YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley told an audience at SXSW he’ll be announcing a new video product that, “gives flexibility for people to work together and create content.”

Digg founder Kevin Rose, who now works for Google, was moderating the talk and asked Hurley if the new product will compete with YouTube. He said, “We’re not setting up to kill it now. There’s always going to be a place for YouTube.”

Hurley founded YouTube with fellow PayPal employees, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim in 2005 with an initial investment of $3.5 million from Sequoia Capital. It was purchased by Google the following year for $1.65 billion in stock. The founders were under fire with threats of copyright-infringement lawsuits. Chad continued to work at YouTube until 2010.

After leaving Google, Hurley company AVOS launched Zeen. It’s a way to make beautifully designed digital magazines or miniature digital books that can be shared online the same way YouTube videos are shared. A Zeen can be posted to Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or a blog.

The Zeen creation tool allows users to easily add videos, words, articles, and maps and may shed light on what Hurley is working on with his new video site. Since it is designed for collaborative video creation, it makes sense that the new tool will do for video what Zeen does for publication.

Interviewed by The Next Web, Hurley said to expect a lot more opportunities in the online video space:

“We’re playing with the idea of creating a sandbox that gives us the ability to think of an idea, get it up and running quickly and not have to deal with the frustration of starting again from zero. That’s going to give us the ability to not only innovate and work on Delicious but to continue to use the same learnings and technology to build more services.”

If Hurley’s new video venture empowers users to create more professional and beautiful Web video, it is more likely to complement YouTube than compete with it.

YouTube Co-founder To Launch Possible YouTube Rival is a post from: The Inquisitr

Disney’s The Odd Life of Timothy Green is doing so-so with critics, but two boys who saw the film over the weekend can definitely be counted non-fans of the “feel good” movie since they were caught on film sobbing uncontrollably over it in the backseat of the car on the ride home.

Geoffrey Roth and his wife took their two sons to see the new Disney movie starring Joel Edgerton and Jennifer Garner, probably because the film is being touted as the “feel good movie” of the summer. The two boys kindly disagree, and their reaction to the flick was documented in an agonizing two-and-a-half minute video (posted below). Apparently, these two youngsters just couldn’t get over the end of the movie.

SPOILERS (kind of)

I haven’t seen the movie myself. It’s not my cup of tea, and I don’t have any kids who need a good cry, so I’m left to believe whatever the internet tells me about it. RadarOnline says that these two boys were just emotional wrecks due to the fact that one of the main characters of the film dies at the end (our guess? The titular Timothy Green). “He had to die and I didn’t want him to,” said one of the little boys. The mother tried to reassure him that it’s all part of the “circle of life,” (that’s reassurance?) but it just doesn’t work. “But it was so sad. It was just so sad,” the boy sobs. “I didn’t want him to!”

So what’s the review, boys? Should we go see this movie?

“If you do, you will tear out your eyes,” the younger one responds. “It’s so sad!”

Maybe I’ll wait for it to hit Redbox…

Did you see The Odd Life of Timothy Green? Did you cry?

‘Odd Life Of Timothy Green’ Review: It Makes Children Cry Inconsolably [Video] is a post from: The Inquisitr

With more than 25 million users taking advantage of Netflix, millions more adding to the online video craze via Hulu Plus and others choosing Amazon, Vudu and other services for their TV watching purposes cable company’s have become increasingly concerned that customers are “cutting the cord” and gravitating towards cheaper online services. It is for that reason that the Justice Department is currently investigating claims that cable providers are attempting to stifle online video competition.

According to recent accusations company’s including Comcast, Time Warner Cable and others are placing data caps on users who stream a large number of movies and TV shows from Netflix, Hulu and other services. At the same time those accusations claim that cable providers are giving preferential treatment to their own online video services such as the data-cap free Comcast Xfinity service.

Netflix has went on the offensive, claiming that the data-caps do in fact exist and that they are being put in place as customers leave high-priced cable providers for on-demand services.

For their part the Justice Department already has a case, Comcast in early 2012 announced that its own Xfinity app for the Xbox 360 gaming console would not count against a users total bandwidth usage caps. Comcast denied that it was in the wrong during that case, pointing out compliance with the FCC’s Open Internet rules.

