YouTube highlights female content creators


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Michelle Clancy

| 03 March 2016




Online video giant YouTube has announced two programmes to champion female voices and content creators.



The first is a year-long partnership with the United Nations that appoints top YouTube female creators as the first Change Ambassadors for the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Action campaign. The second is a global production programme across the YouTube Spaces that puts women both in front of and behind the camera.

“Through the years, we’ve seen women on YouTube become beacons of inspiration to their fans,” said Danielle Tiedt, CMO at YouTube. “That’s why we’re so excited about this new partnership with the United Nations and to announce Ingrid Nilsen, Jackie Aina, Yuya, Taty Ferreira, Hayla Ghazal, Louise Pentland, and Chika Yoshida as Change Ambassadors - the first group of women on YouTube to join the UN in advocating for gender equality as part of UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. This group of passionate female creators are brilliant role models on YouTube, and we can’t wait to see how they’ll work with the UN to inspire and activate their global fan communities as well as women and girls around the world.”

Meanwhile, across YouTube Spaces in Los Angeles, London, Tokyo, New York, Sao Paulo, and Berlin, female creators attended workshops and filmed more than 50 videos on sets constructed specifically for the Spaces programme. To help drive an atmosphere of collaboration throughout the program, six female creators including Anna Akana (US), Alexys Fleming (US), Julia Tolezano (Brazil), Em Ford (UK), Nilam Farooq (Germany) and Kuma Miki (Japan) acted as creative directors in their respective Spaces, helping mentor other creators who also participated in the global video shoots.

“From tributes honouring historical female leaders and original scripted content, to discussions about women in the workforce and other women’s issues, these new videos will begin rolling out on the YouTube Spaces channel, as well as the creators’ own channels,” said Tiedt. “YouTube has always been an open stage where anyone can share her story. We hope these new programmes will inspire even more women to find their voices, create their own roles, scripts and stories, and advocate for the issues they care about.”