YouTube is entering the living room. Or at least attempting to do so. But can YouTube Leanback, currently in beta but expected to fully launch alongside Google TV, manage to wean people off broadcast TV?

Living Room Ambitions

Things used to be so simple. Broadcast TV was watched on the television set in your living room, with online video confined to the computer in your office or bedroom. But things have changed somewhat over the past few years, and are set to continue changing in the future.

Set-top boxes, games consoles, and TVs which connect to the Web have all brought online video into the living room. While smartphones such as the iPhone and tablets such as the iPad have brought online video to the mobile world.

Next on the agenda is connected TV platforms such as Google TV and the BBC’s YouView.

Continue Reading…

With so many hours of content being uploaded to YouTube every day, it seems a shame we’re not making the most of all that video telling the story of how life is in this day and age.

Hopefully new film documentary Life In A Day will resolve this particular injustice, providing a kind of time capsule for future generations.

The Power Of YouTube

In its relatively short existence, YouTube has changed the world. By providing an outlet for video of all types and lengths, the Google-owned website has made stars of ordinary people (often very ordinary people) from all walks of life.

YouTube now gets in excess of two billion video views every single day. And it’s using this influence on the Web for crowdsourcing projects such as CitizenTube and YouTube Play.

And it’s now turning its hands to documentary film-making, with you and I as the stars. If we, and our clips, are good enough, that is.

Continue Reading…

The ComScore figures for May show that online video is back on track, after a couple of wobbly months. YouTube enjoyed an especially good period, while Hulu had a somewhat mixed month with views up but viewers remaining static.

ComScore May 2010

I think it’s safe to say online video is established. The new ComScore statistics for online video viewers show that 183 million people in the U.S watched online video during the month of May. That’s 84.8 percent of all Internet users in the U.S.

Continue Reading…

The judge in the long-running Google Vs. Viacom copyright infringement lawsuit has granted Google summary judgment, effectively meaning the search giant has won the case. Unsurprisingly, Viacom is promising to appeal the decision.

Background To The Case

The Google Vs. Viacom story began way back in 2005 even before the former had acquired YouTube. Viacom demanded to know who had uploaded a clip from Twin Towers to the site, and the arguments over copyright infringement and who was responsible began in earnest.

However, it wasn’t until Google acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion that things got nasty. Viacom backed out of a previous deal, and pulled all its content from the video site. A month later, in March 2007, Viacom sued Google for $1 billion over 63,000 counts of alleged copyright infringement.

Both sides have been building their case since then, and court papers were leaked in March of this year. We knew then that the case was coming to a head, and it’s done so today with Google’s motion for summary judgment in its favor granted.

Continue Reading…

There are plenty of dedicated video editors available, some free, some costing a small fortune. But for the most basic editing options and tools, YouTube has now entered the fray with its new cloud-based video editor.

YouTube

YouTube is, and has been for a long time, the biggest and most-popular online video site. It has a full range of videos, from long, professionally-produced clips, to a lot of user-generated content.

The site is now five-years-old, and celebrated its birthday by hitting the two-billion video views a day milestone. However, one thing that’s been missing from the site is a video editor, apart from the short-lived YouTube Remixer from a few years ago.

2007’s YouTube Remixer was a Flash video editor based on Adobe Premiere Express. It was quickly discontinued after users complained it was slow and buggy. So YouTube has gone back to the drawing board.

Continue Reading…

CitizenTube has been around for a while as YouTube’s news and political blog, but it’s now being refocused ans tested as a video news feed. Could this eventually lead to a YouTube breaking news channel via connected TV platforms such as Google TV?

CitizenTube

CitizenTube has been a part of YouTube for a few years now. It started as a video channel on the main site before spawning its own separate domain.

Originally conceived as a way of keeping track of the way people are using video to change the world, CitizenTube morphed into a video blog covering news and politics. And now comes its latest iteration – as a breaking news video feed.

Continue Reading…

YouTube isn’t really known for its arty content, being considered the actual and spiritual home for funny home videos in this Web-obsessed age. But that could soon change thanks to a biennial event in association with the Guggenheim Museum.

YouTube Video

When you visit YouTube, which is something a great many of us do on a regular basis, you expect a certain type of video. Music videos, funny videos, videos with animals, that sort of thing.

YouTube has made an attempt at opening up its content in recent years. Deals with content creators have seen long-form video sit snugly alongside the more common user-generated video content.

Now comes another attempt to open YouTube up to a wider, more diverse audience.

Continue Reading…