NewsClipper.org collects major networks’ videos, avoids ire - so far

Venture Beat — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 23:44:34 -0800

The idea behind NewsClipper.org is a straightforward one - collect all the videos posted on the websites for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, BBC, CNN and ESPN and put them all in one place for a viewer to watch without visiting all of those sites.
Obviously the site can’t just take all of the networks’ content and store it on it’s own servers without permission, but it’s not - it’s streaming those videos straight from the television networks’ servers.

NewsClipper.org creator Onar Vikingstad is utilizing a modified version of the open source flash video player, Flowplayer, to pull the videos right from the source. The player even allows users to embed any of these videos on their own sites even though most of the videos as hosted on the networks’ pages offer no embed codes.

The legality of this is questionable as TechCrunch noted a few days ago, but we asked Vikingstad if he’s yet received any warnings about video usage on his site and he told us that it has been “surprisingly quiet”.

He did say that one network contacted him, but only to request that he use an embed player they created rather than his - which he is happy to comply with and is working on.

One of the television networks’ main concerns would no doubt have to do with the fact that the videos on NewsClipper.org do not show advertisements - whereas if you were to watch the clips on ESPN.com you would be bombarded by them. Vikinstad says he is also happy to show their ads if they ask for that.

VeohTV and Miro (our coverage) offer similar functionality in gathering of Internet video from several other sites, but do so only with stand-alone, downloadable players.

For now, Vikingstad presses forward working on new site features. He just added a new main screen that now features the day’s top stories based on their coverage by the networks.

He also added search functionality which seems to work very well. A search of “Obama” for example returns 40 clips from just the past week including the top result of Senator Obama and Senator Clinton debating from just a few hours ago.

Vikingstad funded NewsClipper.org completely by himself, but is open to the idea of others’ involvement as he considers where to take the site next.

The Industry Standard - NewsClipper.org collects major networks’ videos, avoids ire - so far - Comments

NewsClipper.org collects major networks’ videos, avoids ire - so far