Leave a comment below to join the discussion.