YouTube has rolled out a brand new video editing feature on the site to enable users to make simple changes to their videos. The feature, that has been available in the service’s TestTube lab since last year, is designed to enable users to apply simple and easy quick fixes as well as some substantial changes to their videos after they have been uploaded. Users can edit their videos without the risk of losing view count, comments or existing links.

YouTube product manager, Jeff Toff, said the idea came about when ”we noticed a lot of the videos that were uploaded to YouTube could use some polish, some basic video editing.” There is even an option to change your existing soundtrack and trim footage.

View the tutorial video below.

As is always the case when traditional media starts edging more and more into a digital media space, there’s a bit of uncertainty as to which approach to take in making that transition. Take a look at print, for example. On the one hand, there’s the view that ‘citizen journalism’, freelance bloggers, and social media will take the power away from the traditional publishers altogether. Then there’s the approach that says that digital is just a new distribution channel for the same content, and the fight between free and pay-walled services within that. Or that digital consumers expect something more in terms of content than traditional print consumers. And, finally (though probably not), the debate as to whether to continue to distribute things through your own channels with dedicated sites, tablet applications and the like, or let people get the content wherever they like (a la Flipboard), and to figure out that whole “how do we make money now?” issue later.

For television, though, the changes are even more disruptive.

How I watch

This is where the BoxOffice debate kicks in. In the days of old, the television experience was incredibly limited by the technology that could be utilized to actually provide the content. Locally, the launch of PVR finally allowed consumers to choose to watch their favourite content at a later time. BoxOffice is the next big step in this direction, allowing subscribers to once-off ‘rent’ a movie and watch it in on-demand. There’s one very simple reason that this is where it stops, really in SA – our broadband. But as this continues to improve, the changes to the way we actually watch television will continue to manifest.

On the one hand, the concept of a ‘connected TV’ is made possible, allowing content to be pulled into your television experience from all over the web, and an endless library of content streamed on-demand to your television screen. Google is very much leading this charge at the moment, but don’t count out (surprisingly) Yahoo yet (more on that later…). AppleTV opens up your television to the full on-demand power of the iTunes library. While Hulu, Netflix and the like make all of it possible.

On the other hand, there are a whole new range of devices themselves. While television used to be constrained to the living room, tablets and smartphones means that you may never have to switch your actual television on again. Better still, concepts like central cloud-based storage mean that instead of choosing what device you use based on where your content is, you instead choose which device you use based on where you are.

What I watch

In the same way as the news industry is discovering that consumers aren’t interested in the same sort of content online as they are in, for example, their Sunday newspaper, so too the video content people are interested in is different in a different space. While I’m not for a second suggesting that viewers will switch off their TV’s to Modern Family in favour of piano-playing cats in HD glory, a wider network of content with a lower barrier to entry for producers means that the space for a new style of content is endless.

Revision3 was founded some 6 years ago now and has grown to be the world’s most popular ‘Internet television network’, producing and distributing a variety of very niche shows, primarily for the geek community, including the beloved Diggnation. Touting millions of downloads every month, Revision3 represents a new possibility; content made especially for a new era of television.

What I do while I watch

According to Nielsen, a rather staggering 86% of mobile users are busy using (playing) with their phone while watching television, with almost 40% actually browsing the internet, and another 40% social networking. What this represents is an amazing opportunity to do something to augment the television experience, no matter how that is delivered, by making use of the ‘second screen’.

While services like GetGlue and Miso have tried to introduce the ‘media check-in’, in a way that FourSquare has done in the space of the ‘geographic check-in’, there is none more exciting than smartphone app IntoNow. This startup was recently picked up by Yahoo (remember them?) for a cool $20m+, and is essentially the ‘Shazam of TV’. Based on an underlying service called SoundPrint which identifies TV programs based on an archive of over 250 years worth of content, IntoNow ‘listens’ to whatever is playing, checks you in, and allows you to then view information about it, share it socially, and even comment on the show. Not convinced? Try it for yourself. Amazingly, it even works if the episode is being aired for the first time.

While still in very early days, the ability to chat to my friends as we all watch the F1 together in real-time is a hugely exciting prospect, and would go a great distance (to continue the example) to bring the television experience, or at least the experience surrounding it, into the digital age.

So where to from here…

As connected devices and, more generally, connectivity itself continues to improve, television is about to undergo a massive revolution. What does this mean to you? Hopefully, it’s as simple as the best experience winning – more available content, more conveniently, and surrounded by a much more enjoyable, engaging and interactive experience.

