WebProNews

Tag: YouTube

  • George Takei Sets Phaser To Peace Between “Star” Stars

    Human rights activist and the once and future Mr. Sulu, George Takei, has entered the fray among his two sci-fi colleagues, William Shatner and Carrie Fisher, in hopes of quelling their YouTube dispute over which sci-fi franchise is better, Star Trek or Star Wars. As the debate between the two quickly accelerated from professional disagreement to vile personal attacks (the latter of which was mostly from Shatner), Takei’s entreaty for the warring actors to put aside their petty animosity is an effort to unify the “Star Friends” and focus on what he perceives to be the true threat to their legacy: the Twilight movies.

    The feud between Shatner and Fisher, which WebProNews covered last month, began when Shatner proclaimed Star Trek, the sci-fi television show he starred in, as superior to Star Wars, the sci-fi vehicle that Fisher was a part of. Fisher replied with a playful prod to Shatner’s declaration along with a couple of good-humored jabs at Shatner himself, but then Shatner accelerated the debate into a territory of pure venom with a very invective video he recorded for YouTube. In his video response, he launched insult after insult towards Fisher. Fisher, at least publicly, never dignified his attack with a response.

    Although the issue seemed to have simmered down following Shatner’s last response, Takei, who co-starred next to Shatner in Star Trek, has possibly resurrected the feud but with the mission of peace. In a video address released last night, Takei implores Shatner and Fisher to call a truce and focus on the greater threat of “vampires that sparkle and mope and go to high school.”

    “Sci-fi fans be warned,” Takei declares, “there are no great stories, characters, or profound life lessons to be had in Twilight.” He follows up with a campy appeal to take up arms against pithy supernatural creatures and hopefully “rid the world of this vampire menace.” The full address can be viewed below:

    It remains to be seen if Takei can broker peace among the embattled sci-fi stars, or if they even care enough to continue this dispute. While Takei presents the olive branch between Shatner and Fisher, what I really wanna know is if that painting he’s standing in front of in that video is a portrait of himself. If so, then forget about his “Star” Friends. He wins.

  • YouTube, Photoshop and Google Earth

    Today’s video round-up includes some nuggets about education, gadgets, social media, startups, coding and more.

    View more daily video round-ups here.

    YouTube for Schools:

    The Verge reviews the Motorola Xoom 2:

    WebProNews interviews SocialCode CEO Laura O’Shaughnessy about social holiday spending:

    Lifehacker shares some coding basics:

    BBC’s recent Mark Zuckerberg documentary:

    Another view of Google Earth:

    Kevin Rose, Leo Laporte and Sarah Lane at LeWeb:

    Ben Parr at LeWeb:

    Robert Scoble and Dennis Crowley at LeWeb:

    Photoshop hidden gem:

  • Cheerleader Mom Becomes A Viral Hit

    Little league parents are something of a phenomenon in the United States, as thousands of adults live vicariously through their children’s athletic accomplishments. This is normally done in a very vocal, and sometimes, physical manner as the adults ensure no one interferes with their child’s progression as a blossoming sports star.

    Normally, or at least until the Internet took over, most of the stories related to the parent/child athlete dynamic appeared in local newspapers or, perhaps, even a national publication like Sports Illustrated when an incident warrants such coverage. But now, thanks to the power of social media, oftentimes, we get an up close and personal look at this kind of parent/child behavior, and it’s normally not the prettiest thing to see.

    Take, for instance, the video of the cheerleader mom that’s currently blowing up on a viral level. What we have is video footage of a cheerleader mom who is completely and utterly absorbed by her daughter’s team’s performance, complete with a tendency to stomp her feet when she’s trying to emphasize her support.

    The video in question, which can be found here, for those out there who are seeking credit for filming someone without that person’s knowledge:


    Much like the second most popular comment hinted at, you get the feeling the mother in the video didn’t have much success at her cheerleading career, and so, she’s pushing her daughter’s team as hard as she can. Well, as much as an observer can push a team from the stands, I guess. It’s either that or she used to be a cheerleader coach and she’s just doing what comes naturally.

