Web video is forever increasing in popularity and number, so being able to find what you are looking for is becoming as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack. VideoSurf may soon be able to help.

While Google may have the text search market virtually sewn up, video search is another matter altogether. While there are various competitors, not one has become the dominant force.

VideoSurf Enters The Fray

VideoSurf is a new contender to have entered the playing field, and it offers something radically different from the rest of the crowd – visual video search.

The company has only just launched at the recent TechCrunch50 conference, but it is already gaining a lot of buzz around the Internet for its innovative approach to providing users with a suitable system for searching for videos.

With over 10 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every single minute, getting your video noticed amongst the masses can be a difficult task. Which is why optimizing your video is so important.

Guaranteed Hits

Some video producers can be guaranteed a certain amount of viewers. For instance, record companies uploading a music video can be assured a much-viewed video, although not many will achieve as many as Avril Lavigne’s Girlfriend.

There are also the YouTube personalities such as Chris Crocker and Fred who can be safe in the knowledge that their latest efforts will garner at least enough attention to warrant them uploading it in the first place.

The Rest Of Us

But what of the rest of us who produce a video and stick it on YouTube in the vain attempt at persuading thousands of people to watch our efforts over everyone else’s?

Luckily for us YouTube non-personalities, there is somewhat of a cottage industry surrounding optimizing videos for video sharing sites, and using collected data to analyse where you’ve gone wrong, and where you’ve gone right.

YouTube is by far the biggest video sharing site on the Internet, but until now, no single video has managed to reach 100 million views. How did it end up being Avril Lavigne that managed it?

The story of the Avril Lavigne video for her single Girlfriend has been going on 18 months now, as that is when RCA Records uploaded the video to YouTube with the ubiquitous ‘embedding disabled’.

Avril Lavigne Vs Evolution

It didn’t really get interesting until earlier this year when Girlfriend and The Evolution Of Dance started gaining massive amounts of views and became the number one and number two most watched videos on the site.

The Evolution Of Dance is a simple enough 6 minute clip showing comedian Judson Laipply demonstrating how dance styles have changed over the years. (more…)

Weeds Synopsis

Weeds is a sit-com which follows Nancy Botwin (played by Mary Louise Parker), a widowed housewife from a wealthy Californian suburb. When her husband died Nancy became a marijuana dealer serving the local upper-middle-class in order to make ends meet.

Nancy set up her ‘business’ using a bakery as a front with the assistance of a city councilman and sourced her weed from streetwise dealer Conrad Shepard.

The comedy series reveals the hidden underworld and dirty secrets that lie behind the seemingly peaceful and affluent homes of the gated community.

The first series aired on Showtime in August 2005 and will run for 5 series.

• Watch On Demand at Amazon (U.S Only)
• iTunes users: Get Weeds Episodes on iTunes
• Search for Weeds Episodes
• Find Weeds Torrents
• See if you can stream this on Netflix

(more…)

Online television is constantly evolving, and part of that evolution is persuading more people to utilise the Web as a method of watching TV and video. Luckily, that is happening quite quickly.

Writing for Web TV Wire over the past year has increased my knowledge of the business of Internet television and video considerably. And in that time I have seen the popularity of Web TV increase considerably.

Consumer Internet Barometer

Last year, TNS and the Conference Board revealed the results of their Consumer Internet Barometer survey which looked at the Internet usage habits of 10,000 US households.

That survey showed that 16% of US households regularly watched online television. But the results of this year’s survey, revealed this week in a press release, show that online TV is rapidly growing in popularity.

Joost is killing off its desktop client and moving lock, stock, and barrel over to a Web-based system of content delivery. But will this actually help Joost gain viewers?

Joost has been out of the headlines for the last few months. In fact, we haven’t even spoken about the Web TV application since May. But now it’s back with a big announcement.

From Desktop To Web-Based Client

Calling it an announcement is actually a bit on the presumptuous side as the news that Joost is abandoning its desktop client to move to a purely Web browser-based system is still just filtering through.

GigaOM broke the news of the switch in strategy, before NewTeeVee gained access to the new Joost site and gave its first thoughts on the new and improved app.

Michael Moore’s latest documentary film, Slacker Uprising, is set to be available for free on the Internet. Does this signal a change in the movie industry or just Moore’s desire to see Obama in the White House?

When Radiohead released their latest album, In Rainbows, for free over the Internet last year, it was seen as a forward-thinking step which could revolutionise the way music is distributed.

Changing The Status Quo?

The album did well, but most people still ended up downloading it via less legal means. And the experiment didn’t really do anything to end the monopoly that the big record companies enjoy.

Could film-maker Michael Moore do any better in persuading the movie industry that there is an alternative to releasing movies in to cinemas?