Though many Flickr users seem to be against the presence of videos on the popular photo sharing site the truth is that you can already find a bunch of short movies of all kinds. Now the question is whether there is a way to download them to your hard drive, and the answer is yes, though you need to install Orbit Downloader first.

For those of you who don’t know this program, Orbit Downloader is an excellent download manager that handles all your downloads in an easy, convenient interface and is compatible with all main browsers. So once you have Orbit Downloader on your PC, browse to the Flickr video you want to download and you’ll see a tiny gray arrow on its right top corner.

Click it and you’ll launch Grab++, Orbit’s grabbing utility. You may be asked to refresh the page - for Grab++ to get all the downloadable elements available on the webpage - so simply press F5 on your browser and go back to Grab++.

Now look for the video on the list. It’s easy to spot: it’s an FLV file and it’s probably the largest in size. Select it, click on “Download” and it’s all yours. Just make sure that the video is actually playing on Flickr (otherwise you’ll get an error message in Orbit) and that you have an FLV player to watch the video once it’s on your system.

With Apple’s senior manager of PR Anuj Nayar announcing that Apple would not take part in this year’s National Association of Broadcaster’s (NAB) Show, the world’s largest broadcast media show, many started to wonder if that meant Apple would draw back from its pro apps. The decision was explained, “Apple is participating in fewer trade shows this year,” said Anuj Nayar, senior manager of PR at Apple. “Often there are better ways to reach our customers. The increasing popularity of our retail stores and Apple.com Web site allows us to directly reach more than 100 million customers around the world in innovative new ways.”

As TUAW also do well to point out, Apple took more than a year to release their new version of Final Cut Server, which came out only this April. Apple’s Pro range includes a dozen applications, of which the Aperture image editor, the Final Cut video editing tool and Logic Studio for music creation are still highly popular. To calm all rumors, Apple have pointed out how successful their line of professional video software is, with Final Cut Pro now past more than one million paid licenses.

I don’t believe Apple would sell off their Pro apps, especially when you know that an application like Final Cut is becoming the preferred choice of movie makers in Hollywood. What I do believe though, is that Apple probably looks to focus more on the mass market and I actually expect them to make their Pro applications attractive to everyone, not just professionals. This seems to be the reason why they are refocusing on the Apple website, which is the best way for them to reach mass market.

Now that Adobe Air is starting to get itself established, there are some really exciting applications based on it coming out and one of them is mooFlair. As more and more applications become desktop based, mooFlair applies this principle to video downloading and viewing by helping you manage and watch both online and offline FLVs videos. But don’t mistake it for just another FLV player because its much more than that.

mooFlair allows you to build your own FLV library of FLV videos both on and offline and save your compilations in playlists. This includes FLV files such as h.264 encoded videos, those on RSS Feeds or those from content providers such as YouTube. If you don’t have time to watch them online, mooFlair can select several videos at once and download them for later viewing while you get on with more important things. Two things were rather annoying in the original release though - it used to hog your memory and you couldn’t watch videos in fullscreen mode but all that has been ironed out in the latest release. The design and feel of mooFlair is excellent too - this doesn’t feel like yet another YouTube downloader - it’s a solid looking application with lots of gloss and touches of class. Searching videos is still a little bit awkward though because the search option has been hidden away in the file menu and you still can’t search several video sites at once. Of course, one other big disadvantage is that you can’t view any of the comments attached to the videos you are watching which for me, is half the fun anyway.

However, as a one stop solution for viewing, storing and downloading FLV videos from a variety of sources, mooFlair is one of the best solutions yet and if this is an indication of what is to come from Adobe Air, the future looks very bright indeed for desktop apps. Note that mooFlair currently runs on Windows and Mac but a beta version for Linux is under development.

Windows: If you like listening to music while working with the PC but you’ve grown tired of your MP3 collection, try Nexus Radio instead. This amazing radio player has just released its latest version, 2.2.4, which features more than 7,000 online radio stations in 38 different genres. Nexus Radio is iPhone and iPod compatible and can also record music with just a single click.

Mac: Looking to download videos straight from Safari onto your iPod? CosmoPod, a plugin for the Mac browser lets you convert videos into the iPod ready H.264 or MP4 formats in seconds. It includes an embedded player so you can preview your videos to make sure they are of adequate quality before taking them with you on your iPod.

