Crave

Trips to the video rental store may be a thing of the past sooner than thought.

Netflix and Blockbuster are already offering DVD rental service by mail. Amazon.com, Microsoft's Xbox Live, and Netflix deliver movies directly to the PC. TiVo, Vudu, and Apple TV--not to mention cable and satellite companies--are doing the same for TV sets. Local independent stores notwithstanding, the only major brick-and-mortar options left for renting discs are Hollywood Video/Movie Gallery, which is close to bankruptcy, and Blockbuster.

(Credit: Blockbuster)

But The Hollywood Reporter says Blockbuster may be giving customers more reasons not to visit its stores. The rental chain is said to be making a set-top box that will allow video content to be streamed directly to a television. The announcement should come sometime later this month, according to THR

A Blockbuster spokeswoman said it is "talking to numerous companies" about ways it can provide "access to media content across multiple channels--from our stores, by mail, through kiosks, through downloading, through portable content-enabled devices--so it's not surprising that there are rumors out there."

The service would take advantage of video-on-demand technology from Movielink (which Blockbuster bought last year) that allows movie downloads from Universal Studios, Paramount, Sony Pictures, MGM, and Warner Bros.

There was no mention of price or how such a service would work in the report. But let's think about this: to compete with Apple TV or Vudu, the device would have to cost around $200, and rentals of movies and TV shows should be around $3 to $4 each, which would be slightly cheaper than rentals of new releases from Blockbuster currently. The big advantage Blockbuster would enjoy over Apple TV, Vudu, and TiVo, it seems, would be selection. Considering its longstanding relationships with the studios, it would likely have the largest library of films and TV shows to choose from. See my colleague John Falcone's excellent comparison of set-top rental boxes.

No matter the details of the how the device would work, this represents a new direction for Blockbuster and the video rental market. Money spent on DVD ownership and rentals has been decreasing steadily for the past four years, according to the Digital Entertainment Group, which tracks sales of disc media. And though there's no indication Blockbuster would eliminate its brick-and-mortar stores, a streaming video service would clearly cannibalize some of that business.

Assuming the report is spot-on, and Blockbuster attempts to make this transition to digital content, it's time to wonder how much longer physical media will be a factor for mainstream movie renters.

There's another way besides certain popular video games to emulate your favorite guitar heroes--have them teach you themselves.

An Atlanta-based start-up is launching iVideosongs.com on Tuesday at the Demo Conference in Palm Springs, Calif. Users can pay to download videos of famous guitarists and expert music teachers giving detailed musical instruction in high definition.

(Credit: iVideosongs.com)

For $9.99 each, artists such as Graham Nash of Crosby, Stills & Nash, Jeff Carlisi of .38 Special, and Alex Lifeson of Rush, spend time demonstrating how to play all the different parts of some of their most famous songs. The lessons are presented in chapters--introduction, verse, chorus, bridge, outro--and titles can be sorted by skill level and genre. For $4.99, professional instructors will demonstrate a variety of songs, and basic instrument tutorials are available for free.

It's not only for guitarists however. There are videos instructing aspiring drummers, keyboard players, and more. But the site is heavily geared toward the guitar, which also happens to be the instrument of choice of the site's founder and Grammy Award nominee Tim Huffman.

Huffman started to take guitar lessons from an instructor as a kid, but became bored learning to read sheet music. "So I set out to learn popular songs by connecting with local musicians who were better than me," he explained in an interview. He kept at it, eventually cutting his college career short to go pro, and in 1984 was nominated for a Grammy. Now after 25 years in the music business, Huffman says he sees a need for connecting artists to aspiring musicians.

(Credit: iVideosongs.com)

"It struck me, how could we take the best people and make them available to people everywhere, anywhere, anytime from a learning perspective," he said.

But it wasn't an easy or a quick process. Huffman said he spent several years getting the company's legal ducks in a row. Now iVideosongs.com has master licensing agreements with five of the biggest music publishers in the world. Both artists and publishers get a direct royalty payment for each video downloaded, according to Huffman. Also, there's no DRM on any of the songs. They can be downloaded to any device.

Though there are currently about 50 songs (60 percent are taught by instructors, the rest by the original artists) in the database, there are 300 lined up and ready to go. They will be released in small batches, and by the end of the year Huffman says he expects the catalog to reach 1,000 songs.

