Youtube's new homepage and interface design, besides having a new color scheme, places more emphasis on channels, trends and the social element of video content, which is shows Google's focus on social content as demonstrated with Plus.
There is now an emphasis on the activity of friends with better integration with Google+ and Facebook. Certainly, these recent changes will be dramatically favored by advertisers that now have a new way to engage with Youtube's global audience, as well as gain better insights. The new design also moves Youtube towards becoming more like a traditional TV broadcaster. Youtube has begun to commission it's own video content, which paves the way for making the website a destination for longer-form online entertainment.
Long-form video is predicted to be the biggest areas of growth in online video - TDG estimates it will make up nearly 70% of online video by 2013. Long-form video with a social networking framework is a new and powerful direction for online video.