Chatroulette is basically Russian roulette with Webcams. But while you could find yourself chatting to a celebrity or your future partner, you’re more likely to either encounter unwanted male nakedness or become part of an improvised music performance.

Chatroulette

If you haven’t heard of Chatroulette yet then you’ve clearly been living in a hole for the past few months. You also won’t have tried out the service, which really is something everyone should do at least once.

Chatroulette is online video chat for strangers. You connect to the site with your Webcam open and a procession of partners roll in, with you having the power to sit and chat for a while or ‘Next’ them.

Chatroulette was created by 17-year-old Russian Andrey Ternovskiy, who is currently visiting the U.S. to talk with potential investors and buyers.

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YouTube was in existence for 18 months before Google acquired it. And it was probably just as well the search giant did, because the burgeoning online video site was massively expensive to run, and there wasn’t any sign of profit being made any time soon.

Google Vs. Viacom

The Google vs. Viacom legal battle is rapidly approaching its crescendo, with both sides likely to meet in court and tell their own side of the story regarding the copyright infringements that formed a big part of the site’s early days.

As part of the recently-revealed legal documents, confidential profit and loss information was uncovered. Which NewTeeVee has used to build a picture of how YouTube was financed before Google took the site over in October 2006.

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Viacom’s $1 billion lawsuit against Google over copyright infringement on YouTube is coming to a head, with a court battle likely to ensue sometime this year. For now, the accusations made by both sides have been released. And they pull no punches whatsoever.

A Brief History Lesson

Viacom Vs Google can be traced right back to May 2005 before YouTube was under the protective wing of Google. A clip from Paramount Pictures’ Twin Towers was uploaded to the site, and Viacom demanded to know who the uploader was.

In October 2006 YouTube made a deal with Viacom to syndicate content. Then Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion. February 2007 saw Viacom retract the previous deal and pull everything off the site.

March 2007 saw Viacom sue Google for 63,000 counts of copyright infringement, for which it was seeking $1 billion in damages. Google argues that YouTube is protected under the Safe Harbor provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

BetaNews has the full timeline with many more twists and turns. But it all builds to this point when Google and Viacom’s documents pertaining to the court case have been released. And they make for interesting reading, to say the least.

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Google looks set to venture into the living room with Google TV, an Android-based set-top box capable of delivering the best of the Web (and online video) to your television set. And it’s partnered with Sony and Intel to make Google TV happen.

Google

Google is, without a shadow of a doubt, the biggest name on the Internet right now. The search giant controls the search sector, is making gains with its Chrome Web browser, has Maps, Street View, and all those other cool apps, and, of course, owns YouTube.

Google has also made the move to smartphones with its Android operating system. But it’s yet to venture into the living room, at least until now.

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SpeedBit’s Free Video boost the speed of video downloading speed and also ends interruptions in video streaming.

No More Freezing YouTube Videos

I have a fairly old Sony VAIO computer, around 10 years old, that I still use because I don’t have the heart to put it out to pasture yet.  And being an old computer, I’ve had problems with YouTube videos that will freeze a couple seconds into each clip.

The videos start like normally, then just freeze completely, showing that the video is loading but going nowhere.  I do all I can to keep the computer in good shape, but alas, those videos would just keep freezing on me.  So what to do…?

The Accelerating Solution…

So I recently gave SpeedBit’s free Video Accelerator a try, and it did a great job speading up streaming videos on my old box.  No more freezing.

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The world is going mobile in a very big way. And as people start using smartphones and the new breed of tablet computers to browse the Web, so video sites have to adapt. And so, therefore, does the advertising on video sites.

YouTube Mobile

YouTube’s mobile site is a version of the online video leader built especially for mobile phone users. It isn’t the same as the specially-created YouTube interfaces on iPhone and Android, although users of these two platforms can visit the mobile site at m.youtube.com.

The YouTube mobile site is surprisingly popular, boasting “millions of people all over the world … streaming tens of millions of videos every day.” That isn’t even close to the main YouTube Web site, which now boasts over one billion videos viewed every day.

However, with growth quoted as “over 160% in 2009,” and that likely to rise even higher in 2010, Google is keen to wring every drop of revenue possible out of YouTube as it endeavors to make a profit from the site.

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ComScore has released its viewing figures for online video during January 2010. And the results aren’t positive on a month by month basis, although year on year figures are better. The big losers this time around are Hulu and Vevo.

Online Video Viewing Figures

Online video viewing figures are generally on the up. To a vast degree. As more and more people start turning to the Web for new ways of watching movies and television content, the big players are generally picking up new viewers left, right, and center.

But it isn’t exactly plain sailing, especially for everyone other than YouTube who is currently fighting to maintain or steal second place behind the Google-owned site.

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