    While I’m poking fun at the mother’s overzealousness, the video uploader deserves some scorn here as well. Apparently, when the video was first uploaded four days ago, the embed function was disabled, and so, people started posting their own versions based on the original video. Apparently, that upset the user who uploaded the video, and so, they wrote this little disclaimer on the YouTube page:

    ********** THIS IS THE ORIGINAL VIDEO SHOT AND UPLOADED BY MYSELF. DON’T BE FOOLED BY IMITATIONS!**********IF YOU ARE GOING TO POST THIS IN YOUR BLOG OR ELSEWHERE, PLEASE GIVE ME CREDIT. THANKS FOR LOOKING!**********

    I’m curious if he gave credit to the person cheering on the performance, or if he filmed the video without her consent. Furthermore, I wonder how she’d feel if she knew the uploader’s intentions when she was being filmed. That is, to make fun of her. Did the person complaining about not receiving credit for their YouTube video ask the lady’s permission before he started filming her? Furthermore, did he tell her the video would be used to poke fun at her and other sports parents?

    If not, perhaps the video uploader should just be quiet and enjoy the ride while his video pops.

    As for the mom/fan/observer in question, perhaps she should relax a little bit and let the youngsters enjoy the competition.

  • YouTube Friends Merge with Google Address Book Contacts

    Last week, Google began rolling out the new version of YouTube, and from the sound of it, everyone should have it by now.

    Immediately, some users have been wondering what’s going on with their friend activity on the site. “ I want to see what videos my friends are Liking, Favoriting, I don’t see any bulletins. Where is the Friend Activity?” commented a reader on our article about the roll out last week.

    As I said at the time, they seem to be placing more emphasis on Google+ friends (and even Facebook). Google’s goal is for Google+ to be the social glue of all of its products. Having YouTube friends separate from Google friends is counter-productive to this strategy so it makes sense that they would put more focus on Google+.

    That’s not going to sit well with everybody, particularly those that have put a lot into developing relationships on YouTube itself over the years, but it does seem to be the direction Google is headed in. You can still see friends functionality from profile pages. You can add people as friends and send message from there.

    Keep in mind that having a YouTube account now means having a Google acccount (which is the same account used across Google’s other products, including Google+).

    Kendall, a Google employee said in a new thread on the YouTube Help Forum, however:

    Coming soon, we will be making some adjustments to Friends and Subscriptions which will allow for a much more streamlined experience.

    Friends and Subscribers have overlapped in many cases and it’s been confusing how they’re different. Some people both “subscribe to” and “friend” a channel at the same time, making it hard to tell why you’re getting an update. Now, you will have all the information you’re looking for from one source, making your experience much more relevant, easy to view, and (hopefully) more entertaining.

    You will have full control over which of your friends you decide to subscribe to. Those who you prefer not to subscribe to will still remain contacts in your Address Book, retaining existing friend-like features such as messaging. Stay tuned for more details around how to get started, including choosing which Friends to subscribe to!

    Throughout the thread, Kendall said a few more things in response to various user questions and comments:

    There will be similar privacy settings around who can comment, just like there have been. I will give you more details around how to go about using those privacy settings once we start this transition.

    You will still have a cap on the number of Channels you can Subscribe to, but, no limit to those you can have in your contacts. Keep in mind though, those who you subscribe to fill your subscription feed, so having thousands of Subscribers would be incredibly difficult to maintain/consume.

    You still have the ability to develop your Channel’s community through interacting with other Channels.

    “Your existing ‘friend’ connections will be automatically converted into Address Book contacts, and when you visit YouTube.com you will be given the option of creating subscriptions to any or all of those accounts,” says Jeff Posnick in a post on the YouTube API blog.

    He has a bit more info on the effects on API feeds.

  • Serious Sam 3 Shows The Correct Way To DRM

    Digital rights management is still a concept of contention, which only gets exacerbated when companies like EA decide to block a consumer’s access to games they’ve already purchased. Yes, content developers and their publishers should have some level of control over the digital files being offered to the public, but when DRM gets abused, it easy to see why users are soured on the idea.

    That’s why video game developer Croteam and their approach to DRM regarding the Serious Sam 3 sequel/prequel is so awesome. Instead of cutting off access to previously-purchased files, if the game has been pirated, the person playing the pirated copy is going to have some DRM issues to deal with, but it won’t be like any DRM enforcement that’s been seen before.

