Not a new player in PC-based IP Videoconferencing, Sightspeed has been building proprietary software for VoIP and Video for more than 5 years (a lifetime in this industry).

The fresh and new CEO – Peter Csathy was kind enough to comp me a Premium account so I could play with it a bit.

First impression was good, easy to download and get setup. Since they mention in their PR that they are leveraging Web 2.0 I would imagine they are using Ajax, it looks good.

This new release is much more esthetically pleasing than past apps and includes some great tools for creating html links from the video/voice mail recordings as well.

The video clip can only be 60 seconds long and only as a local recording, I can’t record a video conference that I am part of. Not sure if this is by design but if we look at the flickr model we get plenty of storage space for free and Counterpath offers a SIP Voice/Video softphone that records all media to AVI.

In Sightspeed 4.5, we can extract the MPG link from the webpage that follows the recording which is great but I should not have to go through that much hassle to find it. I would also like it if the link were made available in MP4 and WMV and include the media extension in the html link so that my media enclosures will pick it up.

Skype got picked up by the bloggers because it was the easiest app to use that was freely available, it’s still not easy enough.

I should also be able to upload my own MP4, MOV, WMV etc. Add some mobile integration not unlike shoZu and multi-party conferencing recording capabilities for the Desktop client and we would now have a very useful tool for citizen journalists worldwide.

I would seem that most apps like this are targeting an audience that is less technically inclined but I think that with a little more work they could also carve out a pretty cool niche in a market that needs tools like this.

Alec has some comments as well.

So my buddy Andy just sent me this fancy shmancy cell phone that does everything a video blogger would want. The video capture is so easy to use anyone can do it, really… I am not kidding.

Just pull down the camera cover on the back of the phone and you are ready to film. Push the big button in the middle of the phone to start recording and push it again to pause. Whalla! You now have a video already in MP4 format. Here is one I shot of my son Kyler as an example, my Mom and Dad are in Australia visiting my bro and my other bro is in Calgary, I thought they would all appreciate this 🙂

http://sipthat.com/movies/kyler1205.mp4

The audio is pretty good and the quality of the Carl Zeiss 2 megapixel camera is also quite good. I could not get Lifeblog to work, not even for a text posting so uploading the movie from my direct to my blog was a no go, but I am sure I will figure this out. I could not get the USB cable to work with the software on XP either, good thing I have a MMC card reader in my laptop and PC, yes the MAC is coming 😉

For me this is a handy tool, good for impromptu interviews and it actually works quite well as a cell phone. It’s too bad these manufacturers are still struggling to combine a good keyboard with a multimedia cell phone. I would love to be able to IM on this thing as well but alas the keyboard sucks for that.

I have been an advocate of Video Blogging for a while now and I sincerely think that vlogging is the catalyst we need to bring independent film makers right into your living room.

Today you will find a wide assortment of crappy (crappy to me might not be crappy to someone else) home videos out there but there are also a few very well put together Vlog Programs or Vlogcasts, as I like to call them, which I watch regularly. Rocketboom is decent and maybe not always be rich with content I would like to watch but it offers something different that I find appealing. Hmm, maybe it’s the uncensored tell like it is attitude?

At any rate, set-top’s like Akimbo will become more and more popular as time goes on. Our media is changing rapidly and the advertising mantra of days gone by are slipping by the wayside.

If you want to get involved check out Vloggercon, Videoblogging.info and Freevlog.org. It’s your media after all!

According to News.com, TiVo is in talks with Internet search giants Google and Yahoo over a possible deal aimed at bridging television and the Web, CNET News.com has learned.

With Google’s recent press around Video Blogging and Yahoo!’s Video search now in beta, Tivo seems like a natural fit. This is good news for video blogging as well.

more…

Here is a crash course on how to use ineen to create your own vlog clips. The clip is quite lame, the opening frame has me looking like I just dropped a log in my pants 😉 I created an AVI clip using ineen by simply pressing the REC button on the main interface and then uploaded that to my audioblog.com account. I then used audioblog to post my clip and add this posting text. Pretty damn cool if you ask me!

Since ineen supports videoconferencing I plan on recording some of my videoconferences with other ineen users which I will post here.

Imagine vlogging directly from ineen to your blog! Hmmm, I think I am on to something here 🙂