The Sony Bloggie Live

This is being done through a connection with Qik which has been used for live streaming on smart phones for years.

There is also a new smart phone application from Sony called Play Memories Mobile that allows you to use your phone as a hotspot for the camera if there is not an open WiFi signal to connect with.

In addition to live streaming of video, the camera also has the ability to upload videos to the web directly from it. Shot something that you loved and want to share it with your friend on Facebook and YouTube? You can now do this directly from the video camera.

We are excited to see what people create with this because it opens the possibility for everything from citizen reporting to live event coverage. We are hoping some of you will show us what you’ve created with this camera in the coming months on your own .tv’s.

The camera is set to be released at the end of January and expected to retail for around $249. If you’d like to watch a hands-on demo, the team at TPN.tv has a great one.

Flingo.tv

As covered by GigaOM, two .tv’s that showed new products are Flingo and Simple.tv.

Flingo, headquartered in San Francisco, launched in late 2008 as a way for sending online video to internet-connected TVs (including sets from LG, Samsung and Vizio). They launched a new product at CES, called SyncApps, which they claim allows users to share easily on Facebook and Twitter, while allowing social content from broadcasters, like polls and updates, to be sent to the user’s TV screen. There have announced a number of really exciting features, including an API that enables developers to create application that use SyncApps to hook into their system. This looks like the next phase of social television and we can’t wait to see where this goes.

Another .tv that emerged from CES is Simple.tv, a set-top device that lets you stream live and recorded TV content to supported mobile devices – including the iPad.  Simple.tv announced availability for Spring 2012 and are taking reservations for their device on their website. Simple.tv also announced a premium subscription package will be available  that will include an enhanced program guide, automatic recording and streaming to a set number of connected devices.

Simple.tv

These are pretty exciting uses of technology for online video – it looks like the future is really here!

We’re also looking forward to exploring great new features that are being implemented in cameras – like Wi-Fi and 3D – that will help take online video up to the next level.

One of the big events of this year’s CES was the International Academy of Web Television Awards. This is an organization that promotes and celebrates online video and the amazing creators behind them. The awards were given out on January 12^th and you can watch the stream of the ceremony here.  We were really excited to see one of our advocates, Brad Powell’s webshow, DadLabs, win Best Educational Web Series – Congratulations Brad!

Once again, the Consumer Electronics Show was an exciting kick-off to the year and we’re looking forward to seeing all of these products in use during 2012!

Phil really has the Holiday Spirit.

Well, it’s the season for giving and one of our .tv Advocate Panel, Phil Campbell, has really taken that to heart. For the month of December, Phil has put together an advent calendar of videos featuring terrific howto’s, tip and tricks for anyone wanting to make great web video.

To make sure that you don’t miss a thing you can subscribe to the iTunes feed, Phil’s RSS feed, or keep an eye on the @fibrecamp and @WatchDotTV Twitter streams.

So far, Phil’s Advent Calendar has included:

• December 1: Welcome to the Advent Calendar and Video Editing Tips while “On the Move“
• December 2: Tracking Conversations
• December 3: Getting Creative with your Mobile Videos
• December 4: Being Prepared “On The Ground” with Battery Backup
• December 5: Audio Editing “On the Go” 

We’re having a lot of fun watching Phil put these together and can’t wait to see what he has coming up next! What’s your favorite tip that Phil has shared so far? Send us a tweet or comment here, on our Facebook page or YouTube channel.

Stay tuned!

* Disclosure: Phil is a compensated member of the .tv Advocate Program,  http://CMP.LY/3/HPynQH

Some of our favorite moments:

• C.C. Chapman: “Seeing the constant stream of people swinging into the booth and asking what .TV was all about. The living room set instantly welcomed everyone in and they came in droves which was great to see.”
• Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff : “The great Anji Bee interview!”
• Melissa Pierce: “People stopping by to watch the live interviews – on the bigscreen TV instead of the studio itself… what does that say about our LOVE of video?”
• Rick Griffin: “Getting to interview the Vacation Gals, JD Andrews and iGrandma.tv”
• Sandi McKenna: ”Our educational segment with JD Andrews. As an Emmy award winner his knowledge of video production was such added value to viewers.”

And there’s a lot more – my favorite moments was having so many people visiting our booth and wanting to know more about .tv, & the folks who already use .tv stopping by to inquire about interviews & becoming advocates (Also -the booth looking so amazing that someone wanted to rent it to film an episode of their own show!).

We’re busy editing all the amazing video we took and will bring the best of BlogWorld to our YouTube channel and Facebook page later this month, so stay tuned.

Did you go to BlogWorld or watch our Watch,tv Studio livestream? Send us a tweet or comment here, on our Facebook page or YouTube channel. We can’t wait to hear what your favorite BlogWorld moment is.

