I posted this little bit of info over a year-and-a-half ago on BusinessCasualBlog about linking to a specific point in YouTube videos. Surprisingly, even after more than a year-and-a-half, it’s still one of the most popular searches on that site. So, considering that that’s probably a clue of a bit of demand for that info, I figured it’s worth sharing with you, as well. Certainly it’s relevant to the kind of topics you and I discuss here.
The URL Format You Want To Use
The picture above is the syntax (format) you want to add to the tail-end of a YouTube URL if you want to send someone to a specific timecode in a YouTube video. The explanation of variables goes like this:
- #t (This defines the line between the “regular” YouTube URL and the timecode you want to define as the landing point.)
- h (This signifies hours.)
- m (Signifies minutes.)
- s (Signifies seconds.)
As a practical example, let’s say that I wanted to direct you to the exact spot where my friend Scott Schang mentions the book Cluetrain Manifesto in the video of a panel discussion we participated in recently. Well, I could tell you to click the link below and then scrub to the point at about 5 minutes and 35 seconds (5m:35s) into the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRuEgmrabrU
Or, I could just as well say, click the link below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRuEgmrabrU#t=0h5m35s
Notice the difference in URLs? The second has the added syntax.
Go ahead, give it a try.
Your Turn
Do you have a similarly helpful tip? Please share it in the comments below.
In the meantime, it’s Friday. I hope you’re preparing for a great weekend. Let me know if there’s anything cool this weekend that’s worth checking out. I’m wide open for the weekend; unless you give me an option, I’m probably gonna otherwise just be mowing my lawn. So, save me… tell me what else could I be doing?!
Get the player I use for my self-hosted videos. If you found this article helpful, and want to start hosting your own screencasts and training videos for sale or in a members’ only site, then you’ll want to check out Easy Video Player. It’s on my “Recommends” list.
