Adapted from Jakeschincariol/youtube-agent-skill (MIT). Not affiliated with the original author.

yt-shorts

A Short cut out of a long video is not a clip of the best moment. It is a moment that survives without the video around it, which is a much smaller set. Use it for "cut this into shorts", "clip this", "repurpose this video", "what should I clip".

The input is the long video's transcript (srt, vtt or whisper json). When a shell is available and the video is on YouTube, this saves its automatic captions (use the video's language code):

yt-dlp --skip-download --write-auto-subs --sub-langs ko --convert-subs srt "<video link>"

Before you write

Read ~/.uplika/<workspace-slug>/voice.md if it exists, for the new first lines. If it does not exist, create it with the voice-profile skill, or ask its three questions (tone, ending style, words to avoid) and use the answers for this session.

Picking

Read the transcript and find spans of roughly 20-55 seconds (the original pack's rule of thumb for a Short that holds; YouTube's own Shorts rule is in list_platforms) where all three are true:

1. It opens on a complete thought. If the first sentence needs the previous minute, it is not a Short.
2. There is a turn in it: a claim, then something that complicates or proves it.
3. It ends on a line, not a trail-off.

Rank the candidates and show the person the top five with their timecodes and first line, so they can reject one without reading the whole transcript.

Writing each one

• A NEW first line. The long video's line assumes context this viewer does not have. Write the replacement and run it through ../yt-script/scripts/hookscore.py (a Korean line gets a rank-only score marked Korean: heuristic, not calibrated).
• On-screen text for the first two seconds, different words from the spoken line.
• A loop point: what the last line sets up so the first line answers it.
• Vertical framing note: what gets cropped out of a 16:9 frame and whether that matters.

With Uplika connected

Uplika cannot cut video: the person cuts each Short in their editor as a vertical clip. Then, for each Short:

1. select_channels with scope youtube gives the account id to post to, and skipped with a reconnect link if the connection needs it. Nothing connected: https://uplika.com/dashboard/connections.
2. The file: if it has a public https address, media_from_url; if it is on the person's computer or phone, upload it the way the yt-upload skill does.
3. Read YouTube's shorts rule in list_platforms: a vertical video inside that length goes up as a Short, and a custom thumbnail does not apply to it.
4. Show the person the title (options.youtube.title; the new first line is a good start), the description, the privacy (options.youtube.privacyStatus; left out, it goes up private), whether it is made for kids (options.youtube.madeForKids: ask, and send it only from their answer), and when it goes out. Only after they approve, call publish with the account id, the media id, wait: true, and scheduledAt with a time zone offset if it should go out later.
5. get_post gives the status, the link and any warning (for example the privacy YouTube actually applied). Read the warning out.
6. If a call answers workspace_required, show the workspaces it lists, ask which one, and pass workspaceId. Errors: get_help with the code.

Without Uplika

The person cuts and uploads the Shorts themselves: hand them the titles, first lines, on-screen text and timecodes.

The gate

Nothing goes out until the person says yes. Every output ends in a block they can copy, and the last line of every run is the question: ship it, or change it? With Uplika connected, "ship it" means you upload the approved Shorts with publish.

Tools

• select_channels: the YouTube account to post to
• list_platforms: YouTube's Shorts rule
• media_from_url: attach a Short that already has a public https address
• publish: upload an approved Short, now or at scheduledAt
• get_post: status, link and warnings after the upload
• get_help: the answer for an error code