Google Permits India To Download YouTube Content Overnight (thestack.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Google India has announced that users of the YouTube app in India can now download content during cheaper night-time connectivity periods for offline viewing later. Downloaded videos can be viewed for up to 30 days... Streaming providers are currently conflicted between the low-risk policy of denying offline viewing, and the risk of alienating the lesser-connected markets where they're keen to grab an early foothold. In late 2014 a Netflix executive said offline viewing was "never going to happen", but in April of this year CEO Reed Hastings backtracked in a letter to shareholders, commenting "as we expand around the world, where we see an uneven set of networks, it's something we should keep an open mind about."

Comments

This makes so much sense for developing countries

[gaiageek]

Outside of urban areas in many developing countries (India being a great example), internet speeds can slow to a crawl during waking hours as everyone is doing their online thing and traffic is going through a single connection from that town or village, often through a repeater to a repeater to a repeater that might get you 1.0 Mbps when congestion isn't an issue (during the middle of the night).

Given that video takes huge bandwidth, and YouTube is the single largest provider of free video content, this tactic is actually long overdue. Not only will it make people's YouTube experience more pleasant, but it will also likely make the internet experience of everyone in that village/town/region/country much less frustrating.