blip.tv

As I create more videos and have more discussions with online video talent, the conversation seems to move many times to finding the optimum hosting and distribution structure for video. I want to make sure my viewers never hit a dead end and can easily find other videos to view from the series. Since at least half of my videos are business-oriented, the idea of putting them on YouTube and hoping for the "viral effect" is not attractive. Earlier this year I wrote about the online video market here in NYC and I see it continuing to expand today.

Currently I am using Viddler almost exclusively for my videos. I like Viddler because their player allows for in-stream commenting and their upload function is easy-to-use. I find the uploading function on YouTube to be absolute crap, can't they even offer an upload status bar?!? For the purposes of this discussion, we will only discuss pre-recorded video content and not live services (Mogulus, Ustream) or mobile video streaming (Kyte, Qik, Flixwagon).

I get the idea behind services like TubeMogul which put your content everywhere and I will probably look at doing this as well. But it's critical from my standpoint that you select a video sharing/hosting partner to work with in which you can build your video brand. This means that the player that's used on the video creator's site remain consistent over time. Some video content creators are being paid to use services and I see this trend continuing as the video creation market expands and hosting networks fight to get out of the commodity business.

There are a number of indie video stars on the scene today. I've selected Justine and Gary Vaynerchuk to use as examples with regards to how they use various video hosting networks for their videos and shows. When I check out Justine's Web site, she seems to use YouTube as her first choice and it's clear that this strategy has helped her with growing her brand. Justine has over 18,000 subscribers on YouTube. These subscribers drive massive views to her videos. She uses Viddler as well for some videos and all of her videos are distributed there as well. Gary Vaynerchuk at WineLibraryTV uses Viddler for the main player on the site. Gary also has a distribution deal with Revision3 which publishes a shorter wine show on Revision3 and other video hosting providers including YouTube.

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Today I spent some time at the blip.tv headquarters in NYC. I had an opportunity to interview co-founder and COO Dina Kaplan. Dina gets online video. Check out our discussion in the video below where we discuss a variety of topics including:

• What is blip.tv
• Who is using blip.tv
• blip.tv video stats (they haven't shared stats yet but Dina did say they are hosting "thousands and thousands and thousands" of shows
• Discussion of the "total potential audience"
• How many shows are actually generating revenue and turning a profit
• Can an indie show generate revenue or are most advertisers going to the broadcast shows like Lost or 24
• Comparisons to other video sharing services incluing Viddler, Vimeo and Brightcove
• Why should I switch from my current video host to blip.tv
• How does blip.tv generate revenue
• Video host exclusivity versus placing the video show content everywhere and anywhere using a service like Tubemogul
• Support for FriendFeed
• Does Dina see a time when video hosting networks like yourself will pay talent a fee to come to their network exclusively
• Where's online video going over the next year
• What shows are Dina's favorites

Don't forget to check out our look at online video in NY. Thanks to Dina for spending the time with us today!

Last night I started following Noneck Noel on Twitter. Noneck has decided to become a NYC cab driver and is documenting the entire process from the initial inquiries through actually driving the cab. I have found the first batch of videos very interesting and a look into an industry that most of us don't see. We get into a cab and never wonder what goes on behind the scenes.

The site is available at TaxiNYC.TV and I've embedded a clip inside.

Episodic video content hosting company Blip.tv COO Dina Kaplan is this week's guest on nextNYers. Dina speaks with Meghan about her company, the shows they pimp, their revenue model and the rev share options with video content creators. They are working on creating a new form of advertising she says and also working on getting their shows onto the TV set as well as online.

Check out all of the previous nextNYers episodes along with our review of online video in NYC.

Come inside for her video »

Earlier this week was the NY Video Meetup. Somewhere around 250 NY'ers attended and viewed a variety of demos and a healthy video discussion. One thing rang true throughout -- online video is HOT here in the city. So many companies, so many ideas and a amazing level of excitement/passion around online video.

Here are just a few of the companies in the online video space in the NYC area. I certainly forgot a bunch, so please leave them in the comments.