Symbian: If you enjoy nothing more than a game of sudoku on the bus to work then get hold of Sensible Sudoku on your mobile phone. The game features a powerful sudoku engine capable of generating billions of puzzles in multiple difficulty levels. Sensible Sudoku includes a pleasant interface, elegant audio and enjoyable gameplay. Download it now for a compelling experience!

Although Blu-ray may well make it a redundant format, there are still many people that use the Video CD (VCD) format. In addition, since most modern DVD players and PCs can playback the format and the discs are cheap, it will probably still be around for quite some time to come. The drawback obviously is that it can’t hold anything near the capacity of Blu-ray plus the image quality isn’t much better than VHS.

This latter issue can be a major problem when converting video as poorly compressed VCD video can sometimes be actually lower quality than VHS video. One of the best tools to prevent this, and ensure pristine conversions from your DVDs is DVD2SVCD. The program extracts DVD video files to .bin or .cue format but you’ll then need a burner such as Nero to finish off the job. If you need to do several films at the same time though you’ll be better to go with Batch WMV to VCD converter although as the name suggests, it only works with WMV files.

If your DVD player or PC was made within the past 5 years, then the likelihood you can watch your VCDs on them. However, it’s nice sometimes to have a dedicated player that’s attuned to the special needs of the different formats which is what VCDEasy does. It’s a dedicated VCD player, recorder and even allows you to catch still images of your favourite VCD movies. And if you’re going to use a decent viewer, you might as well make a decent menu to play with via VCD Menu Lite which quickly and easily allows you to take stills from your film and add them to a professional looking menu.

If you’re sitting in front of your PC and feel like watching TV, you don’t need to switch your TV set on anymore: simply launch Zattoo and you’ll be able to watch a bunch of online streaming TV channels right on your computer. The program’s latest version, 3.1.1 Beta, includes a TV guide and a channel selector as the main new features.

For those of you that spend a major part of their day writing, having a good program to create and save abbreviations can be a real lifesaver. Typinator for Mac lets you easily create abbreviations, which you can save in sets and use in any sort of document. It also imports snippets from similar applications like TypeIt4Me.

Why bother scrabbling around inside your the many menus in your Windows Mobile Pocket PC, when you can manage your whole life simply from the Today screen? PocketBreeze replaces the built-in calendar, tasks and mail on your home screen with a series of other customisable features. Try it now and your life will never be so well organised!

The number of online TV services is growing by the day, and every time you wake up there seems to be dozens more ways to enjoy your favorite programs. Online Live lets you watch more than 3,000 free Internet TV channels, on-demand videos and listen to free online radio shows. The live TV channels database claims to be the biggest in the world.

It’s not always that we talk about widgets, but when we do it’s usually that they’re pretty good. iCal Events is exactly what you’d expect of one: it simply makes your life easier. The widget will display all your events from one day up to two weeks. It’s also resizable so you can have all future events displayed on your Dashboard without ever having to open up iCal. Events are shown with their corresponding color code and date and hour. A great way to keep on top of your schedule.

Bomberman is one of the all-time classic console titles and now you can enjoy the fun on your mobile phone too, thanks to Bomber. The game charges you with the task of setting bombs to blast your way through rocks and reach the aliens - who you must also blow up. Just make sure you get out of the way before the explosion goes off!

Adobe yesterday announced the launch of their very own desktop internet TV application amid questions over whether the world really needs another media player. Adobe Media Player (AMP) has been built with Adobe Air - the company’s flagship Web 2.0 application. At the moment, a number of content providers are on board including CBS, MTV Networks, Universal Music Group and PBS. Users can also add content from any Flash video sites that support RSS feeds. The service is already being compared to Apple’s iTunes video service and Miro but unlike them, it offers users and broadcasters the chance to earn money from their footage via advertising. In their launch statement, Adobe said this commercial element is what differentiates AMP from the existing options because:

It provides exciting new ways for viewers to discover and interact with their favorite content, while offering revenue and brand-building opportunities for content publishers.

John Loiacono, senior vice president of Creative Solutions at Adobe added:

With Adobe Media Player, we’re bringing viewers and content owners closer together, with an experience that doesn’t constrain them by platform or proprietary software application. It’s a merger of TV Guide and DVR for Internet video content. Some great shows, like The Hills from MTV and CSI from CBS, are already available to view and more will be coming soon.

It’s also thought that depending on the success of the service, Adobe will introduce downloads of films and shows to own or rent later this year which would certainly heat things up between the way competitors such as iTunes and YouTube regard AMP. It’s clear that Adobe are trying to create a one-stop media player that will serve all needs ranging from simple video playback of DivX files to downloading and rental of movies. The worrying thing is the amount of advertising that may be necessary to keep AMP free. Launching an internet TV service supported by advertising is far from easy, as Joost has been finding, and AMP will have to prove that it can provide high quality and popular content that are not bogged down in ads if it is to succeed.

