Online video industry continues to strengthen

This has been a good couple of weeks for the online video space. This morning Comcast CEO Brian Roberts, during the company’s earnings call, gave Netflix props for doing a “great job” in streaming video to its users. Netflix, for its part, last week reported solid, but not stellar earnings but did say its subscriber base was up to some 15 million households and said roughly 61 percent of them were streaming movies or TV episodes

YouTube CMO Chris Di Cesare on legitimizing online video as an art form in its own right

YouTube has been making a lot of news of late, not only for the massive amount of user-generated content it continues to upload (24 hours worth of video every minute), or for the billions of video views its serves up every month, but for the quality of the video its bringing onto its site and the expanding programs it’s offering serious aspiring video makers. YouTube, having just turned five, is growing up, and like any business that survives its first half-decade, it’s looking to refine its place in its industry. CMO Chris Di Cesare, who joined YouTube three years ago from Microsoft, talked to FierceOnlineVideo about how YouTube–without abandoning its massive community of users–is nonetheless making a special effort to legitimize and recognize video artists, independent filmmakers and is looking at developing a more serious side. Last year, it focused on the YouTube Symphony, which was assembled through open auditions on YouTube and with the help of the London Symphony and several other partners. The online, collaborative ensemble eventually played at New York’s Carnegie Hall in April 2009, directed by Michael Tilson Thomas.

YouTube’s shiny new HTML5 embed code is now live

Most of you have probably embedded a YouTube video at one time or another, even if it’s just to share it on Facebook. Because copying and pasting is so easy, you might not have paid much attention to the embed code itself, though.

Blockbuster Says It Has "28-Day Advantage", But Only Has 13 Movies Streaming In HD

For a company that is so far behind their competitors, I can only laugh when Blockbuster continues to talk about all of these supposed “advantages” they have in the market. Last week Blockbuster started running television commercials in two states highlighting the fact that they don’t have to wait 28 days to rent new releases. (Their commercial has since been pulled from YouTube due to copyright issues.) While that may seem like a big deal, we all know that consumers are starting to consume more movies digitally, yet Blockbuster’s supposed “28-Day Advantage” does nothing to help them with their failing digital strategy

Cleapleap’ TV technology integrated with Verizon’s FiOS

Web-based TV technology company Clearleap has successfully integrated and deployed its cloud-based content management, delivery and advertising platform into Verizon’s FiOS TV infrastructure. Verizon will initially deploy Clearleap to streamline production for FiOS 1, which offers local subscribers hyper-local content including news, sports, traffic and weather. In addition, Clearleap will help bolster FiOS1 on VOD across all FiOS TV markets

Online video search engine Clicker debuts social, mobile apps

Online video search engine and programming guide Clicker has launched a pair of social and mobile apps that allow users to discover, share, rate, discuss, and check-in to shows on Clicker and third party partner sites, and access Clicker functions from their iPhone or Android devices. Los Angeles-based Clicker, which claims to be the “complete programming guide for the new era of Internet television,” catalogs premium television shows, movies, Web originals, live events and music videos available on the Web, giving users a pretty solid view of what’s available. It’s Clicker Social app takes advantage of one of the most popular trends in online video viewing, the ability to chat with friends about what they’re watching, and to discuss the shows as they watch. Clicker users also can curate their own Profile page to highlight their playlists, friends, recommendations, interests and recent activities on Clicker. Clicker Mobile, meanwhile, lets users search for programs to watch on their device, add shows to their playlist, manage their profile, check out their activity feed to see what friends are watching, check-in to shows and earn awards for things they’re watching offline, discuss shows with other Clicker users, and also identifies video that are playable on their iPhones or Android devices.

Kantar Video partners with Anvato for online video tracking and analytics offering

Kantar Video, a division of ad tracking service Kantar, is partnering with content identification firm Anvato on a new offering the company says can track and provide analytics on online videos even when they’re modified by users and distributed beyond controlled syndication. Track, one of the Kantar Videolytics offerings, leverages Anvato’s technology to power Kantar’s audio and video content and advertising identification offerings. Agencies, brands, publishers and content owners can now receive more accurate performance, effectiveness, verification, safety, reach and user engagement metrics no matter where and when video content and ads appear. The Anvato technology, often used to enforce copyright infringement, combines audio and visual pattern recognition to provide a robust fingerprint for identifying and tracking online video. The company says it looks at video the same way the human eye does, using machine vision to find illegal duplicates based on visible content, not watermarks at the rate of one million minutes of video in less than a second.

SnagFilms launching VOD play on Comcast, Verizon FiOS TV

Nonfiction film distributor SnagFilms is celebrating its second anniversary by bringing its library to a suite of new platforms, including the creation of VOD offerings with the nation’s largest MSO, Comcast, and with Verizon FiOS TV. SnagFilms has become the web’s largest and most broadly-distributed home for non-fiction films, with more than 1,500 documentaries streamed free to consumers on 90,000 websites and webpages. “We started SnagFilms two years ago for four simple reasons,” said founder and AOL Vice-Chair Emeritus Ted Leonsis.

DECE unveils ‘UltraViolet’ digital-rights locker

The Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem, the group headed by Sony Pictures CTO Mitch Singer to help combat video piracy and create a universal digital rights locker, says it plans to launch trials later this year under the consumer name UltraViolet. The organization, which is made up of some five-dozen partners, including several Hollywood studios, CE manufacturers and retailers, service providers and others, aims to standardize the anti-piracy technology in the industry.

UltraViolet — the next step in DRM, and maybe we’ll finally see legal movie downloads

UltraViolet , with its prehistoric-looking ooh-Web-2.0-reflection!! logo, is about to make a big splash in the world of content distribution. If you thought the days of DRM were behind us, you were wrong. Unless you’re using an Apple device, actually — but more on that in a moment. Be it music, movies, TV shows or books, UltraViolet has enough clout (some 60 major partners) to significantly alter how digital goods are consumed.

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