As if there hadn't been enough news this week concernig Google and videos, I noticed that the Picasa Web Albums new features page notes:

   "Upload videos (only for those who've upgraded to 6GB of storage)"

Do any American readers who have upgraded have an example of this they can share with us? Us second class citizens of the world are stuck with just 250MB, and now we lose out on a feature as well :-(

http://www.zmarties.com/picasa/blog/2006/10/picasa-web-albums-adds-videos.html

I tried to upload a video several days ago, but I got an error message that said something along the lines that video uploading had not been implemented yet. I'll try again in a couple of hours.

Tony

I've updated my blog post, now that I've been provided with an example video. Not surprisingly, it embeds a Google Video flash player within the Picasa Web Albums page.

http://www.zmarties.com/picasa/blog/2006/10/picasa-web-albums-adds-videos.html

You are welcome! ;)
Direct link to the video:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Page.Error/VideoUploadTest/photo#4985114988657115154

This is great. They just need to provide more storage to all and this capability to all.

It is to their benefit to have my whole life on their servers... let me upload all the photos and video I can.

I have tried several different movies several different times over the last half-hour and I keep getting a Failed to Upload Video error after it uploads for awhile.

Tony

Question-seeing how the vidoe upload feature is only available to the people who pays fees, does the space for the video come from the 6 GB?

Tony
I tried to upload a 30 MB video, but it doesn't work. "Error"

Another followup
   – I've a report that Chinese users can't see the videos in Picasa Web.
- trying to upload a video from Picasa desktop specifically notices that I need to upgrade my storage. Presumably this was the reason why the new build 32.95 was pushed out earlier this week. Of course, since I'm outside the USA, I cant actually upgrade the storage...

Can the uploaded video's be seen on Google Video too?

They actually upload this video to Google video for you.

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?videoUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fvp.video.google.com%2Fvideodownload%3Fversion%3D0%26secureurl%3DiwAAAJco0eH5C1MpVC_1ZEQ4Biiw5s3v4UV2YJRS-deSni0ixwJFNfxCp1VQosD7h9tqvBRdWeACpjchmeOBtfAupFUJr-J_DRBJErWpb5sHKqMFn_itR6Crb17vFPN0rzE7H0ywv5ETxjaKD0gKY1XaNzmDBTlFGFsokOzmPgUAxN3vqtJ1TKxvdXqBx9Tg73ZETQ%26sigh%3Dr6b3dJFnl6oj67Hqzfdab3YZVqA%26begin%3D0%26len%3D2147483647%26docid%3D0&autoplay=yes

So it's just an integration of Google video really, not a new video sharing tool.

I wonder if these videos will be searchable through Google video?

[URL fixed – Tony]

any chance you can fix the url tony? the space between 'url' and '=' needs to be taken away. thanks

Yep, done it. (Sorry – I didn't realise that "url =" was blocked...)

Is there any info on when this feature leaves the "us only" state?
im from europe (germany) and realy waiting for this. its a nicer way to share videos for a special group than hosting it on youtube/google video i think.

I'm still having some trouble with it. After many tries, one video finally uploaded. I have not gotten two other videos uploaded successfully. One was only about 12 Mb.

   I was able to successfully upload all three to Google Video and You Tube on the first try.

Unfortunately, I did not make a note of how much storage space I was using before uploading to Web Albums, so I don't know if my video counted against my 6 gigs or not. I wonder how Google will handle that as their Google Video and You Tube are free and allow unlimited storage space. I would like to use Web Albums to share with family as the interface is much cleaner and less intimidating.

The last time I tried playing the video, I got a Video is unavailable error on Web Albums, but it played fine on Google Video. Perhaps they were doing something with the server at the time, but so far my experience has not been the best.

Tony

I am too good:

http://www.seweso.com/blog/2005/12/google-predictions.php#12

Ooh wait, it doesn't create a blog post... *-). But I swear I knew you would be able to upload video's to your web albums when I saw Picasa web albums for the first time.. :D

I am having no problems uploading videos now. Perhaps there was a back-end problem last week.

They definitely count against your total storage space.

It's interesting that Google offers a free video hosting solution (Google Video and now You Tube), but you essentially pay for hosted videos on Web Albums. The attraction for me in using Web Albums is a cleaner, less cluttered user experience for my family and friends where I can group relevant video and pictures together.

I suppose that is worth paying for to me, and I can always use the free solutions if I wish.

TonyB

i think picasa web albums will have more free storage soon anyway, as well as free uploading of videos.. the videos are stored on google video anyway. not acutally on picasa web albums

Videos on PWA are aimed at a more personal use. i.e., you wouldn't want to upload your movie trailers onto there. Think of them as "moving photos".

Yes, the videos I am uploading to Web Albums are of the kids and things like that. Definitely more personal and not anything I am interested in sharing with the world at large.

TonyB