If tweets showcase 140 characters and pictures are worth a thousand words, where do videos fit into the grand scheme of visual pleasures?
This year — on Twitter at least — videos have taken a backseat due in part to the increasing popularity of photo-sharing services like Instagram and Picplz. Although video-sharing sites and apps are playing second fiddle at the moment, a handful of Twitter users swear by their video-centric tweets.
“I share videos on Twitter because let’s face it, sometimes you can’t come across in just words,” says comedian Bradley Laborman, a frequent YouTuber and creator of BradmanTV. “Me tweeting, ‘This HOT DOG is UH-MAZING,’ is not as effective as me posting a quick video where I serenade the hot dog and scream to the sky how amazing it actually is.”
From a business perspective, company-made videos and user-generated videos have proven to be powerful marketing tools. For example, referral traffic from YouTube to the Shorty Awards website this year was higher than Google’s referral traffic to the site because many nominees created video campaigns.
“The scalability of making a great looking video clip is nuts in 2011 and will continue to get easier and easier,” says Natan Edelsburg, supervising producer for the Shorty Awards and vice president of Sawhorse Media. “A year or two from now it will be irresponsible for everyone to write a press release or make a big announcement without complementing it with some kind of short video clip.”
Whether for business or personal use, indulge in these four video-sharing services that launched or added new features in this past year. In the comments, let us know which apps you use to share your own videos on Twitter or other social sites.
Socialcam‘s tagline is: “Shoot, tag and share it with your friends … instantly.” The app, which is tied to Justin.tv, lets you sign up with your Facebook account and then share videos on multiple outlets such as Facebook, Twitter and even Google+.
In fewer than five minutes, I signed up on my Droid X, recorded a 34-second video, uploaded it and shared it. Had I recorded friends in my video, I could have tagged them even if they weren’t Socialcam users. “We hope tagging will insert a level of shareability that will wow everybody,” said Matthew DiPietro, vice president of marketing and Communications at Justin.tv.
“We built it very specifically for friends and family,” DiPietro added. “However, that’s the exact same thing that Mark Zuckerberg was thinking about when he launched Facebook, and Facebook is a much more widely used platform now.”
Laborman uses Viddy, an app that allows you to capture, “beautify” and share 15-second videos.
“It’s basically the Instagram for video users,” Laborman says. “You shoot a video, you add a filter and you decide whether or not you want background music on the video.”
The process is simple: Click the “Share” button in the middle of the navigation panel to upload a video from your gallery or shoot a new one. Trim the clip to your liking and apply effects using “production packages.”
Viddy’s iPhone app, which launched in April and has been downloaded 500,000 times as of May, is compatible with iPod touch and iPad but requires iOS 4.1 or later. Viddy’s website says Android, Windows and BlackBerry versions of the app are in the works.
Web-based screen recorder Screenr launched in 2009, but the service recently added new features that address users’ concerns about sharing video comments via tweets.
“Previously, comments on Screenr were tied to your Twitter account and forced you to tweet your comments,” Screenr said in a blog. “Users told us they often wanted to make comments without tweeting them. Now, Screenr has bulit-in commenting so your comments stay just on Screenr. And don’t worry, there’s also a separate Tweet button if you still want to tweet your comments.”
To create a video, Mac or PC users can adjust the video frame to a size of their liking and then click record to walk viewers through an online activity. Screenr automatically provides a shortened link to the video to quicken the sharing process.
If you like sharing trendy videos on Twitter, Zocial.tv is the site and app for you.
Zocial.tv aggregates the most-shared videos on Twitter and Facebook, separates them into categories (i.e. music, sports, education) and creates top 25 lists sorted by today, yesterday, the week or month. The site’s sharing tool — powered by ShareThis — lets you share any of the videos on Twitter and other social sites. You also can +1 or “Like” a video.
Using the Zocial.tv website (above), I shared a video that was already in the top 25 Thursday morning in the music category. The Zocial.tv app is available for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad and requires iOS 3.1 or later.
More About: screenr, socialcam, twitter, viddy, video, web video, Zocial.tv
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Apple has once again cut the price of its mobile advertising platform iAd, according to a report.
Introduced with much hoopla in April 2010, iAds were only open to advertisers spending $1 million or more, including JCPenney, Citigroup and Nissan. In February, though, reports surfaced that the bar had fallen to $500,000. Now Bloomberg‘s reporting that the campaigns can be had for as little as $300,000 — a 70% drop from the initial price.
