With services like Ustream.tv, Justin.tv, Kyte, and Qik bringing live video streaming to the masses, the web is turning into a viable competitor to television for real-time content. But while all of these services are great for bloggers remotely broadcasting footage,or streaming live events, but they come with a few problems: video content isn’t optimized for search engines, and unlike TV, there’s no closed captioning. PlyMedia is looking to change that.
The company is launching a service that will offer real-time captions and super-fast transcriptions to suit the needs of live streamers. → Read More
A few days ago YouTube announced the addition of Closed Captioning support to its videos. One small problem though… YouTube included neither the tools nor the services to help video owners create the actual captioning source files– SubViewer (*.SUB) and SubRip (*.SRT)—needed to activate this feature. This is where SubPLY, the new video captioning service by PLYmedia might be helpful. With the launch of the service the company is providing an exclusive offer for TechCrunch readers: Free professionally produced English and Spanish closed captioning for YouTube videos!
SubPLY will provide English & Spanish captioning to 5000 YouTube videos submitted by TechCrunch readers. The video source language must be English and video duration cannot exceed 5 minutes. The captioning will be available within 24-hours of video submission. Offer details and how-to, here. → Read More
Web video startup PLYmedia recently raised a round of $6 million to $6.5 million, according to a source with knowledge of the deal. The funding has not yet been announced, but the investors are believed to be Greylock and Elron Electronic Industries, an Israeli holding company. (In fact, Elron already disclosed its investment in PLYmedia in the first quarter). Individual investors (who may have put their money in at an earlier angel round) include former PayPal CEO Bill Harris, former LucasFilm president Gordon Radley, and Gil Elbaz, co-founder of Applied Semantics (which became Google’s AdSense). PLYmedia adds interactive layers onto Web video. These include word bubbles, subtitles, information windows, links, and ads. The company was voted the most promising Israeli startup in a Microsoft-sponsored contest last April. The video below shows an example of its BubblePLY technology, which makes it easy to annotate videos with word balloons. http://www.bubbleply.com/plyPlayer.swf?isAutoplay=false&plyID=674bd1bb-70c0-4eca-9cdf-dfa8c170525a CrunchBase Information PLYmedia Greylock Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
In February the Israel Web Tour rolls into Silicon Valley. Ninety Israeli startups applied to join the tour, and fifteen of them were selected to attend. The tour consists of a week-long conference and cultural exchange between Silicon Valley and Israeli entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. The general public is invited to parts of the show. more information is available on this website, including speakers. Participating startups include 5min, Plymedia, AllofMe, Nuconomy, ClickTale, blogTV, Sportingo, PicScout, Qoof, 8hands, Velingo, Innovid, Semingo, PageOnce and Journeys. I moderated a panel at the event last year. Highlights from that panel and the event in general are in the video below. CrunchBase Information 5min PLYmedia AllofMe ClickTale blogTV Journeys Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
