You can now watch full-length episodes of various Disney shows on YouTube, and even embed them on other sites around the Web. Assuming you’re in America and can actually find the content you are looking for.

Google and Disney

Google and Disney struck a deal at the end of last year which saw the two teaming up to create original programming for YouTube. Disney is one of the 100 partners bringing original content to the site via dedicated channels.

However, the deal also saw Disney movies being made available to rent through YouTube, and now full-length episodes of classic shows have also found their way on to the market-leading online video destination.

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Believe it or not things aren’t as black and white as they may at first appear when it comes to copyright infringement laws.

Which means YouTube is awash with videos that could be legal or illegal, depending on who is arguing the case.

No Copyright Infringement

Andy Baio recently wrote a fascinating article discussing how a new generation see copyright infringement very differently than previous generations. Mainly thanks to YouTube.

His kicking off point was the pronouncement, “No copyright infringement. I only put this up as a project,” placed by the uploader on a video showing Pulp Fiction in chronological order. That’s the full Pulp Fiction movie, distributed by Miramax, with its scenes rearranged.

This video is far from alone, with hundreds of thousands having some sort of copyright disclaimer attached to it. Even though doing so makes no difference to whether a video is infringing or not. The problem is no one quite knows what is and isn’t infringing when it comes to YouTube videos.

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I don’t know about you but the TV set which sits in the corner of my living room is getting used less and less these days. All thanks to the Internet and its range of video content and catch-up services. And so we have the new YouTube design.

Hate

YouTube rolled out its new design on Dec. 1. And the complaints instantly began rolling in. Many people don’t like the changes that have been made. But they were necessary changes for YouTube to become the media center it hopes to, and that Google hopes it to.

Despite the complaints I think YouTube has got the redesign pretty much spot-on, though I’m sure it will be making changes based on the feedback in the coming weeks.

All YouTube is doing is evolving: transitioning from a destination where we watch a solitary video of a cat being cute to watching multiple videos created by dedicated video producers. This is the new YouTube, which is very different from the old YouTube.

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YouTube is keen to help us all become video creators. But good video creators. And to help us all wring the most out of the clips we’re uploading to the site, YouTube Analytics has been created. If you like statistics you’ll be in hog heaven with this offering.

YouTube Insight

It’s all well and good creating a video and uploading it to the Web. People may watch it, and it may even go viral. But unless you know who is looking, how they learned about your video and arrived on your YouTube page, and which parts of the video they liked or disliked then there is little chance of learning what worked and didn’t work. Which is where analytics come into play.

YouTube has been offering video analytics on the site since March 2008 when it rolled YouTube Insight out to all users. This gave video creators a detailed set of statistics about who viewed their videos, how long they viewed them for, and from where they came. But there was definite room for improvement.

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PS3 owners who are also users of Playstation Home can now watch films and TV shows completely for free from right within the PSN’s virtual world thanks to Sony teaming up with Crackle. And UStream is set to follow along shortly.

Playstation Home and Crackle

Playstation Home is a free social network/virtual world/gaming hub which is available to all PS3 owners signed up to the Playstation Network. You create an avatar, enter Home, and can then explore, chat, shop, and generally mess around at your leisure. And all for free.

Crackle is a website offering free movies and TV shows, as well as original content. There’s a wide range of films available on the site, as well as trailers and clips. They’re all of a classic nature, it’s fair to say, as in you’re not going to be able to watch Avatar or The Dark Knight on there for quite some time, but there is little cause for complaint when it’s all free.

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Content is king, as we know all too well. Netflix knows this better than most, and is trying to secure a good line-up of movies and TV shows in advance of its launch in the U.K. and Ireland set for a few months’ time.

Netflix Expansion

It was less than a month ago, in October 2011, that Netflix announced plans to launch in the U.K. and Ireland. This would be its first foray into Europe, although skirmish may be a better word for it as the company faces tough competition from Amazon’s Lovefilm. If all goes well then mainland Europe will surely follow.

This follows on from Netflix moving out of the U.S. and into both Canada and Latin America and the Caribbean. Its recent troubles may have dented confidence and slowed down the international push but Reed Hastings and co. clearly still have one eye on world domination.

As discussed yesterday when revealing Roku’s plans for Europe, content is all-important for any of these services. And Netflix is no exception. Thankfully partners are signing up left, right, and center.

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YouTube is getting a makeover. Yes, another one. I know it only feels like a few months since the last one, because it is only a few months since the last one. But this one has a point to it in the form of Google+

YouTube Redesign

If there is one thing YouTube loves as much as videos it’s redesigns. The site is constantly being tweaked, or so it seems. I guess it’s good to keep things fresh, especially when you’re the most-trafficked website in the world, but still.

The latest one, which is currently being tested by some users but which is likely to be rolled out to everyone in the near future, tweaks lots of different aspects of YouTube. But the biggest change by far is the Google+ integration, which signals Google’s continued belief that its social network has a future.

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