As Nick reported a few weeks back, Flickr have decided to jump on the video bandwagon. As of today, Pro users will be able to showcase videos of up to 90 seconds in their photostream. The 90 second limit might sound a bit odd, but as Flickr explain on their blog, they want to remain a photo sharing site so the idea is for videos to be like ‘long photos’. According to the guidelines videos will also have to be simple and personal, so hopefully Flickr will not turn into another YouTube clone. Having Pro users only uploading videos should also ensure that they meet quality standards normally expected on the photo sharing site.

I can’t really say for now if I’m really glad or not by this new offering. Obviously, Flickr are trying to keep it to some level of quality, however I really see video as another medium. Will the 90 second limit always be around? How will you guarantee that all videos have that ‘long photo’ feel? From what I’ve seen of the videos that have already been posted on Flickr, the focus on ‘artistic content’ seems to be respected: it’s all about the beauty of the image and showcasing cool effects. The playback functions are very simple: a start/pause button, a draggable progress bar, volume control and full screen. Videos can also be of different sizes and shapes.

As Flickr do well to explain, this will also change the role Flickr moderators will have. The photo and video sharing website has also taken the opportunity to double the video size limit to 20 MB for Pro users and 10 MB for Free users. One point that is not mentioned though is how video will affect all the Flickr related apps out there like the Flickr Uploadr, Flickr Downloader or FlickrFox.

Would you like to transfer your favorite videos and movies to your mobile phone so that you can take them anywhere with you? Now you can with MediaCoder Mobile Phone Edition, an easy-to-use video converter which supports the most popular formats for mobile audio and video. Select the file, choose the appropriate format for your mobile and you’re done!

If you’re the sort of person who was fascinated with bouncy balls as a kid then you’re going to love JumpyBall. This fun game for Pocket PC and Windows Mobile Smartphone devices features realistic 3D graphics and slick animation and charges you with the task of bouncing your ball over countless obstacles at breakneck speed. Just keep off the grass!

As unexciting as it may sound, you can’t overlook backups, even if you have a Mac. With BackityMac you can store all your important files and even restore them at the click of your mouse. The application makes it really easy to select the files that matter most to you and save them somewhere where they’ll be safe. It’s also much easier to use than other advanced backup programs.

Indie music fans will be interested to learn that the Pitchfork music site have launched a live new music video site Pitchfork.tv. The site features live performances in high quality video by bands both well-known and obscure from Radiohead and Nick Cave to King Khan and Jay Reatard.

I have to agree with Newteevee that it’s pretty good. There’s always a danger with new music video sites that the content is simply music videos from YouTube or aspiring musicians who’ve uploaded some of there dubious work themselves but the new site seems to feature some genuinely exciting, professionally filmed gig performances and talent. The quality of the footage is superb too - far bigger and better than you get on YouTube, even in full screen mode.

Unfortunately however, there’s no option for embedding videos in blogs and it’s not particularly intuitive when it comes to navigation. There are no suggestions for further viewing related to the content you’ve just watched and no history of your viewing activities. However, I don like the fact that it auto plays so basically, you can watch (or listen) to a whole gig by the same band without it stopping or starting - it just cycles through the tracks automatically until you stop it.

This is obviously a niche noncommercial service that Pitchfork are attempting to appeal to a select number of discerning alternative indie fans. But with such a small viewing audience, it does beg the question how are they going to afford to keep filming and distributing high quality footage. As Chris Albrecht points out:

Right now, Pitchfork.tv has a very small, intimate feel, which is best because the company would never want to be perceived as big and corporate. But as it has to start paying for all this video bandwidth, it will need to make adjustments (and add advertising) to remain viable.

However, if you’re tired of watching sub-standard mobile phone footage of your favourite upcoming bands on YouTube, Pitchfork.tv is a breath of fresh air although European fans will have to wait a while to see their bands on their as it’s predominantly focused on American talent. I’ll certainly be adding it to my video favourites for now.

Video converters are ten a penny these days, which generally means that you’ll come across as many good programs as terrible ones. Although you may not have excessively high technical requirements and may simply want to convert from one format to another it’s still best to go for a better known application.

