Social Networking Watch: News on the Social Networking and Social Media Industry

A Tour of Mobile YouTube

GIZMONDO -- June 16 -- Mobile Youtube seems to have mysteriously soft launched. I used 3G phones, the Helio Ocean and the Treo 755, on Sprint's EVDO network. You can upload videos via SMS. The files come in .3gp streamed format. The interface is HTML. Video res is downscaled compared to the main site, but impressive. Buffering takes ~10 seconds. The videos are too beefy for EDGE. You'll have to use WiFi if you want to keep from going insane. FULL ARTICLE @ GIZMONDO

YouTube Clarifies the State of Video ID Tool

SEARCH ENGINE JOURNAL -- June 14 -- Here's the official statement about the state of  YouTube's video ID tool. The statement further clarifies that it may not be the most effective method of stopping copyright infringement on video contents uploaded in YouTube. FULL ARTICLE @ SEARCH ENGINE JOURNAL

CNN and YouTube Team Up

WEB WARE -- June 13 -- CNN and YouTube will team up for the CNN's upcoming presidential debate coverage. The press event will feature the president of CNN U.S, CNN's Washington, D.C. bureau chief, along with Chad Hurley, YouTube's CEO and co-founder and Steve Grove, YouTube's news and politics editor. FULL ARTICLE @ WEB WARE

comScore Video Metrix

OPW -- June 14 -- Apparently 70% of internet users streamed video in march 2007 according to the comScore Video Metrix rankings for March 2007. YouTube's the top U.S. streaming video property with 53.5 million unique people streaming ("streamers") in March. See report.

Mark Brooks: Pictures never lie.  Ok, well maybe the do.  Scratch that.  Video never lies.   and photoshop-ed all too easily.  Recorded video is good, webcam video is better.  But, video takes longer to approve and police, site owners argue.  What to do?  Your comments please.

Would You Do This To Your Baby?

SNW -- June 8 -- What site preceded YouTube by two years and was recently sold for (a paltry) £630,000?  Why, Holy Lemon, of course.  The site was started by a University of Bath student in 2003 to showcase his Flash creations. Word spread, and he started posting funny videos... hence the name ‘Holy Lemon!’ Kieran O’Neill made the site profitable through ad sales, on 50,000 users per day. Handheld Entertainment (San Francisco) bought HolyLemon.com. See a baby playfully teasing a rather unhappy cobra snake.

YouTube gets local TV news programming

WEB WARE -- June 5 -- YouTube is now hosting several channels for Hearst-Argyle, a television company that owns 26 local USA TV stations. YouTube will share revenue with Heart-Argyle based on viewership, similar to what's been done with some of the other partnered content providers like the BBC and several sports leagues. The five new channels are from all over the country: WCVB 5 – Boston, WMUR 9 – Manchester, KCRA 3 – Sacramento, WTAE 4 – Pittsburgh, WBAL 11 - Baltimore. FULL ARTICLE @ WEB WARE

YouTube's 'Lonelygirl15' to Get U.K. Spinoff

REUTERS -- May 25 -- The creators of the online phenomenon "Lonelygirl15" have joined forces with social networking site Bebo to create a British spin-off story that will use brands to help define the characters. The organizers say the project will give advertisers the chance to pitch their products.  The star of the show, to be called Kate Modern, will post a series of videos and have a profile on the Bebo site, allowing members to interact with her and fellow fictional characters. Lonelygirl15 received more than 50 million hits on the Internet and has occasionally incorporated advertising. In the British version, Kate Modern will be a 19-year-old art student living in central London and the story will be set around the hip Carnaby Street. FULL ARTICLE @ PC MAGAZINE

Mark Brooks: Lonelygirl15 is getting a little contrived at this stage. The British public tend to be a little quicker to yell 'b.s.' so I'm not sure they'll see the same reaction over the pond.

UTube Rings in YouTube Cash

RED HERRING -- May 16 -- Universal Tube & Rollform Equipment, owner of uTube.com, was besieged by a crush of Internet visitors but discovered it can cater to the online video generation by selling ring tones. The site installed a ring tone search engine and generates $1000/day. That's $360K straight to the bottom line, at 10% pretax that's like finding $4M of revenue all of a sudden. FULL ARTICLE @ RED HERRING

Soldiers Lose MySpace, YouTube Privileges

TECH NEWS WORLD -- May 14 -- Citing security and bandwidth concerns, the military has blocked its computers from accessing many popular social networking Web sites. Military personnel are still allowed to access the sites; they just won't be able to log on using the government's network. However, for many stationed overseas, that's the only network they have access to. The directive bars Defense Department computers from accessing MySpace.com, YouTube.com, Metacafe, iFilm, StupidVideos, FileCabi, BlackPlanet, Hi5, Pandora, MTV.com, 1.fm, Live365 and Photobucket. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH NEWS WORLD

Uri Geller and YouTube

MEDIA POST -- May 9 -- This week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed suit against the "paranormalist," accusing him of misusing the DMCA to get a video he found objectionable taken off YouTube. Geller demanded YouTube purge a 13-minute video of NOVA's "Secrets of the Psychics," which purports to debunk Geller's "psychic" shenanigans. But the clip contains only three seconds of material owned by Geller --- "a classic fair use of the material for criticism purposes," according to the EFF. YouTube nonetheless removed the video and suspended the account of the poster, Brian Sapient, a member of the group "Rational Response Squad." Sapient's account was suspended for more than two weeks and is asking for an injunction and for damages.