    Instead of denying access to the pirated copy, the game-playing pirate is going have to deal with an indestructible enemy that chases them around for as long as they are playing their unlawful copy. There’s even video of the DRM enemy in action, and besides looking very effective, the enemy itself is a creepy looking arachnid/scorpion and it moves very, very quickly:


    Unfortunately, there’s very little information on Croteam’s — the game’s developers — site, but rest assured, the video is not a fake, and their version of DRM really exists. How the game figures out it’s a pirated copy is also not explained by any officials, but some comments over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun shed some light. All of the [sic]s remain intact.

    First, a reader who goes by pakoito says:

    That happens the third time you reload because the cracked game crashes every 5 minutes, o’clock.

    User Ascense offers this perspective:

    I’m guessing the game code adds the scorpion to the game by default, and the file checks disable the scorpion. When the game gets cracked, most likely it’s done by changing all file checks to no-ops, in witch case the code that prevents the scorpion from spawning, is also removed. So unless you modify the executable by removing the drm-check code, you won’t have any issues wrt the scorpion…

    Aside from that, however, there idea of an indestructible DRM monster has some people wanting to try to the pirated copy, just for a chance to fight the creature. Just ask reader ninjapirate:

    Perhaps they could sell the pirated version as a collector’s edition?

    What about you? Do you think this is an effective way to police your digital files, or is EA’s “slash and burn all access” the way to go? Let us know what you think.

  • Tubalr: Gives YouTube A Pandora-like Feel

    A new web app has arrived that is helping YouTube keep up with all of the other online services you’ve probably been enjoying lately like Grooveshark, Google Music, Apple’s iCloud, and countless others.

    Tubalr is a simple app that basically makes a playlist out of YouTube videos based on a musician or band you like. Geared towards allowing you to “effortlessly listen to a band’s or artist’s top YouTube videos without all the clutter YouTube brings,” Tubalr gives you the option to generate a playlist that either contains only music from the artist you choose or that will contain music from that artist as well as music that the app deems to be similar to them.

    The interface is incredibly minimalist and there are no ads except for the extant ads that appear in the YouTube videos themselves (no way around that, really). You can Favorite videos as well as share them on Twitter and Facebook, although I found that when you “share” your playlist the site doesn’t preserve the actual playlist you may be enjoying. Instead, it generates a new playlist based on whatever musician(s) you used to generate your original playlist. This is something of a minor complaint, but that lack of playlist preservation leaves something to be desired as I’d like to revisit some of the entire playlists I’ve listened to on Tubalr. Then again, I guess that lingering desire of mine is a signal that Tubalr is doing a good job at creating playlists for me because, otherwise, I wouldn’t give a toss about being able to listen to playlists again in the future.

    Since music services on the web are legion, I kept my comparison field down to two services: the young padawan, Tubalr, against its Jedi sensei, YouTube’s Disco. I’m listening to Tubalr as I write this and so far the stream of music has been uninterrupted (I’m about eight videos into my playlist) and it’s all been original content from the artist I used to generate my playlist (meaning no covers of songs by people like me who probably don’t do a good job at covering songs). I entered the same artist into YouTube’s Disco, however, and made it through all of one song and then it cued up three videos in a row that had been removed from YouTube due to “copyright grounds.” I didn’t have to manually skip these deleted videos, but still… it created a noticeable lull between songs until YouTube finally cycled to a video that wasn’t removed. Alternately, Tubalr appears to omit those deleted videos and only cue up videos that are currently working. To Disco’s credit, though, I was able to preserve the playlist exactly as it was generated.

    Now onto design. I will let the following screencaps speak for themselves:

    Tubalar

    YouTube

    There’s nothing innately wrong with YouTube’s look, but even with the recent make-over that Google gave the site, Tubalr makes it look like a messy hoarder. It may not look so bad in these particular screencaps but that’s because the monitor I use at work is particular enormous. If you use Disco on a smaller screen, such as on a laptop, the screen begins could trigger some claustrophobia.

    The next completely scientific experiment I put Tubalr to was more out of personal curiosity: in the bar where I’m supposed to type the name of an artist or musician, I simply typed “awesome music now!”

    The first video it gave me: Lynyrd Skynyrd – Free Bird. And yes, I’m aware of that whole 21st century social norm demanding “pics or it didn’t happen,” so here you go:

    I guess there’s no accounting for taste…

    But there you have it. It’s hard to really choose one over the other insofar as function goes, but I do really enjoy the aesthetic of Tubalr a whole lot more, which is all they ever really promised in the first place: less talk, more rock – well, that is, if talk meant clutter.

