Update on Searchles TV & Grouper Videos

There was a lot of coverage on the cease and desist letter we received from Grouper's attorney last week including Mashable, TechCrunch, Slashdot and Digital Media Wire to name a few.

Thanks to everyone who blogged about it or took the time to comment. Most of the comments were very supportive of Searchles and others raised good questions and ideas. We think all of this dialogue is good and that Internet users, copyright holders and all the various websites that help keep people connected with the content they care about will be better served if an open dialogue takes place to find best practices rather than resorting to c&d’s which only serve to stifle innovation. Keep sharing your thoughts and ideas – we DO listen - that’s a large part of how the Searchles platform evolves.

That said, I do need to correct the record on a comment I made Friday at Techcrunch. It turns out (as Freshmaker pointed out) that when users embed Grouper videos on Searchles (using the Grouper player), if you click on the video itself, it doesn’t link back to the Grouper video page. On most other sites when you embed the same code, the links do work. We aren’t sure why yet. This was definitely not our intention.

Links through YouTube embeds on Searchles still work ok, so it isn't an issue with disallowing offsite links through Flash (a la MySpace). It looks like it's the same embed code that Grouper offers on their site so we don't know why the links don't work on Searchles. Here is an example from which I was drawing my conclusions:

http://www.searchles.com/links/show/grouper.com%2Fvideo%2Fmediadetails.aspx%3Fid%3D887772%26ml%3Do%253d7%2526fk%253dsouth%252520park%2526fx%253d%26

We are not sure if this is a problem unique to us or not, but we’re looking into it and will post an update when it’s fixed.

dumbfounder

Sony’s Grouper tells Searchles to Cease & Desist – Pot Calls Kettle Black

Last week, Searchles launched Searchles TV - the Internet’s first video player that empowers users to mashup videos back-to-back with one player using multiple sources like MySpace, YouTube, Google Video, Blip.tv or Grouper and then automatically syndicate updates to the channel wherever it’s embedded across the web.

We think this is a good thing – Searchles TV gives users the freedom to view and present content on their own terms – it allows video hosting sites an additional channel for syndicating user-generated content - and it provides copyright holders with a powerful tool for aggregating and syndicating content. Not everyone agrees.

Yesterday, I opened my email and found a letter from Grouper’s attorney, Ian Balloon with Greenbird Traurig, demanding that ‘Searchels’ [sic] cease and desist. You can read Mr. Balloon’s letter here.

Apparently, Grouper wants its users to “publish to any site,” except Searchles. We’ve never made a claim to be sponsored, affiliated or endorsed by Grouper, yet inexplicably, Mr. Balloon feels that allowing users to embed Grouper videos into Searchles violates the federal Lanham Act. We can only assume that this means Grouper is sponsored, affiliated and endorsed by every website where its videos are embedded.

Mr. Balloon also asserts that Searchles has “effectively stripped away Grouper’s extensive copyright protection system,” [pause for laughter] “including the ‘Flag as Inappropriate’ button and the link that appears on every single page of the Grouper website to allow copyright owners to report allegedly infringing material, in accordance with the terms of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.” We’re confident that Searchles complies with all provisions of the DMCA and are mystified by the allegation.

When Grouper users “publish to any site,” the above mentioned features are missing from their player. Grouper also requires you to enter your user name and password for other sites where they post video on your behalf which is a curious interpretation of other sites’ Terms of Service.

When Searchles embeds videos from video sharing services like Grouper on our website or within the Searchles TV player on other websites, those videos are still hosted at the source site. When those videos are removed from the source site for any reason including violation of copyrights, they are automatically no longer available within Searchles, Searchles TV or anywhere the player is embedded. As an added bonus, Searchles TV can also be used as a tool to help copyright owners like major television networks monitor the prevalence and extent of copyright violations at sites like Grouper. :)

And contrary to Mr. Balloon’s assertions, we do not “reformat” the content in anyway that would preclude or block Grouper or copyright owners from inserting advertisements that would display on our site as well. In fact, we think we can help media companies, social networking sites, and sites like Grouper better engage their audiences and hope they’ll call us.

We’re big fans of Sony (well maybe not their batteries), Grouper, and admire what Josh, David, Aviv and Mike have built. We’d like to work with them. But we’re dumbfounded by Mr. Balloon’s unfounded position and believe it’s anti-social to bully young companies – though we’re flattered to have Searchles TV validated by such a respected source.

What do you think?

dumbfounder

dns problems!!!

We had some issues with our dns provider today for a few hours, but things seem to be back online now. We have switched providers so hopefully this won't happen again...

dumbfounder

Shhhh! Searchles TV is Going Live – Turn it On!

Late yesterday, you may have noticed that we stood up Searchles TVfor final testing– and it’s a big first! We’re not sure why nobody else thought about it, but we think you’ll be glad we did. Today we’re telling everybody about it.

Searchles TV is a video player that lets you combine multiple videos in any order using multiple sources like MySpace, YouTube, Google Video, Blip.tv or Grouper and play them through one viewer either at Searchles or on your blog or website without the hassle of using editing software.

What does this mean? You no longer have to jump between sites like YouTube or Grouper to view your favorite videos or waste time clicking through to play multiple videos individually that are meant to be viewed sequentially.

With Searchles TV, you can catalogue your favorite videos as you bookmark them from multiple sources in one channel, play them sequentially through one viewer, add, remove or change the order at any time, and embed the player into any blog or website including your MySpace page. By adding tags or assigning your channel to Searchles groups, your channel can be discovered through search by a wider audience at Searchles and across the web.

Now for the best part - Anytime you update your channel at Searchles, those updates are automatically syndicated across the web, wherever your channel is embedded. You’ll never have to worry about whether your audience knows about your latest videos or updates again!

Check out the video tutorial above and then take it for a test drive and let me know what you think. We think you’re going to have a lot of fun with it and can’t wait to see what you create! We might even have to have a contest. Stay tuned….

dumbfounder