Reps from Apple could not be reached for comment.
The price-cutting is a setback for iAds, which Apple CEO Steve Jobs dubbed “mobile ads with emotion.”
Noah Elkin, an analyst at eMarketer, says Apple may be trying to make the ads less exclusive. “Apple is never about mass appeal, but this is really about making the upfront cost more manageable for a greater variety of advertisers,” he says. “[It] rekindles marketer interest in something that got a lot of fanfare last year, but hasn’t been talked about that much lately.”
To address the lack of demand for the platform, Apple has been “quietly staffing up” a sales force in New York for iAds, according to Advertising Age. Last month Apple hired Carrie Frolich, former head of digital for media-buying firm MEC, as head of agency relations. Frolich reports to iAd chief Andy Miller, who reports to Steve Jobs.
More About: android, apple, Google, iads
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Verizon has put up Droid 3, the grandchild of Motorola’s legendary Droid smartphone, up for sale on its website.
The Droid 3 sports a 1 GHz dual-core CPU, a 4-inch qHD (960 x 540 pixel) screen, an 8-megapixel camera and a slide-out, full QWERTY keyboard.
It runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread and offers 16 GB of storage, as well as all the other standard bells and whistles that adorn the Android smartphones of today, including Bluetooth 2.1, Wi-Fi, UMTS and aGPS support.
The device costs $199 with a two-year contract on one of Verizon’s new data plans. It is also available contact-free for $459.
[via android, droid, Droid 3, Motorola, Motorola Droid 3, smartphone, verizon
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Verizon has put up Droid 3, the grandchild of Motorola’s legendary Droid smartphone, up for sale on its website.
The Droid 3 sports a 1 GHz dual-core CPU, a 4-inch qHD (960 x 540 pixel) screen, an 8-megapixel camera and a slide-out, full QWERTY keyboard.
It runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread and offers 16 GB of storage, as well as all the other standard bells and whistles that adorn the Android smartphones of today, including Bluetooth 2.1, Wi-Fi, UMTS and aGPS support.
The device costs $199 with a two-year contract on one of Verizon’s new data plans. It is also available contact-free for $459.
[via android, droid, Droid 3, Motorola, Motorola Droid 3, smartphone, verizon
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Microsoft is reportedly asking for as much as $15 for each Android — not Windows Phone 7 — device that Samsung sells.
Although Android is Google’s mobile platform, Microsoft holds a number of patents that are used in Android. Microsoft already has patent agreements with other Android manufacturers such as HTC.
The fees Android handset manufacturers pay Microsoft for each device sold aren’t public, but it’s not that far-fetched to imagine that Android is a more lucrative business for Microsoft than its own mobile platform, Windows Phone 7.
According to Maeil Business Newspaper, which quotes unnamed industry officials, Microsoft wants one of the biggest Android handset manufacturers, Samsung, to pay $10 to $15 per device sold, depending on Samsung’s willingness to extend partnership with Microsoft on the Windows Phone 7 front.
Samsung reportedly sold more than 10 million Galaxy S devices in the first seven months on the market and 3 million Galaxy S 2 devices in fewer than two months.
[via android, galaxy s, Galaxy S 2, Galaxy S II, Google, microsoft, samsung
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In an effort to foster deeper engagement beyond the checkin, Foursquare has released a revamped notifications tray.
The new notification system isn’t focused on notifying users about their friends’ checkins, though. Instead, notifications are focused on all the other activity that occurs on Foursquare, including comments, To-Dos and mayorship changes.
The tray works much like the Facebook or Google+ notification system. It provides a feed of what you and your friends are doing in chronological order. The notifications on the Foursquare Android app appear on the top right and increase in number as more notifications.
According to Foursquare, the new notifications tray alerts you to things such as comments on your checkins, new comments on items you’ve commented on, completion of your Tips by your friends, and when you are ousted as mayor. It also lets you know when your Facebook friends join Foursquare, which should make for a much better experience for new users.
The notification tray is launching today on the Android app and on Foursquare.com, but should be rolling out to BlackBerry and iPhone users soon. For those of you that don’t like being notified about your friends commenting on your checkin, Foursquare’s new notifications come with customization and muting options.
What do you think of Foursquare’s new notification system? Will it get you to use more of Foursquare’s features?
