quietube: Video without the distractions

To watch web videos without the comments and crap, just drag the button below to your browser’s bookmarks bar. On any of the supported video pages, click the bookmark button to watch in peace.

You can then make short URLs too, to send the quietube version to your friends. Easy as.

This is what the creators of Quietube say about their program. As a matter of fact, this is the first tool that lets you to put side all the buzz and concentrate on the video itself. Like everything genius the “Quietube” is very easy to use! You just have to drag the button from the official website to your bookmarks toolbar and once you go to YouTube for videos (Viddler & Vimeo are also supported) you just click the button “Quietube” and enjoy the lack of distractors.

Unfortunately, the� program works with the listed websites only, but can we consider it to be a disadvantage? Just the YouTube itself IS something.

The strangest thing about Quietube is that after having enjoyed a couple of videos you get a feeling that you’re watching them on a poorly-designed blog. But this happened to me and you may have another attitube towards ads-free videos. The only thing that is out of question is the speed! It turned out that Quietube is a great time saver, because you do not have to load ads and different previews of related, featured and other videos you may not even need. So, if you need a clear, ads-free page for watching YouTube videos - Quietube’s just exactly what you need.

Looks like many social websites have finally come to the idea that people love to share videos with each other. So did Flickr, but will it be able to compete YouTube? That is the question.

Last Spring Yahoo has added a video hosting feature to its Flickr, but only for paid users of the Pro version. Recently the company has announced that now even users with free accounts can put their videos on Flickr. The service has also been enhanced with high-definition video quality, still only for members with paid Pro subscriptions.

Free users will be limited to two video uploads per month, and each video is limited to 90 seconds in length and 150MB in file size. This compares pretty scantily with YouTube’s allowance of up to 10 video uploads at a time with a 1GB size limit for free account holders. Vimeo permits 500MB and one HD video upload per week for free users.

A company representative clarified the free account situation as follows: “Anyone (Free and Pro) can upload HD video but it will only be processed as HD video if you are a Pro member. What this means for Free members is that Flickr keeps the original file, so if you ever decide to upgrade to a Pro account, your video will automatically update to HD, too.”

You can read about the changes on Flickr on Yahoo’s Yodel Anecdotal blog.

At the same time, YouTube has decided to give it’s users new opportunities: the site is launching a new Adopt A Feature campaign, inviting users to create videos showing off some of its lesser-known features, like AudioSwap. YouTube will track the progress of the features on its blog, and will present the most effective videos on the YouTube homepage and as permanent additions to its help pages.

You may either love Google or not, there is no other option. As for December 31, 2008 the corporation has 20,222 employees and the revenue is US$ 21.796 Billion. Google’s most popular service YouTube is in favour even with White House. Or it Was?

President’s weekly address has become tradition since first being used by Franklin D. Roosevelt in the 1930’s. And today it’s not the content that is important, but the way of delivering the message. As well as the radio, the President’s weekly addresses were to be filmed and uploaded to YouTube first. This had dual benefits for both the White House and Google, showing a President willing to adopt new technologies, and helping YouTube gain more traffic.

But recently, responding to complaints by privacy activists, the White House has quietly abandoned YouTube as the provider of the embedded videos on the president’s official home page and the latest video address was released using a Flash-based video solution by Akamai’s content delivery network.

Ironically, the decision by the White House comes days after YouTube began to roll out new policies to better protect the privacy of visitors who view videos embedded into federal government Web sites. The move by YouTube may prove to be too little, too late.

The White House is still posting copies of the videos to its official YouTube channel. However, the president no longer provides free advertising to YouTube by embedding those videos on a taxpayer-funded site.

So, despite the recent report that the White House has denied any change in online video policy, the White House spokesperson admitted using an in-house flash based solution for the latest of the president’s weekly video messages, he said the White House is just “experimenting” with different solutions.

Anyway, all the previous video address’ are still hosted by YouTube. Will the White House come back to using Google’s video service or stay with Akamai’s content delivery network, that does not make use of tracking cookies that is the question.

Via CNET.

Stop for a moment and think how much time you spend watching online videos. I bet, not less than couple of hours a week. And where do you usualy go for videos? YouTube? I bet yes, because it seems to be the No.1 place for videos. But don’t you ever get tired of Tube’s interface? And don’t you ever wonder if a video service can be more than that? In this article I’m going to familiarize you with some really good alternatives.

In fact, anyone can set up a video service of his own. So, there are many of them present in the web. But very few are well done and seem to be really interesting. Here are short reviews of the video services I liked very much:

Current TV is a huge peer-to-peer news and information network. The site is produced and programmed in collaboration with its audience. Despite the fact that anyone can submit any kind of information, Current does not look like a junkyard at all (which YouTube actually is). The whole website is done in black, white & green and looks really nice. The interface is very friendly, so that you won’t need to spend hours getting used to it. Speaking about the content, it has no concrete concept and I’m sure you will find many interesting things while just scrolling the front page. So, if you want to watch some viral news & unique videos - go to Current and enjoy yourself in a big & really friendly community. And as an example, in case you love the Beatles - here is a unique thing for you to watch on Current.com

This website has a unique design that from the first second makes you feel very comfortable & relaxed. It is done in white, black green & yellow, but apart from current, which makes you concentrate, Revision3 gives you a feeling of sitting on your favourite sofa & watching your favourite show. Revision3 is an actual TV network for the web, creating and producing its own original, broadcast quality shows. The content is designed for passionate committed fans who want to watch shows that entertain, educate and help expand their life experiences. All in all, Revision is both a good relaxing and educating video service. And the high quality content will make you want to come there again and again.

Another place you shall visit for unique videos and interesting design is Videojug. It was launched in September 2006 and is actually a huge library of free factual video content online. The website provides professionally-produced, high definition videos which cover every conceivable topic and the site is the definitive online “encyclopaedia of life”. Anyone is free to upload his own videos and there is also a forum, where you can ask for answers after watching a video(in case something will be still unclear to you). They also have a contest for the best “How To” video, so if you are a creative person, you’d better give it a try. Speaking about Videojug in general, it can be a great source for answers to any problem you may experience in your life. And the best thing is that everything is explained through videos, so that it’s both informative and very intertaining.

Expert Village is a video service that provides answers to your everyday questions. As you can guess from the name of the service, all the tips & advices are given by experts. At the moment Expert Village provides 148,873 videos and the number grows every day! This video service is a one stop destination to get well-researched, practical, and free information. In addition to the scores of educational and informative videos, Expert Village has interactive community features that allow visitors to provide video reviews as well as have a user-to-user “Q & A” sessions where members can ask a question about a topic and then have the community contribute helpful answers. This way, Expert Village is a video service that will give answers to all of your questions!

All the video services listed are growing incredibly fast and for the February 2008 Current had 492,721 unique visitors, Revision - 77,873, Videojug - 334,132 and Expert Village - 616,607, which appears to be more than 100% growth for any of them. I hope you liked at least one of them and in case you have some favourite video services of your own - please, let us know and in case they are really unique & interesting we will write about them with a great pleasure. And of course, do not forget that once you’re bored you can visit our video section.