...well, that's what the results of the questionnaire point to - and there's a certificate to prove it

Mingle² - Blog addiction test

Oops, Live Writer doesn't quite properly handle the HTML code to post in from doing the blog addiction test - may get time to have a look at later - or, give up some blogging and get back to being normal .

Have a look at Steve Clayton's page (where webDotWiz got the idea from in the first place) to see how it should appear.

Now that webDotWiz has wasted some of your precious time looking at this drivel, you can get back to doing something useful such as exploring the world on Live Maps.

The Soapbox team have just announced that Soapbox on MSN Video (soapbox.msn.com) is now open to the world, i.e., a Windows Live ID is no longer required to sign in to view videos - just go to the site and view to your heart's content.

However, if you're going to upload your own videos, or tag and comment on videos, you'll need to sign in with your Live ID.

It's worth noting that content on Soapbox is now filtered for copyright on a proactive basis so copyright holders can be confident their material is protected.

The Soapbox team announced a few hours ago the next generation of Soapbox on MSN Video (soapbox.msn.com).

There are some good screenshots on the Soapbox team Space and they show up better than here since their Space is using a wide layout for their blog so go and have a look.

webDotWiz hasn't gone through all the new things yet but here are a couple of new features:

• Scalable Page: Change the size of your browser and the thumbnails and page will scale dynamically.
• New Player with integrated Playlists and Progessive Download Indicators.
• Playlist functionality. Each time you watch a video it is automatically added to the playlist. The Playlist can also be shared.
• Improved fullscreen experience
• Video Gallery Sorts. Sort by Hour, Day etc.
• Updated Embedded Player with clean design and Playlist features.
• Upload videos of unlimit lengths
• High quality video encoding
• Watch video with your Live Messenger friends (using the Messenger activity window).

As well, there's a new MSN Video site at http://next.video.msn.com drawing on the many Premiere-Level video content partners, such as NBC News, MSNBC, and scores of other networks.

Has links to a couple of demos where you can see the same movie rendered as DVD alongside rendered as HD DVD.

• Casino Royale - look at the horse and the bikini.
• Serenity - look at the lights on the ships.

Quote

Steve Rowe's Blog : How Much Better Is High Definition Video?

Via The Soapbox Team Space.

The latest Soapbox video player gadget for Live Spaces and Live.com is the most comprehensive one available and it's worth the bit of pain to remove others on your Space or Live.com page and replace it with this latest one.

To install it on your own Space, click the blue + sign at the top right of the player module over there at the top right of the page. Choose Add to your Space from the drop down list of options and do the usual once your Space loads (move it to the right-hand side of your page, click the Install this gadget button, and Save the changes to your Space by clicking the the Save button on the yellow warning strip at the top).

The new player appears on your Space (or Live.com page) as:

Because you'll be signed in to your Space, you'll see a Settings button at the top right of the player module. Click this and you can choose what videos you want to show when visitors come to your Space.

Just note that, if you choose to list your own videos or favorites from Soapbox, you'll have to go to your Profile in My Soapbox (at Soapbox) to get your personal ID - it's a big jumble of letters and numbers after ...user=. Copy and paste this into the input box in the player.

For example, if you want the playlist to consist of your videos on Soapbox, you'll see:

This new player is not only useful to visitors to your Space but it's a convenient, alternative way instead of going into the Soapbox site itself.

Once you've chosen a video to play by clicking on its thumbnail,  the module fills with the video display area. To return to your playlist, click the X at the top right of the playing display.

The days of waiting and hoping your invite would come through so you could view, upload, share, and use the other features on MSN Soapbox Video, are over - MSN Soapbox is now open to everybody as a public trial.

Just go to http://soapbox.msn.com, sign in with your Live ID (if you haven't already through Live Messenger) and enjoy all of Soapbox's video features.

Remember to do a search for all the videos that the webDotWizards have uploaded - search for Rushworth and you'll get them.

Via Soapbox team space.

This afternoon at 1.30 pm (Australian Eastern Summer Time) Bill Gates made the keynote presentation.

webDotWiz watched the stream in Windows Media Player at a whole 100 kbits/sec on his ISDN connection - the audio was ok but, naturally, the video was awful at that speed (other streaming speeds were 500 and 200 kbits/sec).