Got an idea of what your TV habit of the future will look like? As always, we want to hear it…

If you want to be able download Apps, Music, Movies, TV Series etc from the US iTunes store, even if you live in SA, here is how to do it.

Imposing?

When the iPhone 4 came out users were pretty happy about the new 720p HD video recording for the occasional moment you need to record. But over time people became aware that the iPhone does make some pretty great videos, which can easily be used in a more professional environment. A number of apps exist to further build on these video features, and users can be very creative with this little device. For example – take a look at Flare – an app that allows you to take realtime HDR videos with your iPhone (even if you hate HDR, it does make some interesting videos). Of course, limitations still exist – the device pretty small to handle, so the videos can easily be a bit shaky, and the user has very little control over the lens.

This is where the OWLE Bubo comes in – it aims to fill in the usability gaps of using a phone for video recording.

The kit arrives with the Bubo, a wide angle and macro lens, lens caps, glove case and holster bag for lenses.

The Hardware:

Its made of a solid piece of billed aluminium steel, and the phone just slides into place (provided you use the included iPhone rubber case). On the Bubo you will find a threaded mounting point on each of the 4 corners, and a coldshoe onto which you can mount flashlights or a microphone. This enables the Bubo to become a mounting point for a whole number of accesories you might need to shoot a great video.

Holding this thing in your hand makes you realize that this an incredibly well built piece of hardware. It is heavy yes, but not in a way to make your arms tired after long hours. The iPhone fits like a glove inside (but I do not recommend having any extra films on the device, because the steel billing is clearly made to very fine tolerances for a good fit). On the front you will find the lens thread, which enables you to chop and change the supplied macro and wide angle lenses. Sound quality is also handled by small (well built) microphone which can be twisted into any direction, which uses the iPhone’s headphone jack. The iPhone’s dock connector also stays open when placed in the Bubo, so if you have accesories that might powered from the port, you still use them.

As a plus, it is possible to use your existing SLR lenses, should you be so inclined. Of course you will have to manual focus, but if you decent aperture settings, it might be worth your while. A company called Vid Atlantic worked together with OWLE to build a kit to allow you to use Nikon or Canon lenses (no Olympus love yet). For more info look at http://www.vid-atlantic.com/iphone35.html.

Yes, you can really put your SLR lenses on your iPhone.

So what is it like to use?

I tried it out on a few occasions – and its pretty great for wide angle shots where the small size of the kit might be beneficial. Images were crisper, and there is a noticable lack of video shake when handheld, which dramatically improves iPhone video. The add on lenses do not immediately create a noticable difference to the iPhone lens – after all, the Macro and Wide angle abilities of the iPhone 4 is pretty great already. If you have a sharp eye, then yes you will notice. On landscape shots you will notice an even wider view angle, which some people might prefer. Of course, you can simply remove the lenses altogether.

Does it improve video?

Yes. But then one has to take into account the effort that goes into placing your iPhone in the Bubo, and following all the steps. But if you are using the iPhone for Videography for very specific reasons, then the Bubo is worth the effort. The mounting options make a truly useful device, which cancels out that whole “taken with a cellphone” excuse. Videos are stable, and it just further improves upon existing plus points of using the iPhone for video.

Conclusion:

There is no two ways about it – the OWLE Bubo is a pretty niche device. It is meant for a very small group of users, and for those users it will be great add on to use. It transforms a device which is very small and somewhat difficult to handle into a rigid go-anywhere device. Build quality is top notch, and videos do indeed look better with the Bubo. But is it worth the money? If you are serious about using your iPhone for professional looking video, absolutely.

The OWLE Bubo Enthusiast Kit is available for R2000 from 790tv.

“It takes more than a lick of paint to be number SA’s number one network, dont you think?”

One problem though – there is a lot of chatter going on on Twitter about the much reduced speed of Cell C’s network these days. Just take a look at @louisvdm and @sarietha ‘s tweets to see what I am talking about. There has clearly been some congestion issues, especially in Stellenbosch – clearly the students have all switched to Cell C for internet.

Clearly the Cell C sticks have been selling well, but maybe too well for Cell C to handle? The pricing is still the best on the market, with not one single mobile network trying to compete. A few months ago I posted my speeds using Cell C over a period of time, but my performance has always been very good.

