How-To Videos Online

A huge sub-genre of online video is the "How-to" video. On the one hand, I welcome this development because many of the videos are useful, fun and informative. On the other hand, any hack with a video camera and a self-inflated view of what they can teach the world is now empowered to digitally lecture the globe. Let the learning and teaching begin!

5min
A place to find short video solutions for practical questions and a place for people to share their knowledge.

HowCast
User generated content that is produced by the HowCast professional video team as well as freelance associates.

Wonder How To
A community-fueled, search engine and directory for free how-to video, with an index of more than 100,000 videos.

Instructables
Instructables is a web-based documentation platform where passionate people share what they do and how they do it, and learn from and collaborate with others.

Sutree
SuTree is a knowledge community and an aggregator of instructional &
educational videos.

VideoJug
Life explained, on film. A comprehensive library of free factual video content. Professionally-produced, high definition.

ExpertVillage
Professionally produced and researched videos, to answer everyday questions with. More than 120,000 videos.

eHow
A platform for you to share your knowledge with others. Clear instruction and high-quality video.

3D Animation Gets Gooder and Gooder

A host of new 3D animators are cranking up the quality bar. Check out these examples of cutting edge technical and creative wizardry.

Emily: She's not real
Image Metrics (the production company that created the animations for Grand Theft Auto) made a splash this week with Emily, created using their new 3D modeling technology. It captures the movements and expressions of real actors and re-creates it all in the computer in a creepy way.

Oktapodi
A student film about amorous octopi from Gobelins, the French school of visual design that has produced tons of amazing animators.

Also, don't miss the "making of" video.

Big Buck Bunny
Big Buck Bunny is an open source movie made with open source software from The Blender Foundation. They created this movie under a software development type model, all to promote the use of their tools.

Check out the "making of" video.

My Morning Jacket Music Video
For their song, Touch Me I'm Going To Scream Pt. 2, My Morning Jacket had the creative team at Mixtape Club create an amazing 3D animation.

Online Video Mega List

Web video has achieved mass-market popularity. This compilation of links serves as a taste of what's available. Move over, YouTube. You've got company. I will continue to add to (or subtract from) this list as time goes on. Leave comments if I've missed any good ones.

Upload Sites

• 12 Seconds TV: Upload and share short video, like Twitter for video.
• Blip TV: Upload your own or watch other people's videos. Solid set of monetization tools. Great player.
• Cruxy: Post your video, track your buzz and make some dough.
• Current TV: A global television network that gives you the opportunity to create and influence what airs on TV.
• Dailymotion: Video upload, sharing and categories.
• FlixWagon: Broadcast live video from your mobile device.
• HelloWorld: Online studio tools for posting video, live video and video email.
• LiveVideo: Original and exclusive content, weekly video contests, customizable video streaming community.
• Magnify.net: Community video platform. Hosting of pages and videos.
• MetaCafe: Video entertainment powered by you.
• Mogulus: Live broadcast platform on the internet. Mobile features and interactive chat.
• MotionBox: Family-friendly video sharing and storage.
• MySpaceTV: Mega portal/community.
• Qik: Stream live video from your phone.
• Phanfare: Family-friendly private video sharing and collaboration.
• Revver: upload your video and get advertising revenue.
• Stickam: Web video conferencing, live streaming and lifecasting.
• Treemo: An online media sharing community with a mobile component and a "green" slant.
• TubeMogul: Independent video producers use this tool to distribute to multiple platforms, monetize their assets and track their stats.
• Ustream: "Live interactive video for everyone."
• Veoh: From home videos to premier internet television content. From Michael Eisner. Also has a media player.
• Viddler Web application to upload, enhance, and share digital video.
• Vimeo: Slick upload and share site with robust software and player.
• VUVOX: VUVOX is an easy to use production and instant sharing service that allows you to mix, create and blend your personal media – video, photos and music into rich personal expressions.
• Vuze: Upload or watch high-def videos.
• ZigiMe: Social network where users can upload video.