  • LSU, Georgia Fans Use YouTube To Prepare Us For SEC Championship

    The SEC Championship is this weekend, as Georgia and LSU get ready to battle for conference supremacy. The favored LSU Tigers are playing for a BCS Championship berth, while the Georgia Bulldogs are playing for legitimacy.

    No, the Bulldogs won’t make the BCS Championship if they win, but if they do beat LSU, they’ll certainly put themselves in position for a more lucrative bowl game payday. The truth is, even if LSU loses, as long as they don’t get stomped out in the process, they’ll probably make the BCS Championship anyway, meaning Georgia is the team with the most to win when the game kicks off on Saturday afternoon.

    With that in mind, that’s probably what motivated the following video from Georgia fans, which, according to the blog I found it on, represents a new low in the annals of Georgia hip hop:


    While I’m not one to be as judgmental as others, although, it is pretty cringe-worthy. It should also be noted that of the 1000-plus Facebook reactions to Georgia’s video, 691 are dislikes, with only 464 likes. Hey, at least there are shots of the Georgia cheerleaders, right? Naturally, LSU fans responded in kind, and it’s really hard to say which fanbase wins here, but first, try LSU’s video on for size:


    “LS Who? It’s LSU. Where’s BCS title, dawgs? Cause we got two.” Nothing says fan battle like coming strong like that. What’s next? Videos of fans fighting in the stands? Actually, that’s par for the course for most sporting events, but it wouldn’t it be the least bit surprising if more started showing up on YouTube during the LSU/Georgia game.

    With that, who ya got? After the season LSU’s had, it’s almost impossible to pick against, unless, of course, you’re one of the Georgia fans who showed up in that video.

  • New YouTube Homepage Launches

    We’ve been hearing all about this new YouTube homepage for months and months it seems. It’s been available to those who felt like taking the steps to get it early for a couple weeks.

    Now, Google has officially launched it. Go to YouTube.com. The page feels much more personalized, and really places a great deal more emphasis on YouTube as a social entity – something I’ve been long surprised that Google hasn’t done more of.

    It also comes with those new channels that have been in the news a number of times, as part of YouTube’s renewed focus on high quality video content.

    “Given the homepage’s new focus on helping you find and organize your favorite Channels, we would be remiss if we didn’t update the look and feel of the Channels themselves,” the company says. “Today we’re launching an improved Channel design focused on what matters most: helping users find great videos. As different uploaders have different goals, we’ve created new Channel templates to meet your needs whether you produce one video a week or have thousands of videos for a fan to browse. Some partners have even uploaded videos talking about the features, or giving tips on how they’re taking advantage of the new design. To learn how to opt-in to and test this new Channel design, check out our help center.”

    “To bring the new homepage and Channels designs together we’ve also applied a fresh coat of digital paint across the whole site,” Google adds. “In July, we unveiled an experimental design called Cosmic Panda. We’ve used your feedback to improve our overall design, and today, we’re presenting a cleaner and simpler YouTube, with a consistent gray background, bigger video thumbnails and a more streamlined watch page.”

    Here’s a video highlighting the changes:

    I wasn’t one of the ones that implemented the new interface early, but just browsing at it quickly, I can tell this is going to make the home page much more relevant on a personal basis, and is going to inspire people to subscribe to a lot more YouTube channels and gain exposure to more personally relevant video content.

    Not to be overly dramatic, but this looks like what YouTube should have been a long time ago.

  • NickRoll’D: Latest Meme Leads Victims To Nickelback YouTube Video

    If you’ve spent any amount of time on the Internet, then you’ve probably been RickRoll’D. For the off chance that a few of you aren’t familiar Rickrolling, it’s an Internet meme form of bait and switch. Someone will send you a link to something you’d be interested in, upon clicking the link you’re taking to YouTube where you’re greeted with the 1987 Rick Astley song “Never Gonna Give You Up“. The video is below for your viewing pleasure:

    It now appears that Rick Astley has some competition for his meme crown as the NickRoll is here, and it’s awful.

