Online video is growing all the time, both in terms of popularity and frequency. Which is all good for the sector.

However, navigating the breadth of choice now out there and filtering the available content is getting harder as a result. Enter Magma, which acts like a Billboard Hot 100 for online video.

Online Video Growth

Online video has grown, and continues to grow, in popularity and breadth of content. The choice of sites, portals, content, and video clips now available is breathtaking.

There are the long-form video destinations such as Hulu and the BBC iPlayer, and short-form video factories such as YouTube and Dailymotion. Between all of them the range of content available to your average viewer is simply astonishing. It would take years to watch it all.

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The social side of online video is becoming an increasingly important tool in demonstrating the divergence between traditional broadcasts and Web-only broadcasts. Facebook is now taking advantage of this sector of the market with its new Live Stream Box. Ustream is the first company to take advantage of the Facebook Connect feature.

Social Networking Features

Recent months have brought news of a couple of innovations in the field of matching up online video and social networking. The new Xbox 360 Sky Player will allow fans to watch football matches together using on-screen avatars. While both Joost and Hulu have recently unveiled new elements to their services which are designed to increase user interaction during programs. And CBS Interactive introduced Social Viewing Rooms to bring the idea of sitting around watching TV together in a living room to the Web.

Live Stream Box

Now comes a new feature which brings a similar concept to Facebook, the world’s largest social network with in excess of 200 million members. It’s called Live Stream Box and it enables Facebook users to watch a streaming video event, comment and chat while it is happening, and see their messages appearing both alongside the video and on their Facebook profile.

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Reddit is one of the most popular social bookmarking sites along with Digg, Mixx, and StumbleUpon. After years of keeping everything simple, the site has now launched a new video site. It seems Reddit has found its multimedia muscle at long last.

Multimedia Maneuver

I like Reddit for many reasons. It may not be as huge or well-populated as Digg, be as clever as StumbleUpon, or have the glitzy new Web 2.0 elements Mixx has, but it’s simple and very easy-to-use. The clean lines and no-fuss interface is fine but it does mean multimedia such as photos and video are kind of shunned to the background.

But no longer. Today saw Reddit launch Reddit.tv, a separate entity from the main site which shows videos being voted for in a continuous stream. It’s an idea that isn’t particularly original, having already been done by Stumble Video and Twitmatic, but it’s great nonetheless.

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It’s hardly news that Google is desperately trying to turn YouTube in to a money-making venture rather than the high-traffic, low-revenue property it currently is. But are the latest two monetization methods a step too far?

We’ve been keeping a watchful eye on the many and varied ways in which YouTube is being monetized here on WebTVWire, and the past few months have seen a lot of effort being put in to the site.

Monetization Efforts

We’ve seen pre-roll and post-roll adverts introduced, the YouTube homepage filled with banner ads, and a variety of different deals with media companies to improve both content and profits.

These include CBS, MGM, Lionsgate, and independent producers. Then there are the new ‘click to buy’ adverts being added to music videos and the like.

In the last few days, Google has announced two new methods for monetizing YouTube: Sponsored video search results, and overlay adverts on embedded partner videos.

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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.

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The Web continues to gain acceptance as a legitimate destination for watching television and video, with the American networks even beginning to climb on board to the possibilities.

Whether the content is original productions such as Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog from Buffy creator Joss Whedon, or repeats of old TV shows on services such as the BBC iPlayer or NBC’s Hulu, the popularity of the Web as a delivery method is forever growing.

Hulu Fall Première Line-Up

And now, NBC has confirmed its commitment to the cause of Web video by launching its Fall Première Lineup on Hulu which will see shows such as Heroes, House, and Prison Break available on Hulu.

But not only will the first episodes of these shows, along with Bones, The Office, and 30 Rock be available on Hulu, some shows will actually make their début online via the service a week before they première on cable TV.

Peer To Peer networks and BitTorrent have always gone hand in hand with piracy, with many such services used for swapping copyrighted material illegally between users.

YouTube has also been cited as a source for piracy, with clips of many copyrighted shows being uploaded to the site, and not discovered until potentially millions of people have viewed them.

However, none of these services are completely devoid of usefulness to copyright holders, and it seems some are now finally realising the potential for using these kinds of distribution channels for their own ends.