It was just yesterday that we talked about a new strategy coming from YouTube which involved longer form video taking the place of the shorter 10 minute limited shorter videos we are all used to.

That new side of the site has now been officially unveiled as The YouTube Screening Room, a place for independent film-makers to showcase their work, get it seen by millions, and potentially make some money in to the bargain.

High Quality Shorts

Each week will see four high quality short films featured on the site by independent film-makers from around the world. Starting with work from Norway, Sweden, Canada, the UK, and US, directors from other countries such as Germany, Austria, France, Kenya, Australia, and Ireland will also be featured.

There has been a lot of talk over the past few weeks about the problems Google are experiencing in trying to make the 82 million viewers a month help pay back the $1.65 billion investment.

Things have got so bad that we asked whether Google should just cut its losses and kill the site. However, this week has seen the company making plans to go long-form, which could potentially help make Google some money.

Kaltura is going places. It just raised a second round of funding, and recently announced a joint collaboration with Wikipedia to put video on the site by the end of 2008.

This is in addition to recently announcing the release of a new and improved open-source video extension for websites using the MediaWiki software, the first open-source video software available.

Brightcove is an Internet TV platform and network which allows both established media companies and singular individuals to produce and publish video online and then make ad revenue from the resulting content.

It is now in the process of changing its service from the ground up, with Brightcove 3, a completely rebuilt service now going in to private beta before a full release in the autumn.

Online video is already massively popular in its many forms. However, if the latest predictions from Cisco Systems is to be believed, it is likely to be the dominant force on the Web by 2012.

The company has published its first Visual Networking Index, (PDF) and the results show that while video currently already accounts for a quarter of all Internet traffic, that figure is set to rise year-on-year until it surpasses 50% by 2012.

A few days ago, Google CEO Eric Schmidt spoke to The New Yorker about the problems in making money on YouTube, and how hard the company is finding it to make the site a profitable one.

He said that it “seemed obvious” that Google should be able to generate “significant amounts of money” from YouTube, but so far, that wasn’t happening, and he had no idea how to successfully accomplish the goal.

Time To Kill Off YouTube?

In response to this supposed admission of a chink in Google’s armour, Don Reisinger has written a controversial but very thought-provoking article for CNET in which he asks if Google should actually just give up and kill off YouTube once and for all.

Google has so far failed to really see any return for its whopping $1.65 billion investment in the company, and with there really being no concrete plans in place for that to change any time soon, is it time to cut and run?

A home projector is becoming less of a flamboyant purchase and more of a necessity in this day and age when many different forms of media are coming together in the living room.

A projector enables you to watch everything from traditional television, to Blu-ray movies and online video on a huge screen for a relatively affordable price.

A projector also enables you to watch all of the above in full high definition. The Mitsubishi HC1500 720p DLP Home Theater Projector is a perfect addition to any home.