Internet TV Blog

Flick got video.

Many people have been reporting on it and commenting on it.

And with all those opinions going around, it seems only fitting to throw in one of our own.

Here’s our prediction……. Flickr Video will not be like YouTube, Blip.tv, Revver, Veoh, or any of the other video sharing sites.

Flickr Video will be(come) a Stock Video library. Maybe THE stock video library.

(This may even turn out to be revenue source for them if they act as the “payment gateway”, and take a small cut of all purchases of stock footage.)

That’s why only 90 seconds. (Stock Video video is usually short.)

Back when I first heard Flickr was getting video… I thought to myself, if I were Flickr, I’d try to be a Stock Footage site. Flickr certainly already has the right type of users to build up an impressive stock footage library. It also presents a possibility of a revenue source of selling stock footage.

Thinking that I suspected that that may be their plan. And now that they’ve said the videos can only be 90 seconds long, I’m more certain about it.

It will be interesting to see how things play out.

Good tips from experts in Internet TV.

The people at Videomaker give a great overview of Continuity is and why it is important.

Here’s the articles from the video…

• Five Tips of Continuity
• Composition 101
• Composition 102
• Shooting for the Final Edit
• Got a Match?
• Shoot the Plan: Production Planning Tips
• Maintaining Continuity

Andrew Michael Baron (of the Rocketboom fame) tells us that Kent Nichols and Douglas Sarine, of the Ask a Ninja fame, have just landed a film deal, to remake Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.

As Andrew puts it…

You guys are *$@#$@ awesome!

This is awesome news!

Seeing what Doug and Kent have done with Ask a Ninka, you know their remake of Attack of the Killer Tomatoes will be better than the original.

It wasn’t too long again that we pointed out the announcement that Apple’s iPhone would be able to play Flash Video soon.

Well, it seems Apple Computers has done a “180″.

Apple is now asserting that Flash Video is NOT meet Apple’s performance standards for video.

Is this a case of business maneuvering, with Apple simply choosing to not give Adobe an easy in on their iPhone systems?!

Or is there actual merit to these claims? Does Flash video actually have performance problems (that QuickTime itself doesn’t have)?!

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Andrew Michael Baron (of the Rocketboom fame) wrote to point of an article that suggests that you can make a living off of video blogging with just 100 “true” fans.

As Andrew says…

The idea is that a videoblogger could make a living from just 1000 “true” fans.

From the article…

A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for your name. They bookmark the eBay page where your out-of-print editions show up. They come to your openings. They have you sign their copies. They buy the t-shirt, and the mug, and the hat. They can’t wait till you issue your next work. They are true fans.

Assume conservatively that your True Fans will each spend one day’s wages per year in support of what you do. That “one-day-wage” is an average, because of course your truest fans will spend a lot more than that. Let’s peg that per diem each True Fan spends at $100 per year. If you have 1,000 fans that sums up to $100,000 per year, which minus some modest expenses, is a living for most folks.

I’d encourage you to read more of the article… it’s an interesting read.

UPDATE: Kent Nichols (of the Ask a Ninja fame) gave a followup that basically says that about 1% of your total fan base will be “true fans”, so that you’ll end up needing about 100,000 fans to get 1,000 “true fans”.

Over at Web Video Doctor there’s a list of 7 things you can do to promote you videos. He’s a summary of them.

#1: Submit your video to these social bookmarking sites
#2: Submit to these entertainment sites
#3: Promote within YouTube
#4: Submit to forums on the Internet
#5: Submit to the major network television shows
#6: Post to your blog, especially if you have a high traffic blog!
#7: Forward to family and friends

#5 on his was surprising to me…

Submit to the major network television shows: Get your video on one of these huge shows for a chance of big time publicity

He even lists the e-mail addresses to use.

Read the full list to get all the info.

Teleprompters have made it so that people giving a speeches, reading out the news, or talking to an audience no longer have to memorize their speeches or have to constantly look down to read the text off a page.

These can be a great tool when filming. And let’s the subject being filmed look at the camera while being able to read what they have to say.

So then, it’s great to know that you can make your own telepropmter

HowToDoVideo found an interesting video tutorial on how to make your own teleprompter.

Keeping the camera still so that your video doesn’t come out shaky can sometimes be a challenge. Especially for the inexperienced camera man.

Videomaker brings up another great video tutorial. Showing us tips on how to steady the camera so that we can shoot videos without the shakes.

David Hellyer tells us about his dejected view about the YouTube partner program. David says….

How do I know i won’t ever make any money out of the partner program? Simple really, I don’t receive anywhere near enough views. Top YouTubers like Nalts, LisaNova and Renetto can reasonably expect to get 10,000 - 20,000 views per video regardless of what it is, with some getting far more! Views is the key thing here. BusinessWeek reported this week that click-throughs on social networking sites are significantly lower than that recieved on other sites (4/10,000 rather than 20/10,000). This is significant because the partnership that YouTube offers is one that shares revenue with you from funds raised by GoogleAdwords. A friend of mine recently started a website and has advertised using GoogleAdwords as they are extremely effective. He pays something in the region of 15p per click-through. This means that even if i were to get Renetto’s views i would only ever recieve at most 60p per video (assuming YouTube passed on the whole 15p to me - which we both know they wouldn’t). Well we all like getting pocket money don’t we… any revenue sharing under the current partner program on offer would definately be pocket money. Except YouTube clearly state in their T&Cs that they will not pay out any money due to partners until it reaches $100.00 (£50.00)… that’s a whole lot of 60p videos!

Kent Nichols (of the Ask a Ninja fame) gave a follow up to this, with some advice for David Hellyer and other Internet TV makers… and even video sharing sites…

[David Hellyer is] a British fellow, so 60p translates to $1.17ish [USD] at today’s exchange rate.

I recently spoke to another partner with a high traffic track record and they said their best quarter in the [YouTube Partner] program has been $500. $500 for three months and a million views. Awesome. (gulp). [That’s sarcasm BTW.]

Now that YouTube is setting the floor for what sharing sites will pay to creators, this give other sites incentives to pay higher fees to creators of popular content.

[Other video sharing sites… you should] Exploit that.

Kent goes on to say….

Other video sites want to cut into YouTube’s marketshare, but how can they compete with YouTube? Cold, hard, cash. MetaCafe’s $5 CPM would’ve netted my friend $5000 for the same million views, not spectacular, but still a tenfold increase. LiveVideo is trying this tactic, we’ll see how that goes. Vuguru, 60Frames, and MySpace are doing it too, although on a much more selective basis.

As a creator you should be always striving to find the best deal for you and your content, and if you can’t get a great deal, stick with the site with street cred and keep looking for a better deal and get better at making content.

Kent’s advice for Internet TV creators is….

Remember to use these [video sharing] sites as much as they are using you. Establish an audience, make a little money, drive as much traffic to your site and use their free bandwidth.

And brand your content as cool and yourself as a creator of cool things.

But then as quickly as possible move on. One show is not a career. It is a stepping stone. Have a vision for yourself and your career and proceed with it. Have new ideas for new shows, and own, own, own as much IP as you possibly can.

And please don’t limit your thinking to just online video. Film, TV, and books all need new cool content and they are in the habit of paying people more than $1.17 for their work.

Good advice for those who are trying to make a living off of Video Blogging, Internet TV, Video Podcasting, Vodcasting, of whatever you want to call it.

YouTube isn’t the only “game in town”. And there’s no reason to be exclusive to just them.

Do what’s best for you, your career, and your business.