YouTube Launches Online Movie Rental Service In UK, Kenya Domain

Online video sharing site, YouTube has launched its movie rental service in the UK with thousands of blockbusters including The King's Speech and The Dark Knight. Film fans in the UK can now rent new releases for £3.49 and older titles for between £2.49 and £3.49 from YouTube.

The move puts the site in direct competition with Amazon's LoveFilm, which claims some 1.6 million customers in the UK and Europe. LoveFilm makes new releases available to non-members for between £2.49 and £3.49 a film. Viewers will be given a 30-day window to watch their film on YouTube, and 48 hours once they have started viewing it.

YouTube has signed UK-specific deals with Hollywood film companies including Sony Pictures, Warner Bros, Universal and Lionsgate. The website has also signed deals with Revolver Entertainment, the British studio behind Talihina Sky: The story of Kings of Leon, and Metrodome, becoming only the third market where YouTube has launched its movie rental business, after the US and Canada.

The move puts the Google-owned site in direct competition with Amazon’s LoveFilm, which has some 1.6 million customers in the UK and Europe, says The Guardian. LoveFilm makes new releases available to non-members for the same prices. To launch the service, YouTube has signed UK-specific deals with Hollywood film companies including Sony Pictures, Warner Bros, Universal and Lionsgate.

It has also announced the launch of a Kenyan domain, www.youtube.co.ke. YouTube Kenya will offer video content from around the world through a local interface that will promote the most relevant content to Kenyans. Already Kenyan broadcasters Nation Media Group, the Standard Group Limited, and Homeboyz Entertainment Limited are among the top YouTube channels viewed.

The announcement by YouTube comes when Kenya's online user numbers are growing. A recently released quarterly sector statistics report from the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) shows Kenya has 4.2 million internet subscriptions as at June 2011.

YouTube is now the most video website online, with more than 100 million unique monthly viewers, according to figures released by web metrics firm Nielsen in June.