AI tools can help ‘fuel creativity’, YouTube executive says
Steve McLendon was speaking as the video platform revealed it now had one billion monthly consumers of podcast content on the site.
AI tools can help “fuel creativity” by removing some of the “drudgery” from work, a YouTube executive has said.
Steve McLendon, podcast expert and YouTube group product lead, was speaking as the Google-owned video platform announced it had reached one billion monthly users for podcast content on the platform for the first time.
Some have raised concerns about the possible impact of generative AI tools on the workforce, with fears that AI could replace humans at carrying out administrative tasks in years to come.
But Mr McLendon said he believed such tools would in fact help workers, particularly those in creative roles, by freeing them from admin tasks to focus on “the things they want to do”.
“I think as it related to podcasts and creators – really creators across YouTube – I think a lot of these AI products really are tools that will help fuel creativity,” he told the PA news agency.
“If you think of the creation process, there’s a lot of drudgery in that process, and certainly from my team’s perspective, we’re trying to think about ways to help creators be more creative and have more time to do the things that they want to do, as opposed to some of the drudgery work.
“And that’s where I think that AI tooling is actually going to unlock a tremendous amount of value for creators, so really excited to see where that goes.”
Last year, Google made headlines when it added an audio feature to its AI-powered research tool, NotebookLM, which can turn large documents, such as reports, into AI-generated audio content that sounds similar to a podcast.
Mr McLendon said the tool tended to use the same two voices and adopt a similar tone no matter the topic – suggesting it was unlikely to rival human podcasters – but added that the technology was something that “people can use in their personal lives around productivity”.
“So, I have a long article, or a 50-page document, I don’t have time to read it. Maybe I want to listen to a summary of it and be able to engage with it that way,” he said.
On YouTube’s podcast milestone, he said it highlighted the rise in popularity of podcasts as a broadcast medium in recent years, but also echoed how television had previously revolutionised broadcasting into people’s homes.
“I’m not sure that people really think of how big and prevalent podcasting is – certainly, they don’t think about how big and prevalent podcasting is on YouTube,” he said.
“It speaks to how podcasts have really connected with audiences all around the world.
“Broadcasting, I would say, has evolved.
“I think video has been an accelerant to podcast engagement and audience building in particular – podcasts are oftentimes really intimate – you have a relationship with the person you listen to in your ear every day, and being able to see that person I actually think really deepens that relationship.
“It’s funny, I also think that television served that purpose in people’s homes for a long time – televisions were like radios in people’s homes – and if you think of YouTube as evolving what television is, it’s unsurprising that it’s also evolving what radio is, particularly in the home.”