    Nickelback’s latest travesty song, When We Stand Together, is being passed around the Internet, but not necessarily because people like it. Just like the the RickRoll, people are being directed to the video under the assumption that it’s something that they’d actually like to watch. Sadly they’re greeted with the Chad Kroeger repetitiously screeching the word ‘Yeah‘.

    If you’d like to punish yourself, check out the video below.

    “When We Stand Together” just went up YouTube on November 23, 2011, and it already has over 39 million views. To be fair, tons of people like terrible music, so all those views shouldn’t be attributed to NickRolling.

    Let this be a warning to everyone out there: the NickRoll is alive, and it will strike when you least suspect it… just listen to these poor Twitter users:

    @Lunar_chan
    Edomae Luna    Looks like I got Nickroll’d. Immediately proceeded to r/spacedicks to cleanse my mind <_> 10 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    @jbennett
    jbennett    RT @davidjonasyoung: A Nickroll is when U trick sum1 in2 listen 2 Nickelback It’s funny b/c they suck. #nickroll http://t.co/g2XY6370 34 minutes ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    @jadonwongernie
    Jadon Wong    I think I’ve just been Nick Roll’d. 8 hours ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    @Chloechloechloe
    x    Nick-roll’d. 4 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    @jadonwongernie
    Jadon Wong    I think I’ve just been Nick Roll’d. 8 hours ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    @mikelombardo
    Mike Lombardo    Someone posted a link to “Never Gonna Give You Up” in a music forum but it was actually a Nickelback song! The NickRoll has been spawned. 1 hour ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Have you been NickRoll’D yet? Tell us in the comments section below.

  • William Shatner & Carrie Fisher: The YouTube Showdown

    The Internet: a perfect model of the purest strain of democracy. Everybody has a voice and can contribute to the discourse of intellectual debates. That is, until you actually read the comments and debates of people arguing on the internet and, if you’re like me, quickly realize that this place, this Internet is where good thoughts go to die.

    It’s usually easy to dismiss these debates and arguments because the contributors are almost always anonymous. Almost.

    This would be a wonderful exception.

    William Shatner and Carrie Fisher have been engaged in a spirited (if not a little hostile) disagreement about the age-old argument that occupies many nerd disagreements: Which is better, Star Wars or Star Trek?

    Shatner opened his silo first in this interview:

    Carrie Fisher then responded to his comments in this interview:

    A pretty playful jab, sure, but even that was too much for Shatner to swallow. He slashed back with this wild retort on Monday (it’s so mean at times that it’s kinda awkward):

    So anybody wanna comment and speculate how long it takes for one of these two to resort to Godwin’s Law?

  • Mumbai Flash Mob Video Goes Viral

    Mumbai Flash Mob Video Goes Viral

    One of the most common and well-received types of flash mobs is the dancing variety. These spontaneous assemblies have a knack for hitting the interwebs and taking off quickly – a trend that is proven by this Indian celebration that involved over 200 Mumbaikars.

    The video, posted only two days ago, has already amassed nearly 200,000 views on YouTube. In it, folks from all over the age spectrum take over a train station with a dance to the title track from the film Rang De Basanti.

    The flash mob is the brainchild of 23-year-old Shonan Kothari, who used social media to spread the idea. According to the WSJ, what started as some emails to a couple dozen friends turned into hundreds of people wanting to participate in a matter of days.

    Kothari organized the flash mob, tapping a choreographer who had created a dance for her cousin’s wedding. They practiced in a yoga hall for the final performance, the one you see in the video. Kothari hired a local film company to shoot and edit the footage.

    A few conversations with railway officials later, she was blaring the tune from the station’s PA system and hundreds of people were performing their choreographed dance.

    @shonankothari
    Shonan    Oh my god, all caught up with the day’s activity. A big big thank you to everyone for running with this 😀 So much love. 19 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Check it out below:

    Although the term “flash mob” has been used to describe sudden bursts of crime and gang activity in places like Philadelphia, it’s nice to see that at its core, a flash mob can simply be a group of people who just want to get together and dance.

    What are your favorite flash mob videos? Let us know in the comments.

  • YouTube Analytics Replaces YouTube Insight

    YouTube announced the launch of YouTube Analytics, which replaces YouTube Insight. The company says it aims to make it easier for users to learn about their audiences.

