Universal Online File and Media Converter

http://www.folden.info/emedia/2013/05/23/media-converter/

Micro Video and Electronic Commerce

http://www.folden.info/emarketing/2013/03/27/micro-video-and-electronic-commerce/

Films and Shorts from South-East Asia

http://www.folden.info/emedia/2013/03/17/films-and-shorts-from-south-east-asia/

Study on Digital Content and Video Trends

http://www.folden.info/emarketing/2013/01/17/study-on-digital-content-and-video-trends/

Online Videos with Surround View

Immersive Media has already been introduced here. The service is offering a video solution enabling online video with a 360 degree surround view. Lately the service has put some examples onto the website. The application does not require additional software and is navigable by standard web browsers. The navigation within the videos happens by moving the mouse cursor around. Here are the videos.

VodPod Video Search Engine and Video Services

VodPod is something like an all in one video site, not all but a lot. At first it is a video sharing site with an up to date video search engine. The search enables to search for videos at the web, the site itself and displays shared videos in realtime. Other ways to discover videos are by popularity, genres and tagging.

To members some further tools and services are available. People may create video widgets to display their collections at third party sites and blogs. Best of all might be a community feature, which enables the creation of whole video sites. This community feature is available in a basic free version and a premium version with business opportunities by advertising.

Microblogging and Video Sharing with Gawkk

Gawkk is a well designed new microblogging service dedicated to video sharing with some great social networking features.

What makes the service really convenient is the player, which appears by a click on the title of a post. If done, a video player comes up just below the post and ready for viewing. At second a lot of social networking features are included. Below the posts, which are of typical length, there is a comment feature for discussions and a link to video rating. By another click a menu appears with several sharing codes for link sharing or to embed the video elsewhere.

To find videos there are a directory and channels and to find like minded people there is a profile directory at Gawkk.

New Video Search Engine

A new video search engine had been started by Truveo, which is a video search engine itself. The new service, which has some interesting and unique features, is called ejeboo.

At first there is the interface of a visual search engine displaying the search results by movable thumbnail images. It becomes more interesting by the advanced search options. There are two remarkable search options, a search operator for relevance and one for freshness. Last but not least there is a further option to display search results in a carousel.

Best of all are some tools to receive updates about a query. These alert functions are available at the buttom of the page and one may receive updates by newsfeeds, email or on Twitter.

Online Video Cutter for YouTube Videos

An online video cutter for YouTube videos is provided by Splicd. This tool enables to cut out sequences of a video. Additionally a shortened link is supplied and a code to embed just the snippets.

I have not found an introduction at the page, but there is a simple and intuitive interface. One just has to copy the link of a video into the form and to name the starting and ending points of the desired sequence in minutes. Then just a click on the continue tab is needed to get the snipplet and the codes.

ffwd has launched a new Twitter Video Service

ffwd is a video destination with a lot of social networking features. Members may personalize and create own channels, search and share videos as well as getting recommendations. ffwd now has launched a new service called twitmatic. twitmatic is displaying up to date videos shared at Twitter and playing the videos within the site.

Actually the service is in beta and for sure there will come up further features. Wouldn't it be nice to personalize the service to get videos of interest? Tomorrow, 13th March, such thing happens. twitmatic will show videos from the SxSW media festival. As Twitter is fast some nice videos have to be expected. The internet address for this event is twitmatic.com/SxSW. For the schedule have a look at the SxSW homepage.

By the way, there is another Twitter video site. This is Twiddeo, which is both an aggregator and a tool to tweet videos.

Panorama Video Solution

TechCrunch had a coverage of the Microsoft TechFest, where a technology most similar to the covered Photosynth service has been introduced. Photosynth combines several photos to one zoomable 3d image. So the new application, which is still a research project with no particular name, is doing the same for video by combining several video streams to a panorama video. This all happens while sending even independently mobile streams to a server. If the server finds same elements within several videos, it will combine the particular videos to one video stream. On the producer side oppostite to other panorama video solutions like Immersive Media there is no expensive equipment needed, the application will even work with live video streamed from mobile phones.

Below there is a video introduction and the TechCrunch article may be found here

YouTube enhances the interactive Video Experience

YouTube has made a further step to give more interactivity to videos. An enhancement has been made to the Video Annotations feature, which has been covered here. Video Annotations do enable a video producer to add comments and further information like texts to a video. Now people may open up this feature to collaborate with others or enable other people to add annotations to an own video. This feature has been introduced at the YouTube Blog.

This is great and reminds on video discussion services like Seesmic.. Too, there is a relationship to an early but still active similar approach called hypertext fiction or collaborative writing. The term hypertext fiction describes a literary approach, where people write together a story. While one clicks through such a story, there is just one beginning but several ways to come to the end.

