New Media Center

Do a search for “download youtube videos” and the results you get will offer up countless websites with instructions, services, tools, and videos dedicated to the subject. You would think that it was popular to download videos from the YouTube site, and you would be right. I’ve written numerous times on the subject of YouTube, outlining the benefits, but mostly I point out what a valuable resource the site is. Want to find a clip from a popular movie? Consult YouTube. Want to view that obscure music video from the 80’s? Consult YouTube. Want to watch your state’s governor deliver the latest information that will affect you? Consult YouTube.

Over the past year and a half I have written a few times on how to take YouTube videos and incorporate them into PowerPoint presentations (here, here, and here). Two of those methods involve downloading the videos and converting them to video formats that PowerPoint will recognize. One of them involves using the YouTube video live in the presentation. I received a comment on my post on Embedding YouTube in PowerPoint 2007 from “John” that was just a republishing of a section of YouTube’s Terms of Service:

5. Your Use of Content on the Site

In addition to the general restrictions above, the following restrictions and conditions apply specifically to your use of content on the YouTube Website.

1. The content on the YouTube Website, except all User Submissions (as defined below), including without limitation, the text, software, scripts, graphics, photos, sounds, music, videos, interactive features and the like (“Content”) and the trademarks, service marks and logos contained therein (“Marks”), are owned by or licensed to YouTube, subject to copyright and other intellectual property rights under the law. Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only and may not be downloaded, copied, reproduced, distributed, transmitted, broadcast, displayed, sold, licensed, or otherwise exploited for any other purposes whatsoever without the prior written consent of the respective owners. YouTube reserves all rights not expressly granted in and to the Website and the Content.
2. You may access User Submissions for your information and personal use solely as intended through the provided functionality of the YouTube Website. You shall not copy or download any User Submission unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the YouTube Website for that User Submission.

I don’t know whether anonymous John was trying to be helpful, or snotty, but there are several points I want to make about YouTube downloads. First, EVERY TIME you watch a video at YouTube’s site, or even embedded on another site, you are downloading it to your computer! You have no choice. You are not streaming it, you are using a technology known as Progressive download. Here’s proof (screencast “YouTube Video and Progressive Download“) Now if I download a video, then republish it in a PowerPoint video, then OK, you got me. However, if I’m sharing that presentation with students for their further enlightenment, then I have the start of an argument for Fair Use. Then depending on what content it is and how much, I hope to make my argument stronger. John posted his comment on the post that described the ability to embed a live video into PowerPoint, so if there is no live Internet connection, no video appears in the presentation. It is no different than embedding a video on another web page. It makes for a more seamless way of doing a presentation with web video, as opposed to switching out of Powerpoint and opening a web browser, then switching back to PowerPoint and continuing the presentation. Sorry John, the Terms of Service don’t apply here, or at best, it’s extremely muddy.

Which gets me to my next point. YouTube needs to rethink their download terms. Let me reiterate that the technology that YouTube uses to show videos breaks their own Terms of Service. They have begun to allow certain organizations the ability to offer “official” downloads and provide a download button. In an article from February, YouTube announced that they were exploring ways to offer videos offline. They were testing “testing free downloads of YouTube videos from Stanford, Duke, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and UCTV“. An example is “The Role of Creativity at Stanford“, a video from Stanford University that has a button to allow you to download an MPEG4 version of the video. YouTube is even experimenting with Creative Commons licenses, but I can’t see yet where an average YouTube member can implement these licenses. It is only open to approved partners, and the partners program isn’t a program you gain instant access to. YouTube is moving way too slowly for the average producer, and seem to bend over backwards to appease media companies with their shoot first, ask questions later take-down policy.

YouTube needs to catch up with Flickr in offering a streamlined way of licensing through Creative Commons. Instead, I see the monitization train coming on full speed ahead. Here’s an example of one of those partners participating in a test of revenue generation by offering downloads of their video, for $0.99. Copyright infringement is still rampant on YouTube, but I argue that it is good for the most part. If people are watching all ten parts of The Wedding Singer on YouTube, then more power to them. If they are using a program to download the videos and stitch them together again and burn them to DVD, then hire them as a New Media Specialist. Either way they are never going to make a good customer for purchasing the original DVD anyway. Now there are legitimate reasons to take down videos from sources that are already putting their content out on the web for free such as Comedy Central. They want the advertising revenue for their site, that makes sense, but come up with new models for other types of content. A good start is a link to the iTunes store for those obscure 80’s music videos.

