Make Money Online

Back in June, I ran a quick post about the Pure Digital FlipVideo Camera over at DVGadgets. I was so taken by this new camera, that I purchased the 30 minute version the very next week.  And I wasn’t alone - over 300,000 Flips have sold since they came out, and the company expects to sell 1 Million over its first year.  That would make it the second largest Camcorder manufacturer in the world behind Sony.  Not bad for a new product.

How has the experience been over the last few months?  My wife and I haven’t had this much fun with a video camera. Ever.

We are acknowledged video freaks. We bought the Canon GL-1 when it launched years ago, and have a variety of Sony and Panasonic MiniDV (standard and Widescreen) camcorders to go along with our digital cameras as well.

But here’s the rub. When we’re heading out and know we want to take video, we’ll grab one of our camcorders, as well as one of our tripods if the occasion warrants. When you want high-quality video, nothing beats videotape. We very rarely just want pictures, but on occasion will also have our digital camera packed away somewhere in our car - “Just in Case”.

The problem comes when we’re just out and about on a casual trip and didn’t plan on taking any video. And that’s where the FlipVideo comes to the rescue.

Small and very light, Jean has taken to bringing the FlipVideo everywhere in her purse. After 10 days of using it, she has claimed it as her own. The casual, candid, everyday family moments that were usually a story to tell to my parents over the phone are now being preserved and shared in video form with my family over the web. Extremely easily.

Although the FlipVideo comes with easy-to-use software to upload your videos to Grouper or YouTube, I choose to upload all our video to stashSpace. Yes, I am a co-founder of the company [disclosure], but my free account at stashSpace lets me trim the starts & ends off of the individual clips, and arrange them in a movie sequence. This way, I can share one movie (made up of a number of clips) with my family, instead of having to share a whole range of individual clips. The video management features (movies, collections, tagging, search, etc.) make it very easy to customize movies for different family members, as well as just keep track of all the video that you take.

I was hoping the FlipVideo would be a convenient would be an easy-to-use way for Jean to take video and post it online for our families without having to get me involved. I am glad these hopes were not in vain.

What else can I say except if you are currently using a photo sharing or video sharing service, buy a FlipVideo now! I very rarely feel this strong about product recommendations, but this is a video device that makes video accessible across all generations.

Even if you own a digital camcorder or camera that can take video, you still need to go out and buy a FlipVideo now! It is not a replacement for your current camera or camcorder - but it will allow you to preserve so many more of your precious moments on video for the future.

I just listed Online Video Sharing into the Sponsored Reviews system.  Unlike ReviewMe, SponsoredReviews.com only charges a 35% administrative fee.  They also require a 3 to 1 ratio of original (i.e. unpaid) posts to paid posts, which lends itself better to blogs that are primarily targeted toward adsense or affiliates for revenue generation.

If you need a review for a video or photo-related website, check out my profile on SponsoredReviews.  Online Video Sharing is a blog focusing on reviews and updates from Web 2.0 video sharing and photo-sharing start-ups, user-generated content, video-oriented social networking, and the technology that holds it all together.

There are many ways to add video to your site, but Bubble Guru is truly a unique way to insert unobtrusive video that is specific to your page — whether it be a tutorial, review, or personal message.

Anyone can use Bubble Guru  by setting up a free account (get in while it’s still free!).  After setting up your account, you connect up your WebCam or Digital Camcorder and hit "Record".  When you’re done recording your message, you’ll get some html code that you just have to cut & paste into your website.  It’s a very easy way to get video content into your site or blog without having to go the traditional route with YouTube, PhotoBucket or any one of the other 200+ video sharing sites out there.

If you’re still not sure how it works, check out the Bubble Guru Tour to find out more.

I’ll be in Fort Wayne Indiana next week for the first annual KillerApp Expo, sponsored by Broadband Properties Magazine. The KillerApp Conference and Expo is the first and only venue to explore the high-bandwidth applications that are driving broadband use and adoption worldwide, and changing the way we work, live and communicate.

As the founder of a web-based personal video editing and sharing company, I was invited to speak on two panels: "Your Media Your Way" and "The Opportunities Internet Applications Offer Broadband Providers."

The first panel, Your Media Your Way, will show how application developers are expanding consumers’ choices and their control over the content they create and purchase. I will be joined on the panel by Chris Brogan, Community Director of Network2.tv, with Masha Zager, Editor of KillerApp.com moderating.

The second panel, "The Opportunities Internet Applications Offer Broadband Providers," will profile AT&T’s approach and strategy of partnering with applications developers, as well as how and why applications providers want to establish business relationships with network providers.  I will be joined on this panel with Ken Tysell, Executive Director, Three Screen Services for AT&T, and Scott Lomond, President and COO of SightSpeed, with Geoff Daily, Assistant Editor of KillerApp.com moderating.

So if you happen to be out in Fort Wayne next week for the conference, please stop by and say hi, I’d love to touch base with you all.

Your friends and family can certainly be part of your traffic-building strategy for your blogs, especially in your early days.  StumbleUpon, BlueDot, MySpace, etc. are all great ways for you to be able to connect your online friends with your new blogs (don’t have accounts & networks with these services yet?  Spend some time and do it now!).

But what about your family?  Chances are you only know the email addresses for your immediate family, or don’t even know how large your extended family is.

That’s where a new company that launched in January of this year comes in.  Geni is an easy-to-use online tool to map your family tree, and is extremely viral.  Within one week, my tree (initially populated with my immediate family), has grown to 203 people - 39 blood relatives and 163 in-laws.  My wife is now also able to track her mother’s side of the family back to 1510!

In addition to being able to finally understand the complicated relationships in my wife’s family, I also hope that this will serve to to open up the lines of online communication with my extended family once again and get some of them interested in maintaining online sites.  Trading links with existing personal blogs among your family is also a great way to increase your SEO and Technorati rank.

You can find out about new updates about the  product on the Geni blog, or be able to ask questions and interact with other Geni users on the Geni Forums.