Just to recap that YouTube was started in 2005 by three former Paypal employees and they were acquired by Google not long after in November 2006. Recently, Google has been making changes on the main YouTube website and even the player.
Here’s a recap of the user interface designs for the player.
The last YouTube graphical user interface is thanks to Tyron Layley. You can actually download the YouTube player Photoshop template from his website. :)
By the way, even the YouTube logo has gotten a facelift. The red hue is darker and they’ve removed the previous tagline “Broadcast yourself” located beneath. I like it.