YouTube unleashed its sleek new interface on the public today, with a dashboard of extra features, foremost a dropdown menu full of viewing and sharing statistics.

Ad space has gained prominence, but subtly so, as has the ‘Subscribe’ tag, moved to the top, directly under the title.

The redesign is a notable investment in user experience for YouTube, the result of eight months’ worth of user research, feedback and data analysis.

The statistics drop menu is a blessing for curious advertisers, and anyone else interested in the immense global reach of the YouTube network.

Search has been simplified. Sharing too, including links to connect Facebook, Twitter or Google accounts.

The related videos section, or what YouTube calls “discovery”, is simplified as well, making for easy navigation and hours spent clicking on the “next” video.

Gone, however, is the five-star rating system, replaced by a simple thumbs up or thumbs down. Seems to be a social media theme here with Facebook ditching its “become a fan button” for “like” instead. Keeping it simple to build interaction. Comments also feature a “best of”.

As expected, as seen in Facebook’s many battles with its users, the revolt is underway. Video comments, seemingly on every video I viewed, were rather expletive-stocked critiques of the redesign. Some, indeed, with very creative manipulations of the qwerty keyboard.

Luckily, YouTube commentators aren’t to be trusted, because the redesign is a significant improvement for a website that was pretty great to begin with. YouTube, however, is keeping the lines open, and is inviting users to let it know what they think.

On it’s company blog, YouTube called the redesign a “back-to-basics” approach, with a focus on the reason users go to YouTube in the first place — the video — and all the ways to engage with content and creators.