    Features include:

    • A Quick Overview: A new overview provides all of the information that you care about quickly, while also enabling you to easily access more detailed information.
    • More Detailed Reports: Analytics now includes more detailed statistics so that you can have a more precise understanding of your content and audiences.
    • Audience Builders: Discover which videos are driving the most views and subscriptions.
    • Audience Retention: See how far viewers are watching through your video in the new audience retention report.

    YouTube’s Creator Playbook has been updated showing how to use the new Analytics:

    YouTube is also sharing this related infographic:

    youtube infographic

    YouTube Analytics will be released to everyone using a modern browser throughout today.

  • Google, YouTube Usage & The Media Diet

    Google, YouTube Usage & The Media Diet

    Today’s infographic round-up looks under Google’s hood, how people use YouTube, and the media diet, as illustrated by Wired.

    View more daily infographic round-ups here.

    Google – Under the Hood by BlogSearchEngine.com (via Search Engine Journal):

    Google Under the Hood

    YouTube usage:

    via

    Balancing the media diet (by Wired):

    Media Diet

  • PageRank, Stephen Hawking & Pizza

    Today’s video round-up features some PageRank eduction from Matt Cutts, NMA’s take on the Ndamukong Suh situation, Stephen Hawking dicussing YouTube Space Lab, and much more.

    View more daily video round-ups here.

    Matt Cutts talks PageRank split possibilities:

    NMA does Ndamukong Suh:

    Stephen Hawking welcomes you to YouTube Space Lab:

    New Domino’s Pizza iPad app:

    Little Printer:

    Hello Little Printer, available 2012 from BERG on Vimeo.

    Google Maps goes indoors:

    Google Maps goes inside the airport:

    Google Maps goes inside IKEA:

    NYC Timelapse:

  • comScore Releases U.S. Online Video Rankings for October 2011

    comScore Releases U.S. Online Video Rankings for October 2011

    Data from the comScore Video Matrix were released today, showing that 184 million U.S. Internet users watched online video content in October for an average of 21.1 hours per viewer. The research company announced that the total U.S. Internet audience viewed 42.6 billion video, which represents an all-time high.

    Google Sites was powered by everybody’s go-to for all things online video, YouTube, to claim the highest ranking with 161 million unique viewers and reached a record high of 20.9 billion videos viewed. Facebook came in at a distant second rank with 59.8 million viewers and the bronze ranking went to VEVO with 57 million. Microsoft Sites and Viacom Digital followed with 49.1 million and 48.2 million, respectively.

    With more than 42 billion videos viewed during the month, the firm reports that the average viewer watched a record 21.1 hours. Since comScore defines the average online video time as 5.5 minutes, that works out to roughly about 229 videos per user. That’s a lot of cat videos people watched last month.

    As far as video ads go, Americans watched 7.5 billion ads in October, which totaled more than 3 billion minutes. Hulu generated the highest number of video ad impressions at more than 1.3 billion. Tremor Video ranked second overall and crossed the milestone of 1 billion ads viewed for the first time. BrightRoll Video Network ranked third with 756 million ads, followed by Specific Media with 512 million and CBS Interactive with 415 million.

    comScore also ranked Youtube Partner Channels in October, revealing that VEVO entertained 54.2 million viewers to capture first place. Warner Music maintained the second-place rank with 30.4 million viewers. Gaming channel Machinima ranked third with 17.7 million viewers followed by Schmooru with 9.9 million viewers.

  • British Woman Arrested After Racist Tirade

    A British woman has been arrested after a nearly two-and-a-half minute video in which she delivers a profanity-laden racist tirade on a British train car gathered nearly 125,000 views and well over 40,000 comments in less than a day on YouTube. The woman, seen holding a small child on her lap, lets fly a torrent of f-bombs in her rant about the minority population of Britain, who she believes are not English, and should go back to their own countries. Several attempts to quiet the woman only manage to inflame her further.

    In response to the attention garnered by the video, word of which spread widely through Twitter via the #mytramexperience hash tag, British police tracked down the woman and arrested her for a racially aggravated public order offense. The woman’s name is not available at this time. The British Tram Police announced that they had made the arrest via Twitter.

    @btp_uk
    BTP    We’ve arrested a 34yo woman for racially aggravated public order offence as a result of #mytramexperience video brought to our attn 5 hours ago via HootSuite · powered by @socialditto

    The video is embedded below.

