MG Siegler at Parislemon has an interesting take on the current state of movie rentals on the�XBox 360, suggesting that it’s not ready for prime time: Last night I sat down to download The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I figured it would take 5-10 minutes to get enough information to start playing and then […]

Ian Lamont, at The Industry Standard, has published his take on “why podcasting is failing” reacting to the news that much-hyped podcasting startup PodTech was getting bought by ViewPartner: “Podcasting is failing as a business platform, and has failed to make a mainstream impact. The news that PodTech only managed to limp into an acquisition […]

Security firm TrustedSource reports that a new trojan has been identified that infects multi-media files on Windows computers. The malware embeds malicious content into multimedia files based on the Advanced Systems Format (ASF), a widely used format for video and audio content such as MP3 and WMA music files, WMV video files and others. When […]

Note: See update at the end of this article. AT&T has just announced a fantastic perk for iPhone owners with AT&T contracts, free WiFi for iPhone customers on the nation’s largest Wi-Fi hotspot network. This opens up more than 17,000 hotspots, including Starbucks, to iPhone users to use for free on their iPhone, laptop or […]

Metacafe and Microcinema, a leading international rights manager, are teaming up on a juried online and offline film festival, MetaFest 2008. MetaFest hopes to combine the best of interactive online video-viewing with the best of the live-audience offline film festival experience. Selected films will have a theatrical premiere in San Francisco in November 2008, will […]

Podcasting site Odeo has relaunched. Again. We have kind of lost count, but Beta News says that this is Odeo’s sixth launch. Initially launched mid-2005, Odeo debuts (again) with a number of new features. The biggest addition to the site is video, but other new capabilities allow users to: — Search & explore over 500,000 […]

BlogHer, the online community (and conference) for women bloggers, has entered a strategic partnership with iVillage, a subsidiary of NBC Universal and a popular website toward female viewers/readers. The agreement provides iVillage access to BlogHer’s network of 2200 member blogs, and shared promotional and advertising opportunities across BlogHer’s audience. As part of the arrangement, NBCU […]

Make Internet TV is a very cool site that explains how to create your own video podcast or video blog. It covers the gear you need, shooting tips, editing, licensing your content, publishing and promoting your videos. The site targets beginners, so if you’ve been wanting to try video podcasting or vlogging, but have been […]

Google announced today that it had reached an agreement with Viacom that will avoid a media debacle over YouTube users privacy: As we let you know on July 4, YouTube received a court order to produce viewing history data. We are pleased to report that Viacom, MTV and other litigants have backed off their original […]

YouTube, by default, creates embed code that displays videos in relatively low quality. Here’s an example, Matt Harding’s Where the Hell is Matt? (2008): It’s possible, though, to embed YouTube videos with higher quality. Here’s the same video, embedded with YouTube’s high quality option: Notice how images, and especially type, are sharper. Unfortunately, this is […]