YouTube adds crazy loading bar to Nyan cat viral video

YouTube has added a special rainbow progress/loading bar to the original Nyan cat video — the three and half-minute clip of an 8-bit Poptart-bodied cat flying in the air on a rainbow that’s been making the rounds over the last few months.

The company hasn’t made an official announcement regarding the customization of progress bars, and as far as I know this is the only instance where a video has displayed something other than the default red bar with the grayish ball. Comments on the video’s YouTube page don’t mention the rainbow progress bar beyond yesterday, so it appears to be a very recent change.

Could this be a new feature for video uploaders? Or is it just YouTube having some fun?

I’ve reached out to both YouTube and the video’s original creator, saraj00n, for comment but haven’t heard back from either yet.

For now, check out the video embedded below. (If the progress bar doesn’t show up, you may have to click through to the actual YouTube page.)

Update: Looks like Youtube is responsible for the rainbow progress bar. Someone from the company just responded back to my inquiry with the following message:

This is a latest reflection of the fun and fast-moving engineering culture here at YouTube. Over time, our engineers have pushed out various quirky features that they thought our YouTube community would enjoy. You may have seen other examples which include the YouTube Vuvuzela button, the playback option for comments, as well as the “Actually Good” tab.