You can find all sorts of reason for needing a video converter: it may be that you want to play a video for your iPod, or your video player only supports one format, or you need to post your video on the web and are looking for a file type that doesn’t take too much space. The reality is, considering the number of video devices that we use in our lives, converting almost becomes an obligatory task. And you want to get it right, so that the movie that comes out on the other side possibly looks as good as it was at first. Here we list up what we consider the best video converters for Mac and let you know why:

• Sorenson Squeeze - Pro choice for converting and encoding to any video format. Excellent for Flash.
• Reelbean - An all-in-one exporter, converter and media player.
• RoadMovie - Batch encode, add subtitles and upload to the web.
• ffmpegX - Handles all sorts of formats and subtitles. A must!
• HandBrake - A Mac fan favorite for ripping and converting DVDs to MPEG4.
• MediaFork - inspired by HandBrake, it may be a little easier to use.
• VisualHub - Quickly convert to any video format and prepare for DVD.
• iSquint - A free version of VisualHub, with a little less features.
• iPod Video - As the name suggests, it’s your one stop shop to convert any video or audio to iPod format.
• Flash Decompiler Trillix - Extract objects from a SWF or convert to FLA.

If you’re a movie buff, then you’ve probably got a ton of films on DVD and DivX but no real way of keeping track of them. Organising your collection can bring many benefits such as helping you rediscover old films you’d forgotten, classify your films by theme or genre and more easily share your collection with friends and family.

My Movies 2 harnesses the power of the internet to catalogue your films by downloading data based on the title of your films. Not only that, but it allows you to preview and watch trailers to newly released films. In this way, it’s both an organiser of your current collection. However, it does work via Windows Media Centre and so if you’re not a fan of this media player, then you’ll be better to use something like EMDB. This program is much more lightweight but key to its success is that it downloads data from the Internet Movie Database (IMDB) so you’re guaranteed quality and up-to-date info on your films plus it has just about every film ever made on there. Another less accurate but even simpler solution is Griffith. This movie organiser also downloads data from the internet but it doesn’t seem to use a single source meaning that it’s rather hit or miss when it comes to getting it right and sometimes, doesn’t fetch anything at all.

Meanwhile, if you’re always lending-out your films to friends and family, then you can easily lose track of who has your movies and how long they’ve had them. If you’re very attached to your collection All My Movies may make the whole lending process a bit easier by tracking who’s got your films plus it organises your collection like a traditional organiser but also allows you to take simple screenshots from your films to add to the database. Finally Fox Movie Manager claims to do away with all those extra features that you’ll never need and while it is very lightweight, the interface leaves a lot to be desired.

If there’s one thing that has been desperately lacking from YouTube, it’s a statistical analysis tool to show detailed information about who’s been watching your videos. There have been some independent efforts such as TubeMogul and Vidstats but Google have just announced their own official tool - YouTube Insight.

With YouTube Insight, you’ll be able to find out a wealth of data about who’s viewing your videos, where they’ve come from, how they found it plus much more. According to Google:

Uploaders can see how often their videos are viewed in different geographic regions, as well as how popular they are relative to all videos in that market over a given period of time. You can also delve deeper into the lifecycle of your videos, like how long it takes for a video to become popular, and what happens to video views as popularity peaks.

To access YouTube Insight, click under the “About this Video” button under My account > Videos, Favorites, Playlists > Manage my Videos. The tool has mainly been designed for those advertisers and YouTube partners that want to increase their viewing figures and reach a wider audience but it makes fascinating reading for individual uploaders who are simply curious about how people found their videos. Considering the popularity of YouTube worldwide, this is one hell of a marketing tool and remarkably, completely free at the moment. Maybe it will also mean that YouTube can start to reign-in those people that abuse the service with malicious and highly racist comments by being able to track their movements more accurately.

Ripping a DVD is becoming an increasingly tricky affair with encryption methods always improving. Of course, unless it’s for your own use or you own the copyright, you shouldn’t be ripping DVDs at all but sometimes, there’s no other way to obtain that particular sound-bite or clip you want from a film. The problem nowadays is that most rippers simply can’t handle the encryption of commercial DVDs but here are 5 that continue in popularity, precisely because they’re continually updated to deal with this problem.

SmartRipper - Not the most glamorous but certainly the most powerful

Quick Video Converter - Designed for cutting and splicing but includes a very powerful ripper

Freez DVD Ripper - Can be hit and miss but rips very well to iPod format

Magic DVD Ripper - Very fast and helps re-synch dodgy audio tracks

Ahead DVD Ripper - Also provides very precise cutting and merging tools