Now I’m not saying that YouTube is doomed to fail (they’re obviously wildly sucessful), but they need to take a more balanced approach. YouTube is doing some good things with their YouTube EDU and non-profit sections. Now it’s time to make it easier to get the content out into the hands of the people who can make a difference, change things for the better, and do what the pioneers in this industry did in the first place – build on other people’s work. A little download help, please?!?

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YouTube is a video sharing website where users can upload, view and share video clips. It’s been around since mid-February 2005 and most people know it as a place to watch millions of silly videos. However, YouTube is one of hundreds of popular “social” websites which allow you to sign-up and have a “space” that you can call your own. You can watch the videos, mark them as favorites, save them to a playlist, and leave comments (even video comments). You can also subscribe to other users and get notified when their new videos appear on YouTube.

The video above shows an example of how you can embed a video in a web page. YouTube provides the code that you need to publish a video, but it still is hosted on YouTube’s servers so you don’t have to worry about providing your own space to host video. They even provide customization for how your video is presented on a web page.

Watching videos is only the beginning. You can also be a video producer, and YouTube can be your screening room. Their motto is “Broadcast Yourself” and there is a whole host of resources that can help with the entire process, from shooting your video all the way to promoting it on YouTube.

So if you haven’t already go watch some videos at YouTube. Then sign-up for an account if you want to participate. The UMW New Media Center has several articles where we talk more about YouTube. We especially recommend that you start with “Making Movies for YouTube“. Also, Columbia University has an In-depth Look at YouTube that is quite good and filled with valuable information. If you have any questions feel free to contact us.

del.icio.us links for YouTube

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Here is a Glog that I created for the Spring 2009 Orientation session. Our “technology showcase” featured a service called Glogster.com where you can create online posters that include many different types of media. Here is the example that I used in the presentation:

The full resolution version is available at http://rushaw.glogster.com/new-media/

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One day, all of the people on the Internet will have an unlimited area to store all the digital media files they could ever want. Storage space is getting cheaper and digital files are getting smaller with the use of better compression techniques. What do people do now though? Let me give you a couple of situations where the storage dilemma rears its ugly head. Here at the University of Mary Washington, we’re moving to a hosted Blackboard solution, and the dilemma is that there will now be a smaller storage area (100MB quota) for files associated with a given course. For some faculty that could mean three, two, or even one PowerPoint presentation.

The other situation is our umwblogs.org installation also has a 100MB limit (though we do have some control over that limit). Where will users store their video and audio content? Privacy is also a concern for these files. How do we keep the control over who sees a PowerPoint presentation? YouTube is a great place to store video, but can those videos be made private? This article will provide those answers and more. Luckily, those answers involve using very cheap web services (as in free).

Make your files smaller

No matter where you store your files, you will want to make them as small as possible. When it comes to PowerPoint, keeping the presentation simple will make for smaller file sizes. However, if you use pictures, your presentations can balloon in size. So here is a way to make the pictures in your presentation smaller.

• How to compress photos in a PowerPoint presentation (step-by-step instructions)
• The Screencast version (this screencast references a video on how to create a photo album in Powerpoint)

Use “sharing” web sites

An alternative to sharing the PowerPoint files directly with the recipient, either through something like Blackboard, or through email, is to use a sharing site. Slideshare is a service that allows the sharing of PowerPoint presentations. You create an account, then upload your file and it gets converted into a Flash version for presenting on the web. You can present the small version or use the full-screen option. The Flash version does not include the animations or transitions that you use, but there is an option for downloading the original file which will keep those effects in tact. There is also an option for creating a private web address for sharing the file with only selected people. You can upload up to a 100MB file.

If you want to store and share video, we do recommend YouTube. Even though videos can be made private, faculty may be reticent to use it because of YouTube’s free-form nature and the sometimes objectionable content.

If that is an issue, we recommend a service called DivShare. For your video, as well as audio storage needs, DivShare will give you up to 5GB (gigabytes) of space to store your media. Just as a warning, you are allowed only 10GB worth of downloads per month, so you may at some point want to limit who you share your files with. You can make any audio or video files private. They use an un-guessable web address to link to the media. A built-in audio or video player will play the file on the web page. DivShare also supports images, PDF documents, Microsoft Word documents, as well as PowerPoint files. It converts those files to Flash documents as well.

