YouTube has launched the first ever YouTube Awards with 70 videos in seven categories. This week viewers can vote to pick their favorites of 2006. It's kind of like the Oscars, but for user-generated video clips such as Lonelygirl15 and Ask a Ninja. 

As of right now, there's nothing on the awards page but a bunch of comments from confused users who have made their way to the site to find nothing to vote on. 

Digging deeper, clicking on playlist shows a full listing of clips. We're assuming there will be a voting system similar to the one for Super Bowl commercials, along with some snazzy layout put into place when the page goes live at 2 p.m. PST.

There's much discussion highlighting that this isn't a new idea. In fact, the Vloggies did it last year, complete with an actual event. Winners of this year's YouTube Awards will receive trophies and special promotion on YouTube's front page. I'd like to see YouTube offer some sort of cash or video camera prize to the winners. After all, the traffic and ad revenue generated from these videos is certainly worth rewarding the submitters with something besides a virtual trophy.

Marshall Kirkpatrick from SplashCast has painstakingly taken the time to add all the nominated videos to a single SplashCast player, which I've embedded below [via NewTeeVee].