sharing

Report: YouTube begins experimenting with long-form video

Short clips have always been YouTube's bread and butter, but with the company struggling to generate revenue, the Web's No. 1 video-sharing site is experimenting with long-form videos.

YouTube has for a long time allowed several videographers with a YouTube director's account to post videos longer than the standard 10-minute maximum allowed on the site.

But the company now seems more serious about offering long-form videos more widely. During the Los Angeles Film Festival this week, YouTube began pitching independent directors about showcasing their work on the site, according to a story published Wednesday at the Web … Read more

Random Sampler: Being like Google, JBoss worth the wait, and more

So many good stories, so little time....Here are a few of the best posts today:

You might not be able to get Google-like profits, but at least you can treat your employees more like how Google treats its own employees. There's a good lesson in there.... Most of the music on the iPods of UK youth has been pilfered. Surprising? No. There are two interesting factoids in the data, however: "80% of those who admit to illegally file-sharing are prepared to engage with a legal file-sharing service, and place a considerable monetary value on it"; and The older people get, the more they pay for music. 55 percent of youth aged 14 to 17 illegally download music, jumping to 60 percent when they're aged 18 to 24, but dropping down to 39 percent when aged 25 and above. Does this mean that "old fogey" music is more likely to be monetized than Britney Spears?… Read more

Kyocera KR2 router: Mobile Internet access sharing made easy

I recently reviewed the Windy31, a USB wireless router that allows for sharing your computer's existing internet connection with others, and found it a very cool device. Today I got my hands on the Kyocera KR2 Mobile router and its companion, the Kyocera KPC680 CDMA ExpressCard, and I have to admit, I never thought mobile internet access could be that good. Still, of course, it's far from perfect.

Let's talk the good first. The KR2 is actually the upgrade to the Kyocera KR1. Significant improvements include: a better design (though still I found it a little bulky … Read more

Smarter bookmarking with Add to Any

You love this story and you want to Digg it. Or maybe you want to put it on Reddit. Or maybe you're just in love with Delicious and feel like saving the story there. We're open to anything, but we don't always know your tastes.

The same goes for a lot of sites, which is where Add to Any has created a really smart sharing tool that will read your browser's mind instead. Well, actually it will just give your history a once over to do the heavy lifting. Based on where you've been the … Read more

Docstoc launches simple e-mail attachment replacement

File host Docstoc is releasing a solution on Wednesday for sending large attachments to friends, family, and co-workers. Called OneClick (download), the small application must be installed on your machine to enable right-click contextual menus that let you simply click any file on your hard drive and send it either publicly or securely to others.

Once the file's been transferred, you'll get a link to the Docstoc-hosted document inserted into a new e-mail message that your recipient can open and read without needing to install anything.

Like Scribd's solution, which launched last week, OneClick has been designed to entice business and casual users to start simply uploading their documents instead of e-mailing them for the sake of compatibility and size.

Not everyone has Gmail or Office 2007, which offer popular file compatibility. Nor have all users implemented the small software tweak on older versions of Office that will let you read those .Docx files with ease. Instead, solutions like Scribd and Docstoc are taking office software out of the equation entirely.

It's also a pretty simple way to get users uploading more of their documents from a local machine. Instead of having to go through Docstoc's Web uploader (which is simple and easy to use), you can get them uploaded with just two clicks whenever you come across something you'd like to upload.

The small application is PC-only for now, but I'm told a Mac version will be on its way soon. To see a video of the tool in action, click the link below.

… Read more

Google ekes out more share gains in search

Google increased its market share of searches in the United States in May, rising from 67.9 percent share in April to 68.29 percent in May, analyst firm Hitwise reported Tuesday.

During the same period, Yahoo dropped from 20.28 percent to 19.95 percent and Microsoft dropped from 6.26 percent to 5.89 percent. Fourth-place Ask.com increased slightly from 4.17 percent to 4.23 percent, Hitwise said.

Search share is financially important because it means there are more opportunities to sell advertisements.

In the U.K., Google had 87 percent search share to Yahoo's … Read more

Power Downloader e-mails large files

Summer is fast approaching, and Power Downloader is fielding lots of vacation-related questions. Kitty Kilobyte wants to know what's the best way to send her friends and family photos and video of her upcoming trip to South America. Pando for Windows and Mac is the way to go, says Power D.

Power then explains that with Pando installed, Kitty can drag and drop her large folder of images and WMVs into the Pando interface, which lets her send Power D, Francois Foto, and virtually anybody else in her address book a message with a link. When Power clicks that … Read more

British ISP, recording industry warn illegal downloaders

Virgin Media and the British Polyphonic Industry will work together to "educate" broadband customers on avoiding legal action while downloading music with peer-to-peer software, the organizations said Friday.

A joint release posted on the British Polyphonic Industry (BPI) Web site said Virgin Media broadband customers using their accounts to illegally share music will receive letters from Virgin Media and the BPI. Customer names and addresses will not be disclosed to the BPI--which is comparable to the Recording Industry Association of America--and the release says the letters will be of an "informative" nature.

According to the BPI, … Read more

True or false: Is file swapping legal?

Students at one Missouri university don't just have to take surprise quizzes on economics, chemistry, or Spanish these days. They also get pop quizzes on digital copyright law. The online test aims to prevent piracy and violation of copyright laws, and if students want access to peer-to-peer file sharing, they have to ace it.

According to an Associated Press report, the Missouri University of Science and Technology now requires students to correctly answer six questions about digital copyright law before they can use peer-to-peer tools. If they pass the test, they get six hours of access to the software. … Read more