YouTube has revealed that more than 1 billion people are now using its online video service each month. The announcement was made at a company event in Los Angeles to present YouTube premium channels to potential advertisers. Robert Kyncl, Google’s head of content partnerships, stated that these billion viewers are also spending more time on the platform.

“Our consumption grew by 50%” over the past year, Kyncl said in a discussion following the event, dubbed YouTube Pulse and held in a building where James Cameron filmed a portion of “Avatar." “When you look at the total number of users," he adds, "that didn’t grow by 50%."

Music played a pivotal role in this development due to the potency of cover songs as a way to engage fans in a two-way dialog, with artists like Gotye making a music video mashup of the covers of his song, “Somebody That I Used to Know.”

About 25% of YouTube's video views now come from mobile devices. YouTube has invested heavily over the last 12 months to make its video available on Apple and Android devices.