More About: foursquare, notifications
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In an effort to foster deeper engagement beyond the checkin, Foursquare has released a revamped notifications tray.
The new notification system isn’t focused on notifying users about their friends’ checkins, though. Instead, notifications are focused on all the other activity that occurs on Foursquare, including comments, To-Dos and mayorship changes.
The tray works much like the Facebook or Google+ notification system. It provides a feed of what you and your friends are doing in chronological order. The notifications on the Foursquare Android app appear on the top right and increase in number as more notifications.
According to Foursquare, the new notifications tray alerts you to things such as comments on your checkins, new comments on items you’ve commented on, completion of your Tips by your friends, and when you are ousted as mayor. It also lets you know when your Facebook friends join Foursquare, which should make for a much better experience for new users.
The notification tray is launching today on the Android app and on Foursquare.com, but should be rolling out to BlackBerry and iPhone users soon. For those of you that don’t like being notified about your friends commenting on your checkin, Foursquare’s new notifications come with customization and muting options.
What do you think of Foursquare’s new notification system? Will it get you to use more of Foursquare’s features?
More About: foursquare, notifications
For more Mobile coverage:
In an effort to foster deeper engagement beyond the checkin, Foursquare has released a revamped notifications tray.
The new notification system isn’t focused on notifying users about their friends’ checkins, though. Instead, notifications are focused on all the other activity that occurs on Foursquare, including comments, To-Dos and mayorship changes.
The tray works much like the Facebook or Google+ notification system. It provides a feed of what you and your friends are doing in chronological order. The notifications on the Foursquare Android app appear on the top right and increase in number as more notifications.
According to Foursquare, the new notifications tray alerts you to things such as comments on your checkins, new comments on items you’ve commented on, completion of your Tips by your friends, and when you are ousted as mayor. It also lets you know when your Facebook friends join Foursquare, which should make for a much better experience for new users.
The notification tray is launching today on the Android app and on Foursquare.com, but should be rolling out to BlackBerry and iPhone users soon. For those of you that don’t like being notified about your friends commenting on your checkin, Foursquare’s new notifications come with customization and muting options.
What do you think of Foursquare’s new notification system? Will it get you to use more of Foursquare’s features?
More About: foursquare, notifications
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It’s another humiliating day for Research In Motion. The company’s BlackBerry, which once owned 55% of the smartphone market, has now fallen to third place with less than a quarter share, according to comScore.
To make matters worse, BlackBerry’s share seems to be falling pretty quickly. In February, RIM was number two in the market with 28.9%, based on an average of the previous three months. By May, RIM’s share had dropped 4.2% to 24.7%, behind Apple’s iOS with 26.6% and Google’s Android platform with 38.1%.
RIM’s platform held a number one ranking in 2009. But by the first quarter of 2010, iPhones and Android handsets had cut into that share with a combined 49% of the market, compared to 41% for RIM.
The latest news follows a woeful June for RIM, which saw its market value drop 20% after a poor earnings report and forecast. And it was conspicuously silent as Apple and Google announced new features for their platforms early that month.
One reason for BlackBerry’s decline: lack of app support, which has been exacerbated by RIM’s frequent API changes and the fact that users often have to pay a higher price for BlackBerry apps than they do for the same apps on iOS or Android.
More About: android, apple, blackberry, ComScore, Google, iphone, RIM
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It’s another humiliating day for Research In Motion. The company’s BlackBerry, which once owned 55% of the smartphone market, has now fallen to third place with less than a quarter share, according to comScore.
To make matters worse, BlackBerry’s share seems to be falling pretty quickly. In February, RIM was number two in the market with 28.9%, based on an average of the previous three months. By May, RIM’s share had dropped 4.2% to 24.7%, behind Apple’s iOS with 26.6% and Google’s Android platform with 38.1%.
RIM’s platform held a number one ranking in 2009. But by the first quarter of 2010, iPhones and Android handsets had cut into that share with a combined 49% of the market, compared to 41% for RIM.
The latest news follows a woeful June for RIM, which saw its market value drop 20% after a poor earnings report and forecast. And it was conspicuously silent as Apple and Google announced new features for their platforms early that month.
One reason for BlackBerry’s decline: lack of app support, which has been exacerbated by RIM’s frequent API changes and the fact that users often have to pay a higher price for BlackBerry apps than they do for the same apps on iOS or Android.
More About: android, apple, blackberry, ComScore, Google, iphone, RIM
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