Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Trying out Mippin's new video function

I'm a bit of a fan of Mippin. It ticks many of my 'moon-on-a-stick' requests for a mobile internet play which will enable the long tail. And Refresh Mobile CEO Scott Beaumont is good enough to keep me up to date on developments. The latest supports video found in RSS feeds.
The blurb claims: "Refresh Mobile (makers of Mippin) and blueapple.mobi Partnership Creates Seamless Video Service Connecting Video in RSS Feeds With Mobile."
"...the service will convert and distribute flash-based RSS video content of any publisher, from international publishing companies through to independent bloggers. The process will see video transcoded automatically to the .3gp mobile standard in real-time for viewing on users' handsets."
What I'm not sure of without testing is whether that means it supports video I upload to this blog AND play videos referenced on this blog (eg the copy and pasted youtube code which makes it appear the video is on this blog).
So here's the experiment.
First (example 1) I'll upload a video of my own to this blog:

Next (example 2) I'll copy and paste in some code (also my own, from Brightcove) and see if Mippin also supports that. Frankly, I'll be surprised and amazed if it does.

If it copes with number 1 and 2 then there's no requirement to change our approach to using video in order for our reach to extend on mobile.
However if example 1 works and 2 doesn't then, for those who want to give the fullest experience on mobile, we'll have to stick to ONLY uploading video, rather than copying and pasting code. And that will change where we upload our video in the first place (why put it on youtube if you then have to go and upload it to your blog, too.)
Might be good news for the likes of VodPod, because you'd upload once to your blog/site then use something like the in browser ease of VodPod to share elsewhere.
Apologies, all this is guesswork until we actually see the result of the test... you are currently walking through the experiment with me!
Stand by. I'll be updating soon.
Right then, so far not working. Scott has come back and explained why (see comments below). My example 2 uses Brightcove (and not yet supported, read the comments for those that are). Bit concerned that the Blogger uploaded one (example 1) ain't working either on my mippin site (go to mippin on your mobile - http://mippin.com - and search for 'fasterfuture' on there, find this post and you can join in as we go!). Scott does say youtube and several others are supported. So...
Here's example 3, David Ogilvy coming at you from Youtube with a clip that wouldn't have seemed out of place in the first series of Lost.




And Eureka the youtube one does indeed work, and very smoothly too. Congrats to all of you at Mippin. It does indeed play videos simply referenced in the rss feed from this blog (ie youtube code). I'm told the Blogger ones should be added fairly soon... Brightcove may take a little longer.

When the Blogger (and eventually) Brightcove ones are live that'll mean any publisher can extend the reach of not only their content and pictures (via rss) onto mobile via Mippin, they can also add video. An impressive and important addition.
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4 comments:

  1. Anonymous2/26/2008 1:25 pm

    Hello David, you are pushing the envelope as usual. As you should you are viewing this release through the eyes of a publisher and how you can leverage existing implementations to minimise efforts. That's great (and what we want you to do) but you've caught us on the hop a little with this first video release. We have received hugh feedback from users to enable video through a widerange of existing popular platforms. We have done that and it works - unfortunately it does not extend to your two examples - but it does deliver YouTube, Metacafe, DailyMotion etc etc. As we prove that this is popular, we'll extend the functionality further to include the platforms included in your post. (PS you are not the first to request Brightcove).

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  2. David Cushman2/26/2008 1:33 pm

    Thanks Scott. Will now add example 3 (youtube!).
    But what's the crack with the one uploaded via blogger's own wysiwyg?

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  3. Anonymous2/26/2008 1:54 pm

    Blogger could well be next but essentially it is hitting our (partner’s) server and being bounced as coming from an unsupported domain. It should not be that difficult to turn this one on – Brightcove will be a little trickier.

    You'll see your example three is working right now.

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  4. David Cushman2/26/2008 1:58 pm

    I do indeed see example 3 working Scott. My apologies for making life difficult with a couple of unsupported ones - bloody typical hey!
    But, the fact that the youtube works is very very impressive. Into the realms of 'magic' of the kind Tomi Ahonen loves. Have you shared with the guys on ForumOxford. I'll pop over and point them at this link. Let's catch up soon. best dc

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FasterFuture.blogspot.com

The rate of change is so rapid it's difficult for one person to keep up to speed. Let's pool our thoughts, share our reactions and, who knows, even reach some shared conclusions worth arriving at?