Infrastructure, Software & Hardware

• Adobe Media Player: Finding, cataloging and watching your videos.
• adotube: Publisher-centric online video advertising platform that enables you to generate revenue by showing brand-name ads in your video content.
• Amazon UnBox: The ecommerce giant begins to experiment with online delivery of entertainment content.
• BitTorrent: Trade huge files with your peers.
• BrightCove: Large-scale internet TV platform.
• CinemaNow: Movies. Buy, Rent, Burn. Online.
• CastTV: Video search, attempting to index every video on the web.
• ClipSyndicate: Search licensed, professional content, embed a channel widget in your site and earn revenue.
• DigitalSmiths: Video search technology. Publishers can register and generate ad revenue.
• Dotsub: Any film, any language. Wiki-type citizen translation tool for video.
• Dragonfly: Your customized video network. Trackable. Monetizable.
• Ekko.tv: Instantly start a video chat with two of your friends.
• Feed Room: Enterprise video solution. Provider of technology to corporations and media sites.
• jetvision: Jetvision provides immediate access to all your content in a single web video player that’s customized to match your existing website.
• Kaltura: Open source video management tools for individuals and organizations.
• Kyte: Kyte is an end-to-end, online and mobile platform for the production, distribution and monetization of video content.
• Mixpo: An online video advertising technology company based in Seattle.
• Maven Networks: Online video advertising solution.
• MoveNetworks: TV 2.0. Web streaming technology and services.
• Ooyala: Manage, monetize, syndicate and analyze your online video. Founded by two seasoned Google veterans.
• Origin Digital: Video application service provider, syndication, reporting, multi-platform.
• Overlay.TV: Enrich, monetize, and share online video with animations, comments, products and hyperlinks.
• PermissionTV: A digital video distribution platform with tools to monetize and track your video assets.
• PLYmedia: Development, design, manufacturing and deployment of an interactive, multi-dimensional web video platform.
• Red Lasso: Search national and local TV broadcasts, make clips, share the clips.
• Another settop box is Roku who will soon have a new product to Stream Netflix and Amazon video on demand.
• ScanScout: In-stream video ad network for publishers and organizations.
• See Too: Privately watch videos with a buddy on the internet.
• Sling Media: Cool digital settop boxes that stream cable from your house to your computer. They will soon release an iPhone app that gives instant access to Cable TV and Tivo while roaming.
• Snackfeed: Snackfeed is a tool that lets you track your favorite videos and watch what your friends are watching.
• SwarmCast: Multi-stream platform provider for HD and live distribution
• Syndicaster: Syndicaster is adding several online distribution options for local TV stations, including the ability to publish video clips to YouTube, AOL (via Brightcove), Yahoo and other sites. Syndicaster is an online editing and video-clip management service that allows TV stations to broadcast any news clip and repurpose it for the Web by publishing it to their own Websites or through its sister service ClipSyndicate (both Syndicaster and ClipSyndicate are divisions of Critical Media).
• Tremor Media: Monetize your video (for companies and individual publishers).
• TVTonic: Watch, subscribe and manage video content. Designed to be used with a remote on Windows Media Center.
• UV Layer: Search and discover video. Create thumbnail walls as visual storage.
• Veodia: Platform-as-a-service video broadcasting tools.
• Veotag: A service that allows you to display clickable text on your audio or video files.
• VideoClix.tv: VideoClix’s original clickable video authoring software segmented, tracked, tagged and categorized objects within videos.
• VidPay: A white label platform for sponsored video campaigns, helping video advertisers reach their intended audience.
• Visible Measures: Deep and relevant measurement of internet video audience behavior.
• Yuxt: Social video bookmarking, list creator, playlist tools.

