CALIFORNIA(Bloomberg) — Google Inc.'s YouTube, the most- popular video-sharing Web site, started nine local versions of the site in countries including Brazil, Japan and the UK to build its audience worldwide.Local sites have also been introduced in France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain, and will each be fully translated, with local homepages and search functions, YouTube said today in a statement. YouTube, based in San Bruno, California, said it plans to add country-specific video rankings and comments, as well as community sections.

The sites will let users share and create videos in their own languages and connect with other local users, YouTube said. The company has signed international content partners including the British Broadcasting Corporation, France 24, Chelsea Football Club, AC Milan, Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace.

"Over half the traffic we get is from outside the US," Steve Chen, co-founder and chief technology officer of YouTube, said yesterday at a Google press conference in Paris.

"With the acquisition by Google, suddenly we have the resources to help us, the local offices to help us. By changing the site we hope to be reaching a new market."

The company is translating its help centre and user interface as it believes it best benefits from a global audience and "localisation," international manager Sakina Arsiwala said.

Google shares fell 89 cents to $514.31 at 4 p.m. New York time on the Nasdaq Stock Market. They've gained 12 percent this year.

YouTube had 160.8 million users around the world in March, according to Reston, Virginia-based ComScore, which tracks Web use. That's more than seven times the number a year earlier.

The company plans to expand its local sites to other countries.

"This is just the beginning," Chen said. YouTube, which hasn't started a local site in Germany because it wasn't ready in terms of products or partnerships, "would love" to be in the country, Arsiwala said.

With new YouTube versions tailored for individual European markets, Google will challenge other local video-sharing Web sites, which recently experienced a "significant" increase in users, the German newspaper Financial Times Deutschland said on June 12.

"A critical mass of content will continue to come from small communities," Chad Hurley, YouTube's co-founder and chief executive officer, said yesterday.