YouTube's new app for the PlayStation 3 rolling out, allows remote control from smartphones
While YouTube has always enjoyed support on Sony's PlayStation 3 thanks to the console's Flash-enabled browser and even offered a YouTube XL layout for connected devices, now it's rolling out a new app …
Context & Ripple Effects
This app is the next step in a line YouTube has been walking since its 2009 push onto television screens: first the PS3's Flash-capable browser, then the [[e:youtube-xl|YouTube XL]] layout built for connected devices, and now a purpose-built application that ships alongside the console rather than inside it.
The pickup was unusually broad for a single-platform launch — AllThingsD, CNET, PC Magazine, The Next Web, Phone Arena and others all carried the story on or about August 14, 2012, which says less about the PS3 itself than about how closely the industry was watching the second-screen pattern: every major outlet read the smartphone-as-remote feature as the headline.
First-order effects
- PS3 owners get a native YouTube client replacing the browser-and-XL workaround, with playback controllable from their phones — search and queueing move off the couch-and-D-pad experience entirely.
- Sony gains a marquee content app for a console late in its lifecycle, at no licensing cost to itself, deepening the PS3's role as a living-room media device beyond games.
Second-order effects
- Rival connected-TV platforms — other consoles, smart TVs, and set-top boxes — face pressure to offer the same paired-phone control, since YouTube can now treat any screen it ships an app for as an equal endpoint.
- The phone-remote model shifts discovery behavior toward mobile: sessions start on the handset, which strengthens YouTube's position across both device categories at once.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, dedicated apps plus second-screen control become the baseline expectation for video services on game consoles, eroding the browser as the default delivery layer for living-room web content.
- Consoles compete increasingly as general entertainment hubs where platform holders' leverage comes from which apps they host, not just which games they sell.
The trend: Television viewing is migrating from browser-rendered portals like YouTube XL to dedicated apps controlled from smartphones, turning every console and connected screen into a first-class YouTube endpoint.