DUBAI, March 18 (Xinhua) -- Internet video channel YouTube opened a YouTube Space in Dubai, the first of its kind in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), the state news agency WAM reported.
Located at Dubai Studio City, the Youtube facility aims "to support the growing creator community in the MENA region by giving them access to a state of the art production space," WAM quoted Youtube as saying.
The space, the 10th in the world, is dedicated to YouTube content creators who will have free access to high-end audio, visual and editing equipment in addition to training programs, workshops and courses.
More than 440,000 creators have visited the nine YouTube Space facilities around the world since the program first launched in 2012, according to David Ripert, head of YouTube Spaces in Europe, Middle East and Africa.
"Creators are the heartbeat of YouTube and supporting them has long been one of our most important priorities," he said.
"As a platform, YouTube provides a blank canvas for creative expression and the Space will be one of the tools creators use to tell their own stories," Ripert noted.
Majed Al-Suwaidi, the managing director of Dubai Studio City, also hailed the program.
"With the launch of the YouTube space, Dubai Studio City aims to cultivate a collaborative environment where like-minded people can create innovative content, which can cross borders and impact a wide and diverse audience," he said.
The MENA region has more than 200 YouTube channels with over a million subscribers, and over 30,000 channels are subscribed by more than 10,000 users, said Robert Kyncl, the chief business officer of the Internet video channel.
The Arab world has experienced a 160-percent increase in the number of channels uploaded from MENA countries in the past three years.