The CastTV Video Search Engine

CastTV is a video search engine with some great and unique features. The search results are clustered by video related issues. Exemplarily the content is distinguished by full length shows or short videos, free or premium content, user generated content or professionally produced videos.

And the term tv in Cast TV is suitable indeed. The first tab of the menu is dedicated to tv content and by pulling down the menu one finds tv shows and a tv guide. Nice features come up by the second menu. By top viral videos one become aware about hottest buzz videos on the web. At video reviews there video features with some background information.

The clustering of the search results seems to be an essential part of the search engine, as at about there is a statement that access to video needs to become easier.

Comparison of HD Video Services at the Internet

Cnet's Webware did a test of hd video services at the internet, which has started to become a common standard at the internet. Nice to know, today the internet with its 1 billion netizens is the largest unique hd platform, no other platform can compete with this reach.

The Webware test compared six internet video services with hd quality. Part of the comparison has been image quality of still and moving images. But what to internet users might be more important are factors like maximal length and storage, which is shown in a nice chart. So the test is fine, but it does not embrace all hd video services at the internet. There are some more hd video services and some are specialized in professional or semi professional usage. If you like a broader choice, click here for further hd video services.

Which HD video Web service is the best?

Short Films and Video Business

I became aware of some nice and new video sites, which are both great to view videos and for business.

At first there is Openfilm, a site dedicated to short films. It is an open place, where everyone can become a member for the purpose of watching videos, reviews or to connect with others to discuss or to do business. But as Openfilm wants to be a place for films of high quality, the content and especially the films are moderated. Film makers may run own channels and earn revenues by of revenue sharing. At Openfilm there are already a lot of well known internet celebrities represented.

Another site with nice short films is Coffee Shorts. They got nice films and are offering uploads and monetization, too. NomadsLand is dedicated to documentary films. It has a similar approach like Openfilm and enables watching and uploads, discussions and business networking.

Video Contest Site combines Advertising with Awards

TubePrize has created a platform to connect video creators with promoters for video advertising by product placement and the like. The service allows everyone to create a video contest and by this to promote a product. The service relies on YouTube and the winner will be the one who generated most views based on YouTube statistics. The latter might be just an example as contest creators are free in the creation of a contest. The service just started and has two contests listed actually.

New Live Video and Personal Broadcasting Service

Floobs is a new and promising live video service. The service is still in beta with some features already available and some in preparation. Floobs surprises with some features that have not been found elsewhere. At first this is an integrated VJ tool, which enables to mix live streams with other videos. This might be most useful for presentations and of course music shows.

According to the FAQ various different video formats are supported enabling the usage of nearly every camera device as mentioned at the company wiki. The up to date beta version already supports webcams and computer connected digital cams. The usage of smartphone cams and even tv cameras is in development, but may become tried by arrangement.

Floobs is available in various languages.

Interactive Video Features at Overlay.tv

Overlay.tv has added a couple of new interactive video features since it has been covered by the very first post at this blog about interactive video. Also the website has been completely redesigned. As far as I remember the site has been dark and it has been turned into a bright one now. Furthermore videos produced by members now are in the center of the page instead of being placed at the bottom to showcase the interactivity of the video platform. Whereas promoting own products is still a key issue of the site this gives it a video sharing touch.

Some of the new interactive video features are unique as far as I know. These features are amazing and come along with the embedable proprietary video player. At first there is a chat, which is placed directly within the video screen. One may suppose this might be intrusive, but I have not felt like that. It rather improves the comfort and enables to chat without diverting the video watching experience. Technically it is a true overlay feature like it has been shown in some science fiction movies. A second tab at the video player is for information purposes showcasing the author and possible third party sources.

One of the key intentions of interactive video is to represent additional information or products within a video and to enable to shop for represented products. At Overlay.tv this feature has become enhanced by a new bar at the bottom of the player. This is a comfortable step, too, as one now may find presented products easily after watching a whole video.

Furthermore the player now is full screen enabled. Below there is a nice video with product presentations.

Success Story about Instructional Videos

In a press release 5min, a video sharing site for how to and instructional videos, has informed that they now are reaching 110 million monthly unique users. This vast number is facilitated by a network of syndication partner sites, which may syndicate content by a proprietary content syndication platform, the VideoSeed platform. The content in indexed with semantic data to assure most relevant content. 5min foresees a bright future for properly targeted user generated content in a similar way as it has been reported here.

Video Discussions and Presentations with VoiceThread

VoiceThread is an interesting multimedia presentation and Video application with some unique features. The presentation may include mostly all kind of media. The key feature of VoiceThread is the the interactivity of presentations. Visitors are able to add comments beside or within a presentation like it happens at some interactive video applications. The comments may become added by text, audio or video. With this feature VoiceThread is a great application for various purposes like collaboration, education or discussions. Related to video discussions VoiceThread may be compared with Seesmic.