Content & Entertainment Portals

• Acceptable: Watch. Vote. Create. Their judges decide which submitted clips are acceptable to be voted on.
• ActiveVideo: ActiveVideo Networks brings the full Web-media experience to TV, using well-established Internet and On-demand infrastructure. With 24 issued patents, ActiveVideo provides a mature, stable platform with infinite programming possibilities.
• AllOfTV: An archive of streaming TV content on the web. A site with this range of free content is surely going to be shut down soon.
• AtomFilms: A source for independently produced, online entertainment for ten years.
• BabelGum: "TV experience, Internet Substance." High-resolution and full-screen.
• Beet TV: Business news about the media revolution.
• Blinkx TV: 26 million hours of searchable video and major partnerships with dozens of media companies.
• Crackle: A Sony Pictures Entertainment Company formerly known as Grouper. A multi-platform video entertainment network and studio.
• DubiousTV: Seattle-based producers of online shows.
• The Fancast Store: Online video store with a respectable selection of modern films.
• ffwd: This video recommendation engine has just released its API to developers.
• Heavy: Early-comer online video company focused on creating entertainment experiences for various demographics.
• Hulu NBC Universal and News Corporation joint video venture. Many popular TV shows and movies available full-length and full-screen.
• HungryFlix: Feed your portable device. Purchase with micropayments.
• Intruders tv : The leading provider of valuable insights through their unique approach to capturing Innovators on video.
• Joost: All the things you love about TV, fused with all the fun and interactive power of the internet. From the guys that brought you Skype and Kazaa. Full screen. Downloaded client.
• JumpTV: Free live TV from all over the world on your PC.
• LANDLINE TV: A comedy video site that is "comically relevant...for about a week or so."
• Live Universe: One of the largest online entertainment networks from MySpace founder Brad Greenspan. Video, Social Networking & Music.
• MeeVee: Traditional TV listings and online video from hundreds of sources. Personalized guides to surface new programming choices based on individual interests.
• mywaves: The largest free mobile video destination for consumers, attracting over 5 million unique visitors monthly to its free mobile video service.
• Neovids.tv: Production company that creates, acquires, and distributes online video content.
• On Networks: Producing tons of original content. Original programming for original people.
• MojoHD: High-def online site owned by Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner among others.
• Podaddies: Advertising solutions for video publishers.
• Revision3: Discover, watch, subscribe, discuss. Original shows.
• Rocket Boom: Daily internet culture news video program.
• STRIKE.TV: Born out of the writers strike, designed to challenge members of the Writers Guild to create original programs for the Internet. The ad revenue profits go to the Writers Guild Foundation Industry Support Fund.
• Tilzy.tv: What to watch on the web. Guides and reviews.
• VideoSurf: A site for users to search, discover and watch online videos.
• ViralVideos: Displaying the web's most shared viral videos.
• WellcomeMat: Local personalities and professionals use video to highlight real estate, cities, neighborhoods, parks, schools, events and local businesses.
• WorldTV: Create your own channel by assembling videos from the web or watch other people's channels.
• Zattoo: Live TV on your PC from all over the world.

Progressive

• DIY Video Summit: DIY video in the age of digital media.
• FreeSpeech.org: Campanion website of the progressive TV channel. Politics, culture and social issues.
• FORA.tv: "The World is Thinking." Political, social and cultural issues via web video.
• TED: Technology, Entertainment, Design. 18-minute speeches from progressive luminaries.

Other

• For Your Imagination: A content production company, creative video studio and marketing team.
• WallStrip: Videos about how cultural trends effect the stock market.

Updated April 26th, 2009.

Online Video Advertising Growth

It seems that every time another research firm predicts the size of the online video advertising market, another firm turns around and makes a higher prediction. The realities of the market and the ever-increasing adoption of online video is proving that the predictions are too low. The only thing we can be sure of is that advertising for online video will be huge! This is great news for all of us content creators...if there is money in the market, funding for shows will continue to increase.

Lehman predicts $2.4B in U.S. Video Ads by 2010. See the TechCrunch post.

Parks Associates predict $6.6B in Online Video Ads by 2012. See the NewTeeVee post.

Forrester predicts $7.1B in Online Video Ads by 2012.

Fifty Percent of US Population will Watch Online Video in 2008

Not everyone agrees. "Expectations for online video ad revenue growing faster than the evidence"

Opportunities for Content Creators

Andrew Baron, creator of Rocketboom, recently talked to Beet.tv about the numerous opportunities that exist for digital content creators. Now, more than ever, individuals and small shops can make a living creating original programming for the web and mobile devices. He talks in detail about how to approach entrepreneurial efforts in the fields of digital film making, story development, online video and web show production.

The Rocketboom folks just announced a seven-figure distribution deal with Sony this week, so this is a content team that knows what they are talking about.

NYT Article Takes Pulse of Web Video Scene

A great recent article in the New York Times titled "Night Life Reprogrammed" explores the nightlife and social scene that has sprouted up around the next-generation web industry that is newly emerging. Special emphasis is placed on web video companies and their interactions with the industry and the world at large. The article mentions a bunch of great internet video content and entertainment sites such as the following:

• Wine Library TV
• Video blogs like Downtown Diary and Pop17
• Digital media production company Dinosaur Diorama
• Online video entertainment pioneer Blip.tv
• Hip Hop video blog Ill Doctrine
• NY Video 2.0

For more companies like this, check out my 4-part series about digital media content sites "They Promised Us Convergence".

Metacafe Partners with Web Video Content Creators

AdAge is reporting that the web video entertainment company Metacafe has partnered with a dozen content-creation companies including 60 Frames, Aniboom, CelebTV, Collegiate Images, Comedy.com, Comedy Time, Diagonal View, GamePro Media, Howcast, SXM, Wannahaves, and Young Hollywood.

"It's important for content creators that they not only have their work distributed as broadly as possible but also that they team with publishers who can help ensure their videos reach the right viewers at the right time," Scott Bushman, vice president of content for Metacafe.