Put hyperlinks over your YouTube video with Asterpix

Filed under: Design, Internet, Video, Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Podcasting, Blogging, Social Software

Put hyperlinks over your YouTube video with Asterpix

by Emily Price Dec 11th 2007

Asterpix is a free video service that allows you to take your regular run of the mill YouTube video and add notes and hyperlinks to it that are then clickable by your viewers. Adding links to video is as easy as clicking on your video where you want to add a note or link and then typing it in. Once you've added a link a box will show up in the video to let your viewers know the link is there and viewers can mouse over the box to get more information or click on your link. Your finished video is then hosted on Asterpix's website and can be embedded on your own person blog or website.

Asterpix also recently launched the Facebook app Hypervideo which does roughly the same thing and also allows your friends to comment directly on your profile embedded video.

The service has a lot of potential for monetizing online video, and making it easier for viewers who want more information to get it. You could user Asterpix for giving more information about a person your interviewing in a video, or even where you purchased the shirt you're wearing in your podcast.

One definite drawback to the service right now is that those little squares. While they're trying to be unobtrusive they're still pretty obtrusive and can be pretty annoying to watch. It would be great to see Asterpix work the hyperlinks like subtitles where viewers would have the option to turn them on if they wanted extra information, and off if they wanted to enjoy a video square free.

There's also no real way to control how long a square stays on your video. The links seem to be depended on the movement of what you put them on, so some squares will stay up for seconds and others minutes. For instance in the Squadcast video the link on Christina goes away pretty quickly but the one on Grant holds on for dear life until the credits start. Some of the links on the video later on barely stay up long enough for you to see them.

It'll be interesting to see how Asterpix changes over time, and what types of things people start to use Asterpix for.

Update: The folks over at Asterpix pointed out that they do offer an invisible mode for the squares or "Beacons." if you want to watch an Asterpix video "beacon free" you can change the beacon style to "No Marker" under the style menu. there are also some other style options on the menu where you can change the traditional rectangle to a "Fading Rectangle," "Flashing Circles," or "Closed Caption." When we tried the closed caption option we saw the contents of the links as closed captions, but the beacons were also there...so it looks like there's some kinks in the process still be ironed out.

Tags: online video, OnlineVideo, product placement, ProductPlacement, video, youtube

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Don Swinscoe said 3:31PM on 12-11-2007

Emily, thanks for the writeup. Just wanted to expand on your comments about the "little squares." Beacons, as we refer to them, are customizable via the player's "Style" button. Asterpix users can choose from a variety of styles from invisible to closed caption and the user options are saved for future sessions. As you've noted, the beacon type is important, not only from a user taste perspective but also dependent upon the content, so we're continuously investigating new alternatives. As far as the length of track is concerned, that does require some practice. The advanced object recognition technology employed at Asterpix has been optimized to provide a balance of usability and speed, so getting the right track is often a factor of the size of the selection rectangle and the background of the selected object. Thanks again for using Asterpix and helping spread the word about the power of our interactive video service.

Jose said 9:28PM on 12-12-2007

Great tool. I'm going to begin using it."

dSLRer said 1:16PM on 2-26-2008

For readers interested in this sort of technology, I've recently been experimenting with Overlay.tv (the name is the URL ;).

If you work with video or photography, I recommend looking into this service. You can see a good, self-referential example of its potential here: http://www.overlay.tv/overlay/990

Hope this helps!

Claude

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