  • YouTube, iTunes & Catfights

    YouTube, iTunes & Catfights

    Today’s video round-up provides a look into the high tech, the scientific, and cats wrestling. Plus some tips for YouTube and iTunes.

    View more daily video round-ups here.

    Desk of the future?

    Cat wrestling:

    Making a mini V-12 engine:

    How to enable the new YouTube design:

    The search for heavy elements:

    How to enable iTunes “Now Playing” notification popup:

    Video games are good for you:

    Good ‘ol Ozzy:

    Magic:

  • New YouTube Homepage Promotes Channels, Sharing

    YouTube is currently testing a brand new homepage design that, among other things, puts a lot of emphasis on channels. Considering YouTube’s recent announcements regarding a push for quality content through new channels, it should come as no surprise that thy would try to build an interface with this focus.

    The new layout contains a sort-of dashboard-like bar on the left. This area sports all of your subscriptions, as well as suggested channels and the ability to look at popular and trending videos across all of YouTube.

    One of the best things about this new setup is that when you click on a specific channel, its video stream pops up in the middle column. There’s no navigation away from the homepage until you click on a video.

    Clicking to “add channels” opens up a new channel directory, where you can easily subscribe to channels based on category. These subscriptions will appear on your homepage subscription feed. It appears as though the channel uploads will be displayed by the time of the upload, with option to expand the time frame to include more videos on the feed.

    Another element of that dashboard is all the social stuff. As you can see, Google+ is front and center. Videos posted by people you follow on Google+ are incorporated into the new subscriptions stream, a feature that we hinted at last week. There is also the option to quickly connect to other networks like Facebook and Twitter. You can go into your sharing options to choose what kind of seamless sharing you will allow between YouTube various social sites. “Activity Sharing” can include letting Facebook or Twitter know when you like a video, comment on a video, subscribe to a channel and more.

    If you want to see the new YouTube homepage, you’ll have to do a little work yourself. Open up YouTube and if you’re using Chrome, press ctrl+shift+j to open developers tools. If you’re using Firefox, hit ctrl+shift+k. Enter document.cookie=”VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE=ST1Ti53r4fU”; and press enter. Hard reload the page. It should now be in the test layout.

    If you want to go back to the old YouTube, open your browser’s cookie manager, search for youtube.com and delete the VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE cookie, says Google Operating System.

    Have you looked at the new layout? What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

  • Rebecca Black Holds YouTube Q&A, You Guessed It, On A Friday

    On Friday, 11/11/11, internet sensation and indecisive seat-chooser Rebecca Black sat down for an exclusive Q&A session, sponsored by YouTube.

    The Q&A session was based on over 3,000 questions submitted by fans from all over the world. Ms. Black asked her fans to submit questions for the session via Twitter. She also announced her Q&A session was ready for viewing on Twitter:

    @MsRebeccaBlack
    Rebecca Black    Hey guys(: check out my Q&A when I was at @YouTube! 😀 http://t.co/GhOTaRAa 22 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

    Check out the entire video below:

    Black just released her new song, “Person of Interest,” on November 15th. It already has over 1.5 million views, although the votes and comments aren’t entirely positive. That shouldn’t be anything new to the young internet star, who took a good dose of criticism and flak over the song that made her famous, “Friday.” By the way, that song has over 172 million views on YouTube.

    Here’s her new song:

  • Viacom’s Ridiculous SOPA Support Pitch Video

    That’s Professor Chaos from South Park which appears on Comedy Central, which is owned by Viacom. The reason the image is leading this post is because it’s Viacom’s intellectual property, vicariously, anyway, and after watching their propaganda video supporting SOPA, I’m hoping you have the same reaction as the Professor does.

    First, the laughable video:


    Oddly enough, Viacom didn’t post this on YouTube. It was apparently ripped from this page — notice the “anti-piracy” in the URL — and that’s another reason I’m using it: To show how ridiculous their position really is. Notice they haven’t requested that YouTube pull this format of their sob story, even though it’s been up on YouTube for two days. Good thing it wasn’t a 30-second clip of South Park, otherwise it would’ve been gone already.

    Apparently, the good people who made this video aren’t trying to monetize it, so it’s OK for YouTube to have it. Ah, hypocrisy at its finest.

