Youtube: force playback quality and speed

How can you force a particular playback quality on a YouTube video embedded in a post? I tried the addition of “&vq=hd720” to the shortcode, but this does not work: the video just plays in 480p quality.

I’m not totally sure, but I’d assume the embedded video would default to the highest-quality version. Are you sure the video you’re embedding actually provides an HD version? I think some videos only have an SD option, depending how they were originally uploaded to YouTube.

You could also try:

– adding height and width parameters to the video shortcode to force the video to display at certain dimensions. Ref.
– a plugin like YouTube Embed Plus, which says it “Force[s] HD quality when available”

I did a quick search and found a whole bunch of advanced YouTube plugins you might also want to look at. Here are just a couple – a search will bring up more:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/embedplus-for-wordpress/
http://wordpress.org/plugins/smart-youtube/

How can you force a particular playback speed on a YouTube video embedded in a post? For example: forcing playback at 2x the original speed.

I don’t think this is possible with plain embedding or the shortcode, but you might want to see if it’s an option in one of the advanced plugins.

Good luck! I’m not a video expert so maybe others have better insight.