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Frequently Asked Questions1. What is blip.tv?Blip.tv is a next-generation television network. We provide services of scale to more than 48,000 independently produced Web shows. Our services include technology, workflow automation, business development, distribution, marketing and advertising sales. As of July 2009 our distribution network reaches more than 22,000,000 people who watch blip.tv shows every month. Our core service is free, and shows have the option of participating in our advertising program. We share advertising revenues 50/50 with all shows who participate in the advertising program. 2. What type of videos do you accept?Our service is designed for people who are making original Web shows. These shows may be sitcoms, news magazines, nature shows, dramas, science fiction shows or tech review shows. They may be about wine or beer, poker or exercise and healthy living. They may be of a format that has never been seen before. The most important thing is that you have a brand of some kind, that you release new episodes on a somewhat regular basis, and that you're intending to build a show and a fan base. We do not work with "viral" video (i.e. one-offs), we do not accept videos that are primarily intended to market a product or service (unless you are a paying advertiser) and we do not accept gameplay videos. We reserve the right to refuse or remove any content if it fails to match our mission. You can learn more about the type of content we'll accept from our Terms of Use and from our Content FAQ. 3. Do you have a copyright policy?We take copyright law extremely seriously. We believe that the only way to build a responsible company is by respecting the rights of creative people everywhere. For this reason we have developed a copyright policy to ensure compliance with the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. 4. Is the blip.tv service free?The basic blip.tv service -- which is more than sufficient to build a successful Web show -- is free. We also promise never to charge you tomorrow for what you're doing today for free. This is to say that we won't charge you in six months for a video that you upload today. We do have some paid features, including professional accounts. We may release additional paid features from time to time that provide new functionality designed specifically for professional or "enterprise" show creators. 5. Do you have any system requirements?We recommend that you use a modern Web browser such as Firefox, Safari or Internet Explorer 8. Opera and OmniWeb should work, but we do not officially support either of them. Viewers and show creators must have the latest Flash plug-in, and we recommend that you have a recent version of QuickTime as well. A reasonably modern computer is also a requirement for watching high quality video served by blip.tv. PowerPC-based Macintosh computers may have trouble providing smooth playback. 6. Does blip.tv take ownership of uploaded videos?Blip.tv does not produce any content itself. We provide services to people who do. As such we do not take any ownership interest in materials uploaded to our service. Your show is yours. Not ours. We've tried to make our Terms of Service as clear as possible on this subject. When you upload a video to us you give us a non-exclusive right to store, distribute and "exploit" the video. You can cancel this right at any time by removing the video from blip. We're trying to help independent show creators, not screw them. It's probably worth noting, too, that we won't sell advertising in your videos unless you explicitly give us permission to do so. We also support Creative Commons licensing. 7. Do you change my video after I upload it?Blip will not make any changes to your original video. We will, however, create "derivative works" for the purpose of displaying your video on the Web. These derivatives are generally transcodes designed to make the videos easier to watch in a Web browser or on various other devices. Other derivatives or changes may include:
We will not make any changes to your video that have any editorial impact whatsoever. You can learn more from our Terms of Use. 8. Where do you distribute?The blip.tv distribution network includes much of what we call the "video Internet" and extends to television screens across America. Show creators maintain control over where their videos travel, and can decide to participate in any or all of the blip.tv distribution network. Unfortunately not all shows are eligible for distribution to all outlets. Some distribution partners (particularly those that involve television distribution) have limited capacity and stringent rules regarding content, age appropriateness and video quality. Our content and business development teams are constantly working with our distribution partners to increase the number of shows that can participate in these "semi-closed" distribution outlets. Some of our distribution partners include:
We are constantly adding new distribution partners and refining our partnerships with existing partners. Some distribution partners are only available using our new Show Creator Dashboard, which is not yet available to all show creators. 9. Do you provide syndication feeds such as RSS?We provide RSS 2.0 feeds for all shows and playlists on blip.tv. In addition to RSS 2.0 we support formats such as SMIL, ASX, Atom, SPFX, OPMKL and JSON. Check our wiki for more information about available feeds and our API. 10. How long has blip.tv been around?Blip.tv was founded by five friends in early May 2005. We launched the first version of the site on May 11, 2005. We've been iterating on our offerings ever since. We are now about twenty people in a loft in New York City's SoHo neighborhood. We're backed by Ambient Sound Investments and Bain Capital Ventures. |