In a blog post at the time Comcast Chief Technology Officer Tony Werner wrote:

“It’s really important to us that we make crystal clear that, in contrast to some other providers, we are not prioritizing our transmission of Xfinity TV content to the Xbox (as some have speculated).”

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings in April by posting a simple Facebook message aimed at the cable provider:

“Comcast should apply caps equally, or not at all.”

In the meantime the caps ultimately violate the Net neutrality rules that Comcast agreed in order to  of merger with NBCUniversal. Under its Net Neutrality agreement Comcast is not supposed to favor its own technology over competitors in any way, shape or form.

Justice Department Investigating Claims That Cable Providers Are Stifling Online Video Competition is a post from: The Inquisitr

The International Academy of Web Television (IAWTV) is now calling for submissions for the inaugural IAWTV Awards to be presented during the 2012 International CES. The Awards will honor content creators driving today’s web television industry,

The IAWTV Awards will have 33 categories honoring web series and talent, both in front of the camera and behind the scenes. Here’s a full list of categories: iawtv.org/awards/categories.

Paul Kontonis, Chairman of the Board of Directors for IAWTV, on the inaugural awards said:

“The original online video industry is booming and the IAWTV is thrilled to produce the first awards for content creators by content creators, honoring the talented community behind the screens. As we open up submissions for our inaugural awards, we welcome entries from content creators who are changing the way we watch and from independent talent to distribution platforms and major studios.”

Submissions for the first awards must be received by 11:59 pm PDT on October 31, 2011.

It is high time that we recognize online video creators. Who are your bets? I’m betting for Khan Academy as the Educational Web Series. Let me nominate that one.

International Academy of Web Television Announces Inaugural Awards (Who Are Your Bets?) is a post from: The Inquisitr

comScore, Inc. released its latest data from the comScore Video Metrix service showing that 180 million US Internet users watched online video content in August for an average of 18 hours per viewer. The total US Internet audience also engaged a record 6.9 billion viewing sessions.

Google sites, boosted primarily by YouTube, ranked as the top online video content property in August with 162 million unique viewers. VEVO came in second but quite far at 62.3 million. Facebook remained at third position with 51.7 million viewers. Viacom Digital (49.9 million) and Microsoft sites followed (46.4 million).

Total viewing sessions at 6.9 billion was an all-time high last August. Google sites contributed the most with 3.5 billion viewing sessions.

Let’s stress what we just said: What else is new?

YouTube Tops August 2011 U.S. Online Video Rankings (What Else Is New?) is a post from: The Inquisitr

The Video Consumer Mapping Study found that 66% of all video is still consumed via live television, and that online video only accounts for 1% of all video viewed. The study claims that consumers tend to overstate how much time they spend on because “it seems new and cool,” where as watching TV doesn’t have as much social cache so people tend to under-report how many hours they watch.

The results come at the same time comScore video data for April shows a 16% increase in video watched online vs the month before. comScore found that 16,785,432,000 online videos were watched in the United States from 151,652,000 unique users.

Whilst it would be easy to suggest an ulterior motive to the results, particularly given a strong representation of media companies on the Council for Research Excellence, the study has a far more substantive range of verifiable flaws.

The initial consideration is how the data was gathered to begin with. The study used “American media consumers, primarily former Nielsen TV People Meter panelists.” Former is the key word there, because TV panel data is gathered through “people meters,” electronic devices that record viewing habits. In theory, it’s difficult to understate TV viewing when there’s an electronic device gathering data on what you are watching; and yet this study specifically picked people who didn’t have the devices.

Then there’s the problem of sample size and location. From the study:

[the study included ] a final sample of 952 observed days. This included 376 individuals in the Core sample from Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Philadelphia and Seattle. Observing those people twice yielded 752 observed days. In addition, for the Media Acceleration portion of this research, 100 people were observed twice and yielded 200 observed days in the Indianapolis DMA.

376 or maybe 476 people in total (it’s not clear if the 100 are originally counted in the 376). The results of 476 people are the key behind a finding that online video is overstated, and some of the United States largest markets, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, and even Austin, Texas (all four known for their tech communities) were completely ignored.