So in a bid to get some real life speeds from more Cell C “whoosh” users, please contribute to BandwidthBlog’s Speedwave for Cell C users. Its pretty easy, connect to the internet with your Cell C stick, and then do a Speedtest using the following link:

http://www.speedtest.net/wave/6be03c3c76bb542c

At present the results look OK, but we do want a representative sample. So lets see how everyone’s Cell C network is performing? Are you a happy customer or are you becoming a bit annoyed as well? Let us know in the comments.

The iPhone 4 is a classy looking device – with all its steel and glass surfaces it really does feel like a high end gadget. One problem though – glass is fragile. It might be made of Gorilla Glass (on the front at least), but even scratch proof glass is no match for a few feet drop onto a hard surface. Luckily I have not experienced the spider-web like cracks on any of my phones, but I have always treated them with the necessary respect. If however you are someone who is a bit harder on your gadgets, or you work in a environment where your phone can easily be damaged, you might want to look at the Griffin Survivor case.

The specifications are impressive:

• Independently tested and certified to meet conditions outlined in US Department of Defense MIL-STD-810 and UK Department of Defense Def-Stan 00-35
• Integral Display shield deflects Wind/Rain (Test: Up to 200 mm/hr for 1 hour)
• Rigid internal frame protects from Shock/Drop (Test: Drop on flat concrete surface from 6′/1.8 m)
• Sealed ports block Blown Sand/Dust (up to 18 m/sec for 1 hour)
• Silicone cladding blocks vibration (18 hrs at 20-2000 Hz)
• Multi-position clip attaches securely to pack strap or belt

But these do not really tell the full story – Griffin decided to stress test the case on an actual iPhone, and it really does seem to live up its name. If you are someone who does not like to see gadgets abused – you might not want to see this. They really try to break the phone, and only in the end do they manage to kill it with something I am pretty sure no phone can survive:

At around $50 it is not cheap – but if you have an expensive phone and you really do go around in environments that can damage your phone, it might not be a bad investment…

You might have used Zoopy in the past – be it for user generated videos or to quickly catch up on current happenings, but now Zoopy is refocussing their strategy to mobile. With a new range of applications made for the major mobile platforms, users can quickly access news and entertainment videos on their device of choice. Zoopy is also halting the use of user generated videos, and is instead focussing on self produced Zoopy TV videos. Zoopy runs on a “the world in 90 seconds (or less)” slogan, so they are ideal for quick consumption on mobile devices.

In South Africa we have a mobile penetration rate of about 98%. Over 20 million South Africans own web-capable phones, which serve as their primary point of contact with the internet. For most of these users, who don’t have access to TV, DVDs or other gadgets, it’s also their only access to the entertainment world at large. Their phones deliver an interconnected choice of games, social networks and video. And as feature phones expire and smartphones replace them, mobile entertainment is fast becoming the industry’s leading growth area.

With SA’s focus on mobile broadband, this is perhaps the ideal time for Zoopy to use this new business model. Mobile broadband is in for a lot of competition, with Cell C getting the ball rolling with their recent Speedstick offerings – but we are still waiting for Vodacom and MTN to match that offer. The ideal is of course that these lowering costs also reach normal data bundles, not only dongle focussed packages. If a user uses a data bundle, mobile video becomes a lot more affordable – and I see a lot of new phone contracts are starting to add small data bundles in the deal. Video traffic from mobile phones increased by 60% globally in 2010. A recent Nielsen report showed that 20.3 million people watched mobile video in the US in the first quarter of 2010, spending an average of three and a half hours each.

Zoopy also did a complete redesign of its site, and the results are impressive! I have to say the new theme is a big improvement on the aging blue design of the past. Here at Bandwidthblog we do love infographics – and Zoopy got the guys from Cow Africa in to make a great one – just click the image below to be taken to the full version:

One of the cooler parts of the app is that it is currently available on iPhone and Android – so regardless whether the users of the two operating systems might not agree with each other, they can at least communicate with each other. I tried it out with the guys over at ZaDroid on their devices, and it worked flawlessly between iPhone and Android. On the iPhone it pops up a push notification whenever you have message waiting.

No you might ask – how is this different to Push To Talk? Well – you do not have instantly hear every message, you can listen to it whenever you want, its just waiting in your inbox. As David Perel points out in Charl’s video review of Heytell, the app is also great for quick messaging while driving. Its pretty stupid to send off an SMS, where this app is very easy to use. I can imagine it being quite popular to contact one or two favourites. You can also share your current position with the person you are talking with – think you great that is when you need to meet someone somewhere?