    As for the video itself, as TechDirt so eloquently pointed out, it’s essentially a “support SOPA or Spongebob dies” approach, and it stinks of hyperbole and a “woe is our company because there’s no SOPA to protect it” approach. Don’t forget about the “we need more of your money, therefore, SOPA is right” approach, either, because it’s definitely available in the video.

    It should be noted that Viacom’s view on piracy is not in dispute here. If you get caught downloading a movie you haven’t paid for, you should have to pay the consequences. The problem is, SOPA is not the way to go about it because it gives entirely too much power to the entertainment industry, which has been the major sticking point against SOPA all along.

    Ironically enough, Viacom’s quarterly financial report has also been released, and after watching their sob story video, you’d think the company is on the verge of bankruptcy. Yeah, about that. A quick look at the document’s title reveals a much different outlook than the one the video presents:

    VIACOM REPORTS DOUBLE-DIGIT GROWTH FOR FOURTH QUARTER AND FULL-YEAR FISCAL 2011

    But, but… didn’t the video essentially plead for people to keep consuming Viacom’s products in such a manner that the money keeps on flowing in, saving the entire Viacom staff from certain doom? So is this more hypocrisy or just an outright lie? Furthermore, when does Viacom get held to the fire for refusing to adapt the technology available? Or, as TechDirt put it:

    Nowhere do they talk about making use of what the internet provides to build bigger audiences, to promote better, and to better monetize. Because that’s the kind of stuff that Viacom just doesn’t do. It just begs others to cover up for its own business failures.

    It should be noted that full episodes of VH1’s amazing lineup of reality programs are available at the VH1 website, but you wouldn’t know that if you visited Viacom. If you want to actually combat episodic piracy, why not go out of your way to promote the fact these very same episodes are available for free on the website of a property you own instead of making videos that further turn public opinion against you?

    Nowhere on Viacom’s site is that knowledge gained. In fact, it was Google that let me know these episodes are available, but yet, it’s a lack of SOPA that causes people to download Viacom’s IP and not a lack promotion? That doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.

  • 4 Video Platforms You Need To Start Thinking About

    When you think of online video, more than likely you think of YouTube. That does make sense, seeing how they’re in the leadership position. But, have you ever wondered what the other platforms are that you need to be familiarizing yourself with?

    Is online video more than just YouTube? What do you think?

    WebProNews caught up with the CEO of Revision3, Jim Louderback, at the Blogworld Expo in L.A. where he discussed his optimism in regards to the future of online video. He told us that there were 4 major platforms that people need to be thinking about in terms of online video.

    The first is, obviously, YouTube. The video giant is just that – a giant. It has created multiple opportunities for people in the online video space and, with its latest move, hopes to create more. Last month, the company announced that it was adding more than 100 channels of original content from media companies and celebrities including the Wall Street Journal and Madonna.

    According to Louderback, these new channels will raise the bar of professionalism on YouTube. In addition, he believes they will raise the “perceived value” for advertisers. He thinks that YouTube will package this new content with the big online video players, such as Revision3, in order to build itself into a multichannel bundle similar to Comcast or Viacom.

    However, Louderback told us that, even though YouTube is the “next big platform as TV gets disintermediated,” there are other platforms that need to be focused on as well. Secondly, he believes that Apple should be taken seriously as a video platform because Apple developed iTunes, which produced podcasts and multiple online video outlets. He suspects that they’re working on “something” else as well.

    “When Apple does ‘something,’ things happen,” Louderback points out.

    The third platform that Louderback thinks people should be acknowledging is Microsoft. Already its Zune product runs content across Xbox and Windows, and with its new Metro OS rolling out soon, Louderback sees this content coming to phones, tablets, PCs, and potentially, TVs.

    Lastly, he thinks that Amazon belongs in the video platform game. He told us that Amazon’s Kindle Fire would be the biggest selling consumer electronic device and that it would “revolutionize the way we consume media.”

    Although he didn’t categorize it as a platform yet, Louderback hinted that Facebook could become a potential player going forward.

    Do you agree with Louderback that these other companies are video platforms that we need to pay attention to? Let us know.

    For 5 years, WebProNews has partnered with BlogWorld and New Media Expo, the world’s first and largest new media conference, in an effort to broadcast how new media can grow your business, brand, and audience. Stay tuned to WebProNews for much more exclusive coverage.