People who play with statistics will always argue that you can use such a small sample size to come to such conclusions, and that may be true to a point. But does a sample so small and geographically limited really reflect the overall market in the United States? Does the sample size fairly support a conclusion that goes against what every other survey and study is suggesting?

Of course it doesn’t, but that was hardly the point to begin with. This study was funded indirectly by media companies, and was to consider the following statements (direct from the study)

- The 30 second spot is dead
- No one under the age of 30 watches TV, They’re all streaming video on the internet.
- No one watches live TV, Everyone is Recording TV shows on their DVRS

Really outrageous propositions to begin with, and you don’t need a $3.5 million study to show that none are true. If you start a study with such outrageous suggestions, its little surprise then that you end up with an outrageous, and ridiculous result.

If you want to read the study, you can download it here (pdf)

Fail: new study claims online video massively overstated is a post from: The Inquisitr

Webb Alert, the Morgan Webb hosted daily tech news video podcast is no more.

The show, launched in August 2007 gained strong initial interest at a time tech video podcasts were starting to become popular. Webb fronted the camera to share the days news in traditional television news format, professionally edited and top of its class in presentation.

Webb said in a post that her decision to abandon the show is due to increased demands from TV show X-Play. Allen Stern at Centernetworks though questions whether the show was paying for itself, with low page views, although notably that’s not a great metric for video podcasts.

I did try regularly watching the show for a while, and while it was reasonable to watch, it wasn’t compelling viewing. That’s no criticism of Webb, who did a sterling job as host, but more a reflection of the format. Do people really want to watch a news broadcast style show that summarizes the news from the day before, when most people would already be aware of it? The show suffered the same issue newspapers and television news do: delayed timing. While we’ll undoubtedly see new online shows emerge in the space, it’s never going to be a hugely popular vertical. News needs to be entertaining if it’s old (What the Buck comes to mind), not read out in a staid, traditional way, to attract scale.

Webb Alert goes tits up is a post from: The Inquisitr

Anvato works by analyzing your copyright-protected video, then searching the Web for any sites that have snagged it without your permission. It claims to use “computer machine vision” to identify videos, even if they’ve been edited or otherwise modified. It then offers you the option of either contacting the site’s owner to ask for the video’s removal, or offering a system in which they keep the video up but add in contextual advertising, giving you the profit. The service is subscription-based.

The new funding will be used to further develop that monetization system, being branded as AdMatch.

Anvato is based in Mountain View, California. It was founded in 2007.

Anvato Gets $2 Million For Video Hunting Technology is a post from: The Inquisitr

The online video network found 88 percent of its visitors prefer to see a two-minute ad before a video than to see four 30-second ads spread throughout the video. The finding is specific to 22-minute programs.

“The opt-in rate is proving this is something people want,” Hulu spokesperson Christina Lee tells AdAge. “We are trying to break down a lot of these very traditional ways of thinking about advertising,” she adds.

Hulu is also experimenting with letting users select the type of ad they see — something it believes increases engagement.

We suspect it may just increase trips to the kitchen to make a snack. But hey, whatever they want to believe.

(Via Silicon Alley Insider)

Two-Minute Preroll Ads: The Future of Online Video? is a post from: The Inquisitr

The online TV network is announcing a second full round of funding this morning, though oddly not saying how much it amounts to. Bain Capital Ventures is backing the dough. It also funded LinkedIn and LaLa Media (see Duncan’s not-so-favorable review here), among others.

It’s an impressive time to be able to pull that off. Startup after startup is cutting back left and right, as anyone who follows the tech space has seen. Yahoo is expected to announce major layoffs any minute now. So a round of funding, in this climate, seems to be a particularly noteworthy feat.

Along with the money announcement, Blip.tv is touting the fact that its servers saw more than 51 million unique views in September alone — a 250 percent jump from the numbers the same month last year, its execs say.

The new funding marks Blip.tv’s first fresh cash since its inaugural round back in June of last year. Ambient Sound Investments — the guys who founded Skype — put up the money the first time around. Since then, Blip.tv has grown to hosting tens of thousands of shows on not only its own site, but also on third-party sites such as iTunes, AOL Video, and Verizon FiOS.

Blip.tv has been around since May of 2005. It is technically still listed as being in beta.

