Online video advertising is hot, and attracting some serious venture capital: Video ad platform Tubemogul just closed a $20 million Series C round of funding to pay for more hires and and expand internationally. The round comes after Tubemogul decided to focus exclusively on advertising. Read more »
Mac OS X video chat app Rabbit uses some unique design decisions to set itself apart from the competition. Even with its sound design, Rabbit wants to emulate the dynamics of real-life social gatherings. But will it be able to compete with Skye and Hangouts? Read more »
Google is offloading Motorola’s set-top-box business to Arris, a fellow TV box maker that will pay a total of $2.35 billion for the Motorola Mobility division. Which brings up the question: Did it really make sense for Google to spend $12.5 billion on Motorola Mobility? Read more »
San Francisco-based online video platform Mevio has shifted almost all of its production to Los Angeles, where it is currently building a new studio. Next year, the company plans to relaunch under the name Bitesize Entertainment, and capture one billion views a month. Read more »
Redbox Instant by Verizon officially launched its beta test Wednesday, offering consumers online streaming and four DVD rental credits for $8 a month. Many of these details had been reported before, but we were able to obtain a video demonstrating the service on PCs and Macs. Read more »
There are video discovery apps, and there is Stevie – a leanback app that plays a stream of videos, complete with tickers that are reminiscent of MTV in the 80ies. The app just launched on the iPhone, and its makers raised $1.5 million. Read more »
Getting Netflix streams to play on all of your devices requires a whole lot of encoding: The company is preparing 120 different versions of each movie to deal with different screen sizes and bandwidth requirements, according to a recently published behind-the-scenes video. Read more »
YouTube just released a new video recording app for iPhones that comes with a bunch of neat features designed to help you make better videos, and share them on social networks. But the boldest thing about the app may just be its name. Read more »
Hulu has been able to bring in more than $695 million in revenue this year, and the number of its paying subscribers grew 50 percent, to more than three million. The company also invested more than $500 million in content in 2012. Read more »
Media data specialist Gracenote wants to show you ads that matter to what you watch and who you are. To do so, the company is looking to embed video recognition and ad swapping technology right into the TV set. First trials are set to start 2013. Read more »
YouTube is going to have its first live telethon Thursday night, courtesy of What’s Trending, and with appearances of a bunch of YouTube stars. It’s for a good cause, but also one more step towards turning YouTube into something that resembles TV. Read more »
Social video curation app Showyou’s new iPad app makes it easier to watch a stream of video with little to no interaction — which is great when you use it to beam videos of your social contacts to your Apple TV via AirPlay. Read more »
Seattle-based file sharing pioneer turned personal music streaming service Audiogalaxy has been acquired by Dropbox. The service will wind down over the coming months, but we shouldn’t be too surprised to see some of the ideas behind it find their way into Dropbox’s offerings. Read more »
Ray William Johnson went public with details on his contract dispute with Maker Studios this week. This resulted in Maker’s CEO Danny Zappin calling him a “low life ego-maniac,” but it also offered a rare look behind the curtains of a YouTube studio. Read more »
Cameras are all around us, but most of them are turned off throughout the day. Two ambient video startups want to change that: Koozoo wants to provide live feeds of public places, and Perch wants to turn your old iPod touch into an always-on video messenger. Read more »
Want the best possible Netflix experience? Then get ready to move to Kansas City: Netflix just ranked Google Fiber the best-performing ISP for its customers. AT&T Uverse on the other hand underperformed. The company also ranked the best mobile providers to watch Netflix on the go. Read more »
Your next set of speakers may be able to wirelessly stream Rdio, Soundcloud and other online services straight from the Internet, thanks to a new partnership between speaker specialist Tymphany and Qualcomm’s Skifta. But don’t expect them to use Apple’s AirPlay protocol for this. Read more »
Videos from PBS, Vimeo, the CW and Crunchyroll are coming to the Xbox 360 as Microsoft is rolling out 40 more entertainment apps worldwide. A few apps will be available right away, whereas others will launch on the platform in the coming months. Read more »
Consumers in Austria could be forced to pay rights holders for accessing cloud services like Dropbox and Google Drive, if an authors’ rights group has its way. The plan is being vehemently opposed by a group of CE makers and internet companies. Read more »
YouTube never had an official Roku channel, but Roku users may have finally gotten a way to easily watch their favorite YouTube videos anyway: Twonky Beam, an app for Android and iOS, makes it possible to stream YouTube videos to the Roku in an AirPlay-like fashion. Read more »
