January 10, 2006 6:22 PM PST
Google Video goes live
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A drop-down menu lets people browse selections of NBA basketball games, movies and music videos, as well as television shows like "The Brady Bunch," "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," "Nova" and "The Ed Sullivan Show."
Diving into the video selections unearthed tantalizing titles including "Birth Control: Myths & Methods, Spanish Version," "Bobbito's Basics to Boogie" and "ChinaPortal Presents: Xu Genbao and the Future of Chinese Soccer Part 1."
A search for the keywords "John Wayne" turned up a 1934 movie titled "Blue Steel" for sale for $1.99, a bunch of interviews with James Garner and other movie stars, and video from a 2005 Long Beach city council meeting.
The main Google Video page also has rotating feature videos categorized under "popular" and "random" sections. Samples of those included the notorious Tom Cruise appearance on "Oprah Winfrey," a "biker dancing silly" and a documentary claiming to expose "the conspiracy between the Free Masons, U.S. presidents and the 9/11 terrorists attacks."
The Web site adheres to the Google philosophy of less-is-more but lacks any slick design elements that would signal the existence of sexy content such as, say, movies. And, rather than still images from videos to click on for a sample clip, many thumbnail images and preview boxes feature only plain screens with the name of the show--or a blank black box.
Peter Chane, senior business product manager at Google Video, said the content providers are responsible for choosing the thumbnail images and if they don't supply one, Google displays the first frame as the image. The company is working to replace the black thumbnails with something more eye catching, he said.
"This is the first day of the store so we have kind of a default experience and we are making improvements all the time," he told CNET News.com.
Some of the free videos looked fine, but a test download and purchase of the "Where is Everybody?" episode of the quirky classic Twilight Zone television series yielded some problems.
The nearly 25-minute file downloaded extremely quickly. But the image quality was poor. That could put the service at a disadvantage to Apple Computer, whose iTunes store offers consistent video quality for commercial downloads. (Google does not enhance images received from content partners, so if the quality is poor, that's the way Google got it, Chane said.)
The purchase process was simple except for a glitch that forced the buyer to log out of other Google accounts, such as Gmail, before completing the transaction. Chane said he had not heard about the payment processing problem and would look into it.
On its
However, the video store--which like some other Google services is unavailable on Mac computers--was not an instant hit with everybody. Dave Pell wrote on his
On
"At first glance, the prices for this home-grown content are...well, optimistic, to put it graciously. Unrealistic or inflated, to be harsh about it," Hill wrote. "A short description and a 30-second clip are the only audition clues you have to decide whether to plunk down 10 bucks (to pick a random example) for 'Segment '76,' an 84-minute comedy set in Poland."
In response, Google's Chane said the company was adding more video from content partners every day. As for price, the content provider decides what that will be, he said. "If the content providers find they are not selling enough (of a video) they can drop the price," he added.
He denied that the product was late. "We wanted to ship a product that was good for users and good for content providers and we think we did that on Monday," Chane said. "We shipped it when it was ready."
Chane also asked people to contact Google with complaints or information about any problems they may find with the service. "I invite users to e-mail us with specific concerns. We take those user comments very serious," he said.
Meanwhile, America Online said Tuesday that it
See more CNET content tagged:
Google Video,
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still great that independents can sell content, but frankly as a consumer I would much prefer to buy from iTunes. If Google can spruce up the UI maybe I'll have the confidence to return.
still great that independents can sell content, but frankly as a consumer I would much prefer to buy from iTunes. If Google can spruce up the UI maybe I'll have the confidence to return.
"We're sorry, but this video is not available in your country". Content providers don't get it, won't get it and never will get it - that's why this will fail. It's comforting to know that anytime someone fires up a P2P client to get the same content, they are actively taking money out of the pockets of those idiots who put stupid restrictions like this on content.
"We're sorry, but this video is not available in your country". Content providers don't get it, won't get it and never will get it - that's why this will fail. It's comforting to know that anytime someone fires up a P2P client to get the same content, they are actively taking money out of the pockets of those idiots who put stupid restrictions like this on content.
50....during a one hour show......all for free..
thank you very much!
Ron & Anna Winship
Cutting Edge - a talk show
50....during a one hour show......all for free..
thank you very much!
Ron & Anna Winship
Cutting Edge - a talk show
When you click on a video it says:
"Sorry, purchasing this video requires Windows 2000 or Windows
XP."
When you click on a video it says:
"Sorry, purchasing this video requires Windows 2000 or Windows
XP."
For me the interface didnt look too bad I will post a screenshot.
http://www.supload.com/thumbs/default/snapshot6.png
http://www.supload.com/thumbs/default/snapshot7.png
Not bad as I dont have cable or tv and it's nice to see Charle Rose although I just wish they would give it out for freee on their websites but...
Probably a FLAT FEE rate would be nice like the musicnow.com service I use.
I might pay 5 dollars a month right now because of weak content.
I dont feel comfortable with that many credit card purchases.
For me the interface didnt look too bad I will post a screenshot.
http://www.supload.com/thumbs/default/snapshot6.png
http://www.supload.com/thumbs/default/snapshot7.png
Not bad as I dont have cable or tv and it's nice to see Charle Rose although I just wish they would give it out for freee on their websites but...
Probably a FLAT FEE rate would be nice like the musicnow.com service I use.
I might pay 5 dollars a month right now because of weak content.
I dont feel comfortable with that many credit card purchases.
certain that it truly is the Big brother, right
along with Microsoft & other Big US media ources.
After all they keep passing Billions of dollars
to each other and hyping each other.
That is why I have been looking for a search
engine that is both pure play on search and that
it is people driven rather than wanting to ontrol
the peoples (eye balls) minds world wide. I have
found it, you should know about it too. It is AnooX:
www.anoox.com
But problem with AnooX is that again it is a US
based search engine - again! However they offer
their search engine for free under Open Source
license to those whom want to provide it in
under languages. So I hope top quality ISPs in
various countries in Europe and elsewhere will
grab their code and start offering AnooX french, German, Italian, etc, outside of US, that would
be only way to ensure the highest freedom of
information.
certain that it truly is the Big brother, right
along with Microsoft & other Big US media ources.
After all they keep passing Billions of dollars
to each other and hyping each other.
That is why I have been looking for a search
engine that is both pure play on search and that
it is people driven rather than wanting to ontrol
the peoples (eye balls) minds world wide. I have
found it, you should know about it too. It is AnooX:
www.anoox.com
But problem with AnooX is that again it is a US
based search engine - again! However they offer
their search engine for free under Open Source
license to those whom want to provide it in
under languages. So I hope top quality ISPs in
various countries in Europe and elsewhere will
grab their code and start offering AnooX french, German, Italian, etc, outside of US, that would
be only way to ensure the highest freedom of
information.
Larry Gilbert, investigative reporter, Cutting Edge a talk show
Larry Gilbert, investigative reporter, Cutting Edge a talk show
Steve Hynes
- Google will legitimize horrendous videos
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by shynes
January 11, 2006 10:17 AM PST
- The "most popular" bit - do we need this? I thought they would do no evil, but the most popular video today is a helicopter crash. Will it be explosive dismemberment tomorrow? Now our darkest curiosities are legitimized by a rating system, which really is nothing more than a rating of human pathology.
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