Using UMWBlogs

All of the sharing sites we mentioned, YouTube, Slideshare, and DivShare, and others we didn’t mention, all work very well in concert with the umwblogs.org environment (in fact many were created with blogging platforms in mind). UMWBlogs also offers a variety of privacy protections, and it functions in a much superior way to Blackboard in terms of media presentation. You may want to consider using UMWBlogs for a course website.

photo credit: William Hook

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Here is a screencast of an example editing session using VideoSpin. We take the video that we digitized from Windows Movie Maker, import it, add it to the timeline, insert transitions and titles, and then send it to YouTube.

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Step #1 – Shooting your video: We’ll assume that you have already shot the video for your project. However, YouTube has some good resources for shooting video, using lighting, and getting good sound at their “toolbox” site. Also a good starting point is their Making Videos page, which is part of their help pages. The UMW New Media center also has some helpful tips on shooting video.

Step #2 – Getting your video on the computer: Depending on what you used to shoot your video, you will need to get it onto your computer. If you have a camera that uses mini-DV tapes, you’ll need a firewire cable to transfer the video. If you are using a PC, Windows Movie Maker can be used to transfer the video from your camera. iMovie will be the software you will use if you’re on a Mac. If you are using a camera with a flash memory card, a hard drive, or using a digital still camera that has a movie setting, you’ll need to use a USB cable. If you have a camcorder that uses mini-DVD, follow the directions that came with your camera to get video onto your computer.

Step #3 – Editing Your Video: Assuming you will take the raw footage from your camera and add titles and transitions, you will need a video editor. Again, if you use a PC, then Windows Movie Maker is the program that is included with the Windows operating system to edit your video. If you use a Mac, iMovie will be what you use. When you have a final edited version, complete with titles, transitions, and any additional audio, you will need to save the movie for uploading to YouTube. YouTube can accept many different formats of video as long as the length of the video is 10 minutes or less, and as long as the file is less than 1GB (gigabyte). If you are using Movie Maker you can save the file as a .wmv file. This will be a compressed file that will be decent quality and be much smaller than the 1GB restriction. If you use iMovie, you can save the file as an MPEG-4 file and again it will be compressed to a much smaller file. If you are using iMovie ‘08, the program has a built in uploader to YouTube. If you want a similar capability on the PC, then download a free video editor called VideoSpin from Pinnacle Systems.

Step #4 – Uploading Video to YouTube: If you are using VideoSpin or iMovie ‘08, then you will upload the movie directly from the program. Look in the help file for specific instructions on how to do this. It’s fairly intuitive for both programs. If you are using Movie Maker or a previous version of iMovie, you will upload the compressed video file that you saved onto your computer from the editor. A .wmv file from Movie Maker and a MPEG-4 file from iMovie. If you haven’t already, you need to sign up for a YouTube account. You then sign in to YouTube and look for the “Upload” button in the upper right corner of the page.

You will then need to provide a Title, Description, a Category, and include at least one “tag” (a keyword) so that people can search for your video. There are other options that you can choose, such as making a video private or public (they’re public by default), as well as date, mapping, and sharing options. It will take a while for the video to upload, depending on the size of the file, your connection speed to the Internet, and how busy the YouTube site is. Once your video is done uploading, additional time is needed to convert the video to the format that will play on the YouTube site (flash, also known as FLV). Again, depending on how busy the site is, your video will be available generally within an hour. You can now tell people about your video by linking to it, or by embedding it in your own web page. Congratulations, you are a YouTube video producer!

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I’ve talked about Professor Michael Wesch and his Digital Ethnography class at Kansas State University a couple times in the past (here, and here). His class, and especially the videos that have been produced as a result are a wonder. The good professor’s latest post is a wealth of information related to putting together a YouTube mash-up. There is so much good information here, and it starts with a link to a great tutorial on Web 2.0. More great resources include the article Recut, Reframe, Recycle from American University’s Center for Social Media. He mentions one of my favorite tools, Video DownloadHelper, a Firefox plugin that assists you in grabbing/downloading YouTube videos (and other media!). He puts a plug in for a video conversion site called Vixy.net that does media conversion. I’ve used that one, but I’ll put in my vote for another site called Zamzar that performs a similar service and adds, document, image, and audio conversion as well. He also mentions using music with a Creative Commons license, and provides Jamendo as a good place to find some CC tunes.

Read the post to see all the resources, and some of the videos that were produced in the past. Watch the video above to see a fine (and funny) example of a "movie trailer mash-up" (based on one of my favorite movies, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles). Thank you, again, Professor Wesch.

Original post by Andy Rush

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As I prepare for a new position as “New Media Specialist”, this is the sort of groundbreaking application that I’d like to highlight. Mac fan-boys (and girls) will be so jealous!

Original post by Andy Rush

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