YouTube down for almost five hours

YouTube, the popular video hosting site, was hit with an outage for almost five hours Tuesday as a result of database troubles.

The site, which allows viewers to tune into uploaded videos ranging from seniors making their homespun video debut to polished user-submitted film clips, went down at 7:30 a.m. (PST), leaving viewers with a tongue-in-cheek graphic of the company's database woes. Although the notice stated that new features were being added to the site, it turns out that wasn't the case.

"There are no new features being added today. This page went up mistakenly," said company spokeswoman Julie Supan.

YouTube is facing increasing competition from a host of players. Analysts have called for the company to add more features to its site to remain added of the competition.

When changes are implemented, the task will not be a simple undertaking, as with any major Web site, Supan added.

YouTube, largely a free site, is turning to advertisers as a means to make a profit. But as with any ad-supported site, an outage can mean more than disgruntled users.