The last couple of weeks have been mind-blowing.  Firstly, I have the pleasure of posting my OVP Test Drive reviews on VidCompare.com, thanks to its founder, Kris Drey.  Since then, I have been contacted by a few people in the online video industry, complimenting me on how thorough and in-depth those posts really go.  Thanks to all those who reached out – the encouragement will only result in more reviews, so stay tuned!

Secondly, to my surprise and excitement, I was contacted by Ooyala and had the chance to speak with its co-founder and President of Products, Bismarck Lepe.  During that discussion, Bismarck kindly walked me through a very detailed demo of Backlot and addressed all of the questions I originally raised in my April review of their free trial.  Don’t worry – the results of that demo will be shared on this site before the end of the month.

Finally, after the demo, Bismarck was kind enough to answer some general questions I had about Ooyala.  The following is an exchange that took place by email late last week.

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Longtail Video: http://www.longtailvideo.com

From the casual observer to the online video professional, there should be no surprise that the online video platform market has two poles – free-to-use platforms, like YouTube, and popular pay-to-use platforms like Brightcove and Ooyala.  In the former case, you can publish your content but you may be concerned that your branding will suffer if your primary hosting site is also the home of dogs on skateboards and Rebecca Black.  On the other hand, you may not have the budget to spend at least $100/month on just online video alone and require something in between.  In between does exist, and we have almost a hundred OVPs in the market, many of which cost a monthly sum of at least a hundred bucks a month.  In comes Longtail Video, creators of the free and extremely popular the JW Player, who have released their own OVP called Bits On The Run.  They offer a monthly cost starting at under $10 and/or a pay-as-you-go service with no monthly fee.  Their minimum cost per GB – under $6.  Oh yes, even the author is reconsidering his video hosting provider.

To be honest, I had not paid much attention to Longtail Video before this month.  I have known about the JW Player for awhile and have always considered it to be one of the best available (where else can you find a stormtrooper skin for your video player), however I had no idea that Longtail Video acquired the OVP developed by the player’s creator, Jeroen Wijering.  This was an excellent purchase for so many reasons.  Firstly, the JW Player is compatible with HTML5 and Flash embedded video and they make their point clear – just support both and get on with other priorities in your life.  Secondly, they support viewing content on mobile devices including Android and iOS.  Thirdly, they just released a private beta of Longtail.tv, a free service that includes the JW Player, where you can display your own videos or earn money displaying content from their media gallery from premium syndication partners, such as AOL’s 5min Media, as well as YouTube content.  In other words, Longtail has been able to get the good times rolling with a popular player, and should not be ignored if you are a SMB (small or medium sized business), or in the blogging business and trading in your World of Warcraft account for something more productive, and possibly revenue generating like online video.

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Since getting my iPhone I’ve enjoyed creating short clips and posting them on my Facebook account, but never really did any editing on the device.  So, I blew some cash in the App Store to try out video editing apps for the iPhone and post my findings here.  Like many, if not most App Store junkies, I download based on positive feedback (no fewer than 3 stars), and secondly, on the screenshots – UI design is very important to me.

With all that in mind, I downloaded five apps that are all very slick and easy to use.  I have categorized these five based on the level of editing and features you may be interested in: Simple (few features, speedy rendering), Intermediate (additional features but not what I would call feature-rich), and Advanced (deep mobile editing, feature rich, offers more tools than the previous two categories).
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