There are tons of YouTube video-grabbing downloads out there, but relatively few also convert those FLV files for later viewing on a cell phone, iPhone, or other flavor of mobile device. Since we don't like using two apps when we can use one, here's a hand-picked collection of apps containing the packaged set.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

1. Out of all the downloader/converters I tried, nothing felt more honest than CinemaForge, with its homegrown UFO-shaped interface. The freeware app lays down a simple 6-step downloading and conversion trajectory that includes finding a video's "real" URL, as opposed to the "mangled" (shortened) link displayed on most sites. The conversion is quick and accompanied by an optional report, and it's easy to choose from multiple file types and drop videos into a preferred file path. Skip that step, if you prefer, because CinemaForge also lets you publish your newly acquired video to the Web, although if that's your goal, dropping the video's embed code onto a personal profile or Web site is a more straightforward option.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

2. With tabs for searching, downloading, and converting video, Free FLV Converter is a fairly beefy app. Unlike most competitors, it finds videos through search rather than by a pasted URL. Other apps download videos from Google, DailyMotion, and MetaCafe in addition to YouTube, but this rarity also serves up content from several adult sites. Parents better keep an eye on this one.

Free FLV Converter saves the video locally as an FLV file, and requires a second step to convert the video to one of five other formats. The two-step process barely qualifies the app for this roundup, but you can do it without closing the app. Free FLV Converter also gets a cheery thumbs up for the in-app preview and PSP conversion option, and an emphatic thumbs down for dragging on board the Dealio toolbar. What's the dealio with that bundling? Though irritating, Dealio is removed easily enough.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

3. YouTube Downloader is another freebie with a two-part conversion process that saves a Flash video just so you can dig it up again and convert it. Of course, you can convert all other previously downloaded videos, too. Paste the video URL into the app to save the stream, and when that's done, select "convert video" to make any FLV compatible with iPods, iPhones, cell phones, PSPs, and then some. The choice to add manual parameters catches other formats that YouTube Downloader didn't optimize for.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

4. With My Video Downloader ($29.99), what you pay for is breadth--apparent compatibility with over 50 video-streaming sites. Paste the URL into the big blue app to kick off downloading. Be forewarned: the trial exacts some personal data (name, gender, e-mail, and ZIP code) before granting access, but converts to Zune video and DVD formats from among the 10 optional formats.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

5. For the same price, Alive YouTube Video Converter ($29.95) offers a wealth of device-specific conversions from a drab XP-inspired interface. This is ideal for you Archos, Sansa, and Zen mavericks. Alive YouTube Video Converter does a fine conversion job, but pins you in the trial by processing only 60 percent of the video.

Other video-grabbing software:
*Free YouTube to iPod Converter 2.8 makes videos iPod-ready.
*Orbit Downloader accelerates download speeds and manages files.
*Ook? Video Ook! is a popular Firefox plug-in.
*TubeSucker seeks out YouTube downloads.

Back in May, Señor Bell wrote about the new RealPlayer, which promised users the ability to download video in a variety of formats (Flash, WMV, Quicktime) from a variety of sites (YouTube, Comedy Central, and so on) using a variety of Web browsers. Somewhat unsurprisingly, I've gotten a variety of results. RealPlayer is fresh out of beta (download Version 11 for Windows from Download.com)--the perfect time to put it to the test, in my book. Personally, I don't find the latest version particularly useful for my video tastes, but you may find it compelling, depending on your preferences, when it comes to online video.

Let me just get this out of the way first: The RealPlayer software interface is...unattractive. Mostly it's just cluttered, but the utilitarian look and feel leave something to be desired, as well. It's relatively easy to get the hang of, at least, but I frankly expected better from the peeps who bring us Rhapsody. All that being said, the inconspicuous, integrated "Download This Video" button is both well-designed and useful, and videos are saved in an obvious spot (under Downloads & Recordings) for future access. Now if they could integrate this button's functionality with another jukebox for media organization (say, Rhapsody), I believe we would have something here.

Of course, simple downloading of Internet video is a compelling feature for some. And the fact that it's free makes it all the more user-friendly. However, if you want to actually take your newly downloaded video "to go" on an iPod, you'll need to plunk down $40 (a one-time fee) for RealPlayer Plus. The Plus version also includes several other advanced features (outlined in the screenshot above) that some users might find handy. I tested both the downloading functionality and the iPod transfer feature, and both were pretty slow. It took about 12 minutes to download a 24-minute video clip from Google Video; RealPlayer then took its sweet time--about an hour--encoding and transferring that video to the iPod. It's definitely an exercise in patience, though--to be fair--the video-grab feature is really intended for short video clips of about 5 minutes or less. More unforgivable is the fact that the app refused to play nice with Outlook, causing the e-mail client to crash when any encoding or transferring was taking place.