YouTube PreRoll or PostRoll Ads?

OPW -- YouTube is testing video ads with the aim of rolling them out more broadly this summer, CMO Suzie Reider said this week at Ad:Tech San Francisco. They're testing pre- and post-roll ads. Just think of YouTube's hosting bills!...but can they get away with pre-roll? Will YouTube members depart in droves? Post/PreRoll Ads may be to YouTube what Adwords was to Google. Your comments please?

YouTube 'Killer' Jalipo.com

MARKETING VOX -- Apr 18 -- Jalipo is a new online distribution network for high-quality TV and video content, launched today in London, with the aim of becoming an alternative to YouTube. For consumers wanting to watch live events and video-on-demand online, Jalipo offers a pay-per-minute credit service called J:Credits. 10 British Pounds buys 1550 J:Credits. It allows rights owners more control over their footage by letting them set their own pay-per-minute price. Jalipo's chairman, the former president of Sony Europe, Chris Deering said, "This is absolutely not for user-generated content. ...Put us at the other end of the market to YouTube. This is rights protected, territory restricted and monetized every minute."  Partners include France24, BBC World, GP Masters and Al Jazeera English among others. It is looking to sign deals to show live sports, concerts and more independent films. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKETING VOX

Mark Brooks: YouTube has spawned a massive shift in the way people will watch TV in the future. Will Google drive YouTube to successful partnerships with rights holders, or will YouTube become the Friendster of the internet video world?

Widsets

MEDIA POST -- Mar 27 -- MySpace and YouTube both flourished in large part because of their simplicity. There has been a lot of griping about the mobile interface in the wake of the Apple iPhone announcement, for instance. One radical answer I have seen to the clutter and irrelevance of the deck is Widsets, a widget-based approach to connecting to the Web. You manage this downloadable Java app from the Web by dragging and dropping widgets for eBay, branded news feeds, Wikipedia, and FlickR onto the Web interface so they show up on your phone screen and configure each widget to access your personal data like a GMail account or a specific RSS feed. Major sites are already available but it looks as if fans, not the companies themselves, made them. FULL ARTICLE @ MEDIA POST

News Corp. & NBC to Create YouTube Killer

ARS TECHNICA -- Mar 22 -- News Corp. and NBC have formed partnerships with Yahoo!, Microsoft, and Time Warner/AOL to supply content and provide distribution channels. The YouTube competitor will launch this summerwith a number of TV shows and movie content. FULL ARTICLE @ ARS TECHNICA

Narcissism on the Internet Isn't Risk-Free

MIAMI HERALD -- Mar 19 -- MySpace encourages attention-seeking, as does YouTube, whose slogan is 'Broadcast Yourself.' "People our age really want to explore themselves and see how they compare to other people by posting up Web site profiles," says Patrick Fishbach, a student at Loyola University Chicago. This generation is rapidly undergoing a bumpy transformation from being merely watchers of content to creators of content. "If you told someone, 'Call your 30 best friends today,' they wouldn't do it," says Friendster President Kent Lindstrom. "But they will use social networking to check in with 30 friends." FULL ARTICLE @ MIAMI HERALD

Mark Brooks: Air transportation made the world a smaller place. Social network sites are making it even smaller.

Viacom Sues YouTube/Google for $1 Billion

REUTERS -- Mar 13 -- Viacom sued Google/YouTube for $1 billion on Tuesday for 'massive intentional copyright infringement.' NBC Universal and News Corp. have also criticized YouTube's copyright protection policies but stopped short of legal action. Viacom is seeking an injunction against further violations as well as damages. Google said it was confident that YouTube respects the copyrights at issue in the Viacom case.  The decision to sue Google followed "a great deal of unproductive negotiation," Viacom said. Viacom and peers like NBC Universal are also investing heavily in their own Internet video sites. FULL ARTICLE @ REUTERS

Mark Brooks: Can someone peel the blinkers off Google's eyes. How is YouTube that different from Napster?  YouTube's best bet for survival is to be proactive in preventing copyrighted material from being uploaded.

News Corp vs YouTube

MEDIA POST -- Mar 12 -- News Corp apparently is mulling creating a video portal to rival YouTube. The company is in talks to amass a trove of video clips for online distribution.

BBC and YouTube Implement Pogram Sharing Agreement

BIZ REPORT -- Mar 7 -- The British Broadcasting Corp. and Google-owned YouTube have started implementing a deal that will make BBC news and entertainment programs available on the video-sharing Web site. BBC is the first international broadcaster to enter into a major deal with YouTube and will provide three of its channels on the site. FULL ARTICLE @ BIZ REPORT

Mark Brooks: If the BBC gets it, shouldn't the U.S.A's major channels? Well, it's not really a typical scenario. British TV viewers pay a TV tax each year to have a TV in their home. TV tax police drive around and 'detect' those who are watching TV without a 'license' and fine them. So, generally, if you have a TV hooked to an aerial in the UK, you have to pay the taxes. The BBC has little to lose in the way of ad revenue, so it makes sense for them to be an early adopter. Google will want to use them as an example to the USA, and will in some way want to show that BBC viewership increases because of the distribution deal. Ultimately, TV content will be distributed via the internet, so YouTube is seems to be a major threat to the TV industry as we know it (and old-school TV executives). Ultimately, the internet will win, and YouTube will win, as long as they somehow manage to stay out of harms way from the looming barrage of legal suits.