YouTube goes multilingual

Literally, it might be known as Voustube, Voitubo or Vocetubo, but the world's most popular video-sharing site introduced local-language sites in nine countries yesterday that will all just go by YouTube.

Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, the co-founders of YouTube, which was acquired by Internet search leader Google for $1.76 billion last year, told a news conference that the nine country sites will eventually feature locally popular content.

Until now, while user-generated videos and comments could be posted in any language, the YouTube.com site framework and navigation menus have been in English only, while the featured pages users first see are heavily skewed to US tastes.