So what kinds of video can you expect to work with RealPlayer's download feature? The short answer is "nothing with DRM protection of any kind." So if you're thinking of capturing the latest episode of Heroes to watch on your iPod (an especially enticing idea now that the iTunes store is NBC-less) you can forget about it. I also went after some Bravo, FoodTV, Netflix, and Comedy Central content--all to no avail. For Bravo, FoodTV, and NBC, the "Download This Video" button popped up, but the resulting grab was just the commercial segment. Sadly, while Comedy Central videos worked during the beta period, the site has since switched to streaming flash, with which RealPlayer 11 is incompatible (the button changes to "Video cannot be downloaded," though--somehow--commercials are downloadable). Netflix uses a proprietary format that the software doesn't even recognize as video. In any event, this adherence to DRM is better for RealPlayer in the long run, but it's really too bad about the FoodTV restriction--how handy would it be to have quick and easy recipe clips on your iPod?

There are, naturally, plenty of video sites that work just fine with the software. Google Video, YouTube, Metacafe, and any other site with user-generated content are all fair game. Also, there are some TV network sites that keep their formats open and free of restriction--Cartoon Network, Discovery Channel, and National Geographic, for example--though you often have to sit through a loud, unmutable ad while you wait for the video to come on. Of course, this is dependent on the sites and not RealPlayer, but I can't help complaining here. Also, it's worth noting that you don't actually have to watch the video while it's recording: You can pause, mute, or even move onto another video and cue that up for downloading. That's definitely a big plus.

In the end, the usefulness of this new RealPlayer 11 feature depends largely on the type of content you are interested in saving for offline viewing (if you're into music videos, for example, it's great)--and also how enterprising you are (I came across a couple of questionable sites with plenty of network TV content that was readily compatible with the software). It is free, so there's no harm in trying it out--unless you count the harm to your eyes/brain by having to deal with the RealPlayer interface. If you're an iPod user who wants to take videos on the go, just make sure you test out the free version with your favorite content providers before you dole out the cash for the Plus option.

Related stories:

• RealPlayer 11 beta is a stream ripper
• New RealPlayer allows YouTube video downloads
• Break free from embedded vids

At this point in time there are many user interfaces for searching, browsing, and watching videos on YouTube. Apple's got custom interfaces on both the iPhone and iPod touch, along with the Apple TV, while YouTube's got its own mobile frontend that works pretty well, but lacks some of the polish of Apple's efforts. One of the newer companies trying to improve on YouTube's offerings is 3rd Eye Solutions which has an app called iDesktop.tv (formerly known as "YouTube Desktop"), that lets you browse, view, and search YouTube videos in a similar style to a desktop application.

The service is a little reminiscent of Apple's iPhoto, mainly due to an array of video thumbnails that can be re-sized on the fly with a little scaler in the bottom corner of the screen. It's also got a built-in search tool that makes it far easier to sort through the often dizzying amount of results that you find clumped together in YouTube's less than stellar site search. This is, in fact, one of the most standout features of the app, since the company has one upped YouTube's own method of digging through what's become a huge repository of content.

There are also some other nice tweaks, like a resizing tool that lets you adjust a video to just the right size, as opposed to the all-or-nothing, full-screen option that comes stock with YouTube. Break.com's video player has had this feature for quite some time now, and I think it's really handy.

What really makes the service worth coming back to, however, are the video downloading tools. If you're a registered user, you can download the full version of any YouTube video in a variety of formats, both for popular portable devices and as a Windows executable file that will play on any computer running Windows. Be forewarned though--you're limited to 10 downloads a month, which is hardly conservative for most people's needs, but heavy users will be likely to reach their limit quickly. This would normally be a huge hindrance, but there are a ton of free YouTube video downloading tools out there, including the latest version of RealPlayer, along with Web and services like VideoDownloadX, Zamzar, Hey!Watch, and KeepVid that take the edge off.

This tool is definitely worth giving a look. While it may not be as powerful as some of the big video search aggregators like Truveo and Blinkx, which pull in content from all over the place, the viewing experience is far more enjoyable romp through YouTube's offerings. I expect them to expand into other hosted video services in the future, which could make it even more useful.

Download and search through YouTube videos in style with iDesktop.tv.

(Credit: CNET Networks)