Google, Inc.'s (NASDAQ: GOOG) YouTube continues to take the lion's share of the online video market. Although startup Hulu.com -- which will broadcast the U.S. Presidential candidate debate live tonight -- has come on strong, YouTube has it. Everyone from teens with $69 digital cameras to professional videographers are uploading video footage to the site.Google announced recently that it was upping the file size of uploaded video to the site as well -- by a factor of 10. Going from 100 Megabytes to 1 Gigabyte per uploaded video is amazing in and of itself, but this will make YouTube all the more attractive to those who want to take rather exhaustive video and upload it for all to see while not being constrained.
For example, five minutes of video on a standard digital camera (just an average, of course) will easily eat up 100 Megabytes of storage. Since we're not all video compression experts, Google -- with this change -- has just allowed its online video universe to expand in a huge way.
In addition to the video file size increase, YouTube's new uploader will allow multiple file uploads at the same time. This is also a rather large change from the "upload and wait" scenario of the past. Although Google surely wants to make more money from the massive amount of video viewed every minute on YouTube, giving regular customers the ability to have larger videos (and several at one) uploaded should just push it that much further in front of the online video pack. What it needs now is to lift the 10-minute limitation for non-partners. But then again, that would invite a whole new universe of copyright piracy. Maybe.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-08-2008 @ 1:27AM
iphonerulez said...
Big deal. Since they no longer allow you to upload TV shows or movies or music videos, some idiots will be uploading gigabyte files of watching their dogs take a crap or some squirrel getting drunk. I want all the old music videos and TV shows uploaded so I can watch them publicly. Now I'll have to upload that stuff in private and invite my friends by invitation. Still the 10 minute limitation is a damn pain in the ass. Make it 30 minutes and then were talking something halfway decent.
11-09-2008 @ 2:00PM
Lelia Thomas said...
It's a pity that the commenter above seems not to understand the situation here. If Google could get media conglomerates to agree to such a deal, I am sure we would not only see our upload limits increase to 30 minutes or more, but we would also find all these lawsuits coming in from said media conglomerates end, and their shows uploaded for the watching.
It will be a while, though. Many of these companies are old, stubborn and greedier than Google itself. (I tend to think Google's greed isn't a bad thing, since they are typically willing to try new things that end up benefiting many, including itself.) Many will probably rather die out than think they could possibly lose out on a few extra dollars, due to a media platform change. I say, let them.
If the commenter above cares this much about watching shows online, he should contact the companies and tell them he is boycotting their material, because it is too much of a pain to watch traditionally. This, as well as ratings dropping, will make changes. Complaining, but not looking into why things are the way they are, nor doing anything about them, will keep this going that much longer.