If there is one little bit of advice I can give to the HeyTell developers – please get it on Blackberry as soon as possible, and perhaps also Symbian. If the cross-platform integration works so well with iPhone and Android, it would be even better with Blackberry! Another small point of advice – maybe get some decent user interface specialists in – the icons and buttons have a very “quick and dirty” feel about them. But hey – I am nitpicking here!

Best part – it is free, and it just works! (But there are a few add-ons like voice changers available). You can get it in the Apple Appstore and the Android Marketplace. Next up: Charl Norman’s video review of HeyTell:

If you ever needed convincing that the future of the internet is mobile, you HAVE to look at this excellent video by the guys at MobileFuture. We are shifting very quickly towards a ubiquitous internet society…

Some mindblowing statistics: (dont just read these, do yourself a favour and watch the video)

• FIVE BILLION apps downloaded — up from 300 million in 2009

Whopping expansion of location-based services

• FIVE MILLION Foursquare users — up from 200,000 users in 2009

Surge in mobile social media platforms

• 347 PERCENT growth in Twitter mobile usage
• 200 MILLION mobile Facebook Users
• 100 MILLION YouTube videos played on mobile devices everyday

Ongoing explosion in data traffic

• 3,000 PERCENT growth in one carrier’s data traffic since 2008
• 3,339: average number of texts sent per month by US teens.

Unprecedented competition and choice

• 96 PERCENT of mobile users can choose from 3 or more providers
• 92 PERCENT of mobile users are satisfied with their provider
• 4 CENTS: average voice rate per minute in the US
• 77 MILLION: number of smartphones shipped in the fall of 2010.

My favourite part: “The Digital Camera died in 2010: Your Mobile Phone is looking very guilty…”

The new domain has a strong focus on content uploaded by South African users, and makes use of adjusted search algorithms to promote South African content on category pages and in the “featured videos” section.

YouTube has also signed partnership agreements with several South African media companies, including the SABC and e.tv, enabling these companies to establish a presence on the site and easily distribute their content. The SABC will be piloting a certain amount of old and current content on the channel, and if the pilot proves successful, this offering will be extended to include a range of SABC news, sport, soaps, dramas and comedies.

Perhaps more importantly, video download speeds are now significantly faster for South Africans. No more grabbing a quick cup of coffee while you wait for that hilarious cat video to load!

Of course, if the new site is still not fast enough for you, you have the option to watch videos with YouTube Feather. This beta offering is a stripped-down version of the standard video page, including only the most basic features. YouTube Feather can be accessed via the TestTube section of the site.

Chad Hurley, YouTube co-founder, says, “We’re very excited to bring a local version of YouTube to South Africa and we look forward to continuing to improve the YouTube experience for our South African users.”

The service is being offered exclusively to DStv Premium subscribers, and they will be able to access it free of charge via both their PVR decoder and MWEB ADSL broadband.

1. The DStv On Demand HD PVR offering, accessible via PVR decoder, will provide 20 hours of the most popular TV series, sporting shows, magazine shows and movies, for up to 7 days after their broadcast on DStv Channels.

2. The DStv On Demand online offering, available exclusively to MWEB ADSL customers (both capped and uncapped), will provide 800 hours of premium content including blockbuster movies, award-winning series, all the best sporting action, kids’ shows and documentaries.

Programmes are chosen for the On Demand service based on monthly consumer surveys. Content will be continually updated after each show appears on DStv channels; international series will be available for 7 days, and local content and movies for 30 days. The pilot episode will always be included.

MultiChoice says of their partnership with MWEB, “DStv Online is committed to delivering the highest possible quality of service to our subscribers. As a result, we request certain guarantees from our ISP partners – the most important of which is uncapped broadband access. MWEB was the first ISP to offer an uncapped ADSL service in South Africa and to meet our quality of service and technical requirements. We are excited to partner with them to offer you unlimited viewing pleasure at no extra bandwidth costs.”

DStv plans to roll out this service to the rest of Africa shortly. They are also investigating the feasibility of launching a Transactional Video on Demand (TVOD) service, which would allow subscribers to have access to the latest movies on a pay-per-view basis, before they are screened on DStv.

Find out more about the DStv On Demand online offering.