Shankar Ganesh

YouTube’s interface can be much better. They could’ve made a good use of AJAX, but they haven’t. Each video loads in a new page, more time, more pageviews.

YouTubeDesktop.com brings a change.

Listed are some videos on the homepage from where you can look up for videos using the search box on top, view the most popular ones, watch the ones that were viewed recently.

The page in itself is like a real desktop. Each video is similar to a window on your desktop. Clicking on the thumbnail will launch the video in the page itself.

That isn’t all. The video box exactly mimics a window – you can close it and watch other videos, or minimize it for viewing later. Playlists can also be created.

Additionally, you can download the video as FLV, AVI, Zip file, email it to your friends, view the URL where it’s located, and also rate it.

Overall, it looks like a great alternative to the original YouTube interface that would require too many pageviews and loadtimes.

I think YouTubeDesktop is be a great site for casual browsers who spend time on YouTube occasionally. But there’s a catch at the moment: The service is in Private Beta and is invite only.

Heard about YouTubeDesktop via Deepak