Blip.tv: Economic Crisis? What Economic Crisis? is a post from: The Inquisitr

Sometimes referred to as the “Google of China,” Baidu says it has the nation’s largest legal online movie and TV database. That database, of course, is closely monitored by government authorities.

Baidu — which pulls in about 60 percent of the Chinese search market share — has denied claims that it deleted sites about tainted milk from its search results this month. Online postings suggested the company had accepted money from dairy companies to help hush concern over bad milk (which is blamed for thousands of sicknesses and a handful of deaths). Baidu does allow advertisers to pay for higher result rankings but maintains it has never in any way censored news related to the infected milk investigation.

Embattled Search Engine Strikes New Video Deal is a post from: The Inquisitr

Magnify’s new player offers a pre-roll adserver integration option, letting you insert your own pre-roll ads before your content if you so choose. It can be linked with DoubleClick’s DART service for tracking purposes or can be used with Magnify as a pre-roll ad server. (In that instance, Magnify splits revenue 50-50 with you.)

The MVP, as it’s being branded, can be downloaded and installed with some options, such as color and size customization, for free. To get customizable logos and skins, though, you do have to pay for an advanced package.

So far, Magnify claims more than 42,000 video channels hosted on its servers. The company has been around since 2006 and is headquartered in New York.

Magnify Releases New 2.0 Video Solution is a post from: The Inquisitr

Conviva says it’s built the Internet’s “first live media platform” that lets developers set up a “virtual living room” on their sites. Oh, well…that’s much more clear. Thanks.

Here’s what we can glean from the company’s site: Its video system lets you stream live video with TiVo-like features, letting viewers pause, rewind, and control the content (interestingly, it appears a TiVo co-founder is among the Conviva board members). There’s a social component, with user-to-user interaction and sharing functions. There’s room for interactive features to go along with the live video. And there’s also the potential for in-video, targeted ads and viewer data analysis from the server-side.

Outside of that, the California-based startup isn’t saying much — including when its technology will become available or specifically to whom its being targeted. We do know its fresh round of Series B funding comes from UV Partners, along with original investors New Enterprise Associates and Foundation Capital. It puts the company’s total raised capital at $29 million thus far.

Conviva was originally founded under the name “Rinera Networks.”

Conviva Scores $20 Million for Hush-Hush 2.0 Technology is a post from: The Inquisitr

Blinkx and Miva are no strangers to each other; the two have worked together in an ad sharing partnership for several years. Blinkx’ CEO stated that the “combination of the two companies would be mutually beneficial to both companies’ shareholders, employees, and customers” and that the two “complementary businesses … could benefit greatly from Blinkx’s technology and Miva’s distribution network.” (The letter is available to read in its entirety over at CenterNetworks.)

Miva’s president and chief marketing officer resigned from the company just a few days ago, saying he was leaving to “pursue other opportunities.”

Blinkx, incidentally, was the rumored to be on the buying block itself a few months. Reuters reported that Google, NewsCorp, and Yahoo were all looking at acquiring the company back in May.

Blinkx Offers to Buy Out Miva is a post from: The Inquisitr

Anvato promises to track down anyone who’s stolen your copyrighted video content and reposted it on his or her own site. The subscription-based service first has you upload your original protected video to its server. Anvato then performs an exhaustive Internet-wide search for any site with matching content.

“Our patent pending technology looks at video the same way the human eye does,” the site explains. “We use machine vision to find illegal duplicates based on visible content, not watermarks. We scan one million minutes of video under five seconds. Our method is robust against missing or replaced sound, image degradation or compression, [and] video editing attacks.”

Once offending videos are found, Anvato offers you the option of either contacting the site owner to request the video be removed, or proposing a contextual advertising system in which you share the profits.

Anvato is based out of Mountain View, California. Its web site claims to have discovered more than 34 million copyright-violating videos since its launch.

Anvato: The Internet Video Detective is a post from: The Inquisitr

Qumu provides video streaming solutions for high-profile companies such as Microsoft, Dell, and eBay. It’s also working with AT&T in a “strategic agreement” to manage the multimedia content within its AT&T Digital Media Solutions for businesses.

Executives say they’ll use the new cash to build the company’s sales and marketing departments and to focus on developing more video-based products.

Qumu Takes $10.7 Million For Video Management is a post from: The Inquisitr