• Magnify.net - providing video upload, encoding, storage, delivery, and rev share mainly for video clips (CN Coverage)
• Blip.tv - a leader in episodic content (CN Coverage)
• 5min - moving offices to NYC next month - knowledge sharing (CN Coverage)
• Rocketboom - daily video show about anything with host Joanne Colan (CN Coverage)
• For Your Imagination - creating a variety of online-only video shows
• WallStrip - filming in NYC about stocks with host Lindsay Cambell
• Vimeo - video hoster and community creator (CN Coverage)
• ExpoTV - video reviews (CN Coverage)
• Kaltura - video collaboration (CN Coverage)
• Joost - NYC office is North American HQ - television replacement (CN Coverage)
• SavoryNY - restaurants video reviews (CN Coverage)
• WineLibraryTV - ok, he's in Jersey but we will allow it since he lives in the city - daily wine video show

While other areas of the country and the world are creating online video, NY is where it's at. Innovation, technology, people, community, it's all here. And Madison Avenue and Google are here to monetize it all.

Tonight I attended what I believe is the 2nd largest NY (tech) Meetup group - the NY Video Meetup. The group continues to get larger month over month and I am guessing 200ish came out tonight. Tonight's presenters were: HeyCosmo, Joost, 5min and blip.tv. I am assuming that the Ustream recorded show will be available later this evening.

Before I provide some comments on the demos, tonight I had the chance to meet one of the hottest video show hosts today, Gary Vaynerchuk. Gary runs a daily video show called WineLibrary.TV. I wrote about Gary on my Vimeo vs. Viddler post and Gary has been on mainstream tv (Tonight Show and Ellen) recently and his video shows continue to explode in visitors.

So many times when techies talk about video bloggers it's always the same crowd. There are plenty of great video bloggers outside the tech market. If you plan to get into the video blogging space, check out WLTV. Gary has 50k+ viewers daily and what's more important is that each day he has 300+ comments on his video. And what's great is that even though Gary owns a large wine store, he never "forces" viewers to buy from him (yet I am sure they do!). Anyway it was great to meet him this evening.

And now on with the recap.

HeyCosmo

First up was HeyCosmo. The demo was pretty hard to sit through yet it worked, which means the product sells itself. The guy who presented (I didn't catch his name) is the brother of the CEO who was unable to make it so I can't be too negative about the presentation :). He was hilarious. HeyCosmo offers a variety of applications on a community video platform. One of the demo'd apps was a live texas holdem app. I have to say, it's hot. Each player uses a webcam and so it's as close to sitting at the same table as possible. They are working on Sudoko which is in development currently. I am working on getting some invites for CN readers.

Joost

David Clark, North American VP presented Joost and if you haven't tried Joost recently, I would suggest you give them another try. The app has lots of improvements from say early summer versions. David noted that they are a small company with big ambitions and they want to create a product that people love to use. Currently they host 15,000 shows and just launched a Facebook widget. I asked about their thoughts on Hulu and David responded, "We like Hulu - and we are looking to move to live and Web down the road as well".

The Joost advertising platform combines all of the current Inernet technologies serving approximately 1.5 minutes of video ads per hour along with other interactive ads. From a peer-to-peer standpoint, currently 70% of the bandwidth comes from p2p and 30% from their server farm.

5min

By now I am guessing most of the CN readers have seen the Israeli actor who discusses how to get VC funding - if not, I have embedded it at the end of this post. 5min is currently located in Israel but is planning to open a NY office in a month. They currently have one million unique visitors for October with 700-1000 uploaded videos per month. Their motto is "helping each other to share knowledge". The idea is simple - you are an expert at something. You create a video about that knowledge that's less than 5 minutes in length and upload it to 5min.

Their business model is to get "sponsored knowledge" where say Absolut would sponsor videos on how to create a great martini or LA Fitness might sponsor videos on how to lose the freshman 15. It's an innovative revenue model.

Blip.TV

Co-founder Justin Day presented Blip.tv. Blip has really picked up steam since their partnership with Rocketboom earlier this summer. Basically Blip is for show creators who create episodic content. Not much else to say here - though Alec from For Your Imagination noted that with Blip you can "replace" a video which is something you can't do on most of the other services.