YouTube tweaked its homepage as well as its video watch page Thursday, making its channel guide a persistent element across almost the entire site. Similar changes will come to channel pages in the near future, and are designed to further emphasize YouTube’s channels. Read more »
Later this month, many folks will find a new iPad, Android tablet or mobile phone under the tree. Wouldn’t it be great if there was an easy way to convert all your media for playback on those devices? That’s where Miro Video Converter comes in. Read more »
Google unveiled a new Google+ feature called Communities Thursday that does more than just mimicking Facebook groups: It builds on the social network’s strengths, and helps to alleviate one of its key weaknesses. Will it help to close the gap to Facebook? Read more »
An app for your phone that recognizes a song playing in the background isn’t exactly a new idea. But Rhapsody hopes that instant playback and an ad-free app will nonetheless help to get more people excited about its music subscription service. Read more »
Netflix doesn’t just want to compete with traditional pay TV networks like HBO, Showtime and Starz – it wants to change television forever. The company envisions a future for TV in which old-fashioned things like ratings, schedule and recaps simply don’t matter anymore. Read more »
Redbox Instant by Verixon has nixed its plans to launch before the end of this year, and is now targeting a launch next spring, according to Verizon’s CEO Lowell McAdams. This comes days after we broke the news about key pricing details of the service. Read more »
Pop Secret just launched a year-long marketing campaign that will include apps meant to help people get more value out of services like Netflix, and have more fun with movie night at home. The reason? Orville Redenbacher’s has a tight grip on the theater popcorn biz. Read more »
Boxee recently announced that it won’t add any more third-party apps to its legacy Boxee Box anymore, as it is looking to focus its resources on Boxee TV instead. But that doesn’t stop enthusiasts, some of which have begun to hack the box. Read more »
Look who’s in the Google TV camp now: Both Asus and Netgear are set to release Google TV-powered devices soon, based on FCC filings unearthed this weekend. Netgear’s box looks like a typical Google TV streamer, but the Asus device is a bit of a mystery. Read more »
We’ve got some exclusive details about Redbox Instant by Verizon, the yet-to-be-launched Netflix competitor with the complicated name: The service will charge consumers as little as $6 per month, launch with apps for Android, iOS and Xbox 360 and open up as early as December 17. Read more »
Some of the most prominent critics of the war on drugs are taking to YouTube to promote a new documentary called Breaking the Taboo that will be released for free on the site next week. So far, their bid for attention seems to be working. Read more »
Just when you thought Chill.com had tried everything, it evloves egain: The former Turntable.fm for videos turned social video curation platform launched a self-serve content marketplace for indie creators Thursday, allowing anyone to sell their flicks as streams and DRM-free downloads. Read more »
Just two months after winning an Emmy for its interactive web content, Los Angeles-based production company Fourth Wall Studios had to let most of its staff go and move away from content production. The company is instead going to focus on its technology assets. Read more »
Peel’s social TV guide is coming to the U.K., Germany, Singapore and 18 other countries, thanks in large part due to a partnership with Samsung. Users of Samsung’s Android tablets will be able to directly change the channel of their TV set with the app. Read more »
Rdio’s new iOS and Android apps allow users to browse the subscription service’s music catalog on their mobile device, and then initiate playback on their computer. This kind of second-screen activity is a big hit with video services, but it’s fairly novel in the music space. Read more »
Just in time for your holiday shopping, here’s our Cord Cutters gift guide. Use it to buy friends and family members gifts that will help them to get rid of cable and have more fun with online video, or simply buy something for yourself. Read more »
BitTorrent isn’t quite ready yet to take on Ustream and Co. with its P2P live streaming technology, but it is getting closer: This week, the company reached out to webcasters, asking them to join the ongoing field tests of the live streaming protocol. Read more »
Watching TV on the Xbox 360 has become hugely successful – but casual users may not be ready to spend $300 on a next-generation Xbox game console. That’s why Microsoft is reportedly working on a slimmed-down set-top box that would more squarely compete with Apple TV. Read more »
Throw your hands up in the air – and wave them at your TV screen: A new open source app makes it possible to control Google Tv devices with a Kinect. The hack shows what’s possible when you let third-party developers toy with remote control capabilities. Read more »
Want to load up your iPad with some movies before you leave for Thanksgiving? Then you might want to take a look at the latest iOS version of Plex: The media center maker just added sync functionality to its iPad app. Read more »