And – don’t forget to vote for your favorite “Make a .tv Commercial” entry!

We’ve set up a webpage where you’ll be able to watch our BlogWorld streaming live, see the schedule and check out our photo stream. Keep watching as the schedule may change and you don’t want to miss out on any of the great BW moments.

.tv is also sponsoring the Thursday Night Networking party and we’ll be there streaming all the fun. We’ll also be highlighting the Top Ten entries from the “Make a .tv Commercial” contest at the party, which kicks off the community voting phase on our Facebook page. So watch to see if your entry made our Top Ten!

So – are you going to be at the BlogWorld and New Media Expo in LA? Send us a tweet or comment here, on our Facebook page or YouTube channel. And don’t forget to check out our Watch.tv Live page. See you there!

Bee.tv has released a new iPad app that takes the experience it introduced online to the tablet experience, providing recommendations to users based on where they’re located and what they’ve previously signaled they are interested in. Users can also invite friends to watch shows at the same time they are and then engage in conversations around those shows. We had turned the .tv Spotlight on to Bee.tv last June and were among those interviewed as part of our presence at SXSW.

Time Warner has made a “strategic investment” in BlackArrow.tv, an advertising systems provider for new platforms. The company says the money from Time Warner will be used for further rollout of its advertising system, which is specially designed to accommodate on-demand and other non-traditional video options.

Both of these stories, combined with examples like Shelby.tv which recently launched an alpha version of its video recommendation service, Synchronize.tv which is looking to move news tickers to a second screen and others signal an unmistakable trend, that .tv domains are being used for services that have some sort of correlation with television itself. .tv has always been about branding a site as having video but now we’re seeing that becoming even clearer as these companies seek to convey to their audiences easily and clearly that their site and service is about not just video, but TV.

Tune in throughout the weekend to see the latest crowd-sourced videos from OVC attendeess and be sure to check out the ecaster.tv app and find out how you can easily connect mobile video and a .tv domain.

First, while it’s been long expected, YouTube began last week to test live streaming video on its site. A number of their content partners, including Howcast, Rocketboom and others are already on board and, one would assume, more will come on board if the test goes well.

Second (and even cooler from our point of view since it involves a .tv), Dynno has begun offering software that will easily allow just about anyone to live broadcast movies, presentations and anything else to their Justin.tv channel in HD quality. That includes an app for Android devices that allows for live streaming from those mobile devices as well. The software is free for the first 10,000 downloaders.

That Dynno app is separate from Justin.tv’s own live video app, recently made available for iPhones as well as Android devices, that lets users begin streaming live video from their mobile devices immediately to their Justin.tv page or Twitter or Facebook profiles.

While technically live streaming is – and admittedly has been – logistically doable, the big key here for those getting involved is going to be raising awareness. It’s basically going to be taking the online video world and applying the same marketing lessons of standard television from 20 years, meaning the creation of appointment viewing.

Ironically, it’s been online video combined with DVR usage that has largely done away with the concept of appointment viewing outside of major events such as the Super Bowl. If the online broadcasters who are creating the new media network model want to succeed with live streaming, though, they’re going to have to dip back into history and bring out some of those same tactics.



This post by Janko Roettgers of NewTeeVee talks about a recent bill that pushes captioning for online video. The bill would set the stage for drawing up requirements for broadcasters who put their shows online to include a closed-captioned version. We blogged about this issue back in November (an eternity ago in Internet years). The bill leaves online-only video as exempt and doesn’t even mention user-generated videos but it’s a start.

Two things not to forget: First, there’s this sneaky little benefit of closed captioning…it makes video oh so much more findable and searchable. Second, if you’re serious about sending the message that you’re all about online video, .tv is the perfect way to do just that.

Congrats to Tom and all those that worked on this bill.

eMarketer’s Paul Verna points out rightly in his report that video has become a necessity for companies that are looking to truly impact and engage with their customers and audiences. That goes regardless of what industry you’re in. The audience wants and expects their interactions with brands online to include some sort of video component, so it’s time to get on-board with that or risk being left in the dust.

Some interesting stats:

• Mutichannel Merchant asked retailers to identify rich media features that they used, 46% picked video making it the highest ranked category in the survey. Another 42% said they planned to add capability in the next year.
• Forrester says the percentage of the top 50 US Online retailers that offer video on their sites skyrocketed to 68% in 2009 from 18% in 2008.
• The Society for New Communications Research noted 31% of Fortune 500 companies with public-facing blogs used video blogging in 2009, up from 21% in 2008.
• Ad-ology ‘s statistics showed “video ahead of mobile marketing and search optimization as budget priorities for US marketing.”

Online video is entertainment. It’s cars. It’s shoes. It’s shirts. It’s engaging with your users, viewers and customers. And, online video is .tv.