This year TV, as last year, was mentioned - but this time it was how high definition TV will be available to PCs and the XBox 360 over the Internet (the tech name for TV delivery over the Internet is IPTV). A reminder that the reason for using the Internet for TV delivery to homes is cost - it's much, much cheaper over the 'Net than over the traditional airwaves, especially when it's in high definition format. Of course, there's also the reason that TV production houses now recognise that we want to watch our favourites shows and movies when we decide to watch, not when the TV stations want us to.

An interesting fact is that now 80% of PC sales in the U.S. run Windows Media Center so the PC and TV are connected. Sales of PCs in Australia with Media Center barely rate a mention because the TV stations won the battle against users being able to automatically schedule their Media Center PCs to record their favourite shows for viewing at the user's pleasure. So Australia slowly but surely slides back into the Dark Ages...

To see some of the stuff that Bill Gates and others presented, go to Microsoft at CES or microsoft.com/ces.

If for no other reason, fast forward through until you see the demo of Vista Ultimate Extras (there's the Windows Ultimate site to check out, too).

Apparently some Soapbox users had a problem with some sort of mixup with nicknames (one webDotWizard Webmaster had the prob). The good news is that the problem is fixed - see here for more info. By the way, one indicator of the nickname problem is you can't access your contact card, i.e., when you hover the mouse over your Live ID profile picture, you won't get the little down arrow that gives you access to your contact card, a link to your Space, and so on.

Just when the webDotWizards on Friday morning were preparing to upload some of their videos to Soapbox, they were greeted with a message to say that the site was being updated. Well, it looks as though the changes will be beneficial so inconvenience can be put aside.

Anyway, that gave them some time to have a look at some great bird's eye views of cities in Europe, particularly sights around Rome because of updates to imagery of European and US cities.

In brief, here are the updates to Soapbox (via the Soapbox team Space):

• improved Flash uploader - it shows progress and, by the way, there's no size limit on videos uploaded
• in your profile the contact card is now available, just as we're used to in Live Spaces (although as of time of writing, it hasn't appeared for webDotWiz)
• the details tab (in the Video Panel on the right-hand side of the page, opened when you choose a video to view) gives all the info about the video and a list of similar videos
• the share tab now enables you to blog immediately to your Space. Note, for the time being, it's just a link to a Soapbox video. Later on we'll be able to directly embed the video and player into a Space entry
• a couple of things webDotWiz can't yet see:
• set permission on a video to public or hidden
• new codecs
• embedded player now can have maximum of 100 videos in a playlist
• there are two embedded players: the normal one and if you set the width to less than 300px, a compact version

Via Frank Arrigo, from an article on the Sydney Morning Herald site this evening (06-Dec-2006):

Network Ten will begin making entire television programs available for download immediately after they air from early in the new year.

Frank has a couple of questions:

• What format
• What platform
• Which programs
• Will it be free or is it paid
• What download technology
• Will there be any DRM involved
• Support for Windows Media Center

webDotWiz has a further question:

• How do people who aren't on broadband get access to this (proposed) service? Or, to put it another way: How do people who probably in the near future won't have a broadband service get the same benefits as their city cousins?

Twango is another photo, video and audio free storage and sharing service (up to 250Mb).

For those with a site apart from their Live Space, Twango has several tools that are easily implemented so you can show off your photos or videos.

Once you've uploaded some photos, for example, you can go to the Tools page and choose which method you'd like to use so your photos are displayed on a page or pages of your site. After you choose the way you want your photos displayed, simply copy and paste the embed code into your HTML page.

Note at the present time that the <embed>...</embed> tag is not supported in Live Spaces (that's why it's a bit of a problem to show videos on our Space but that's to be fixed in the near future).

You'll be able to see one of Twango's tools in action at webDotWiz Online on this coming Thursday (Dec 7th) when webDotWiz's latest column is published.

Another player, Video Player for Soapbox, shows off your Soapbox videos and is available from the Soapbox Team's space (or from here). To install on your own Space, click the + at the top right of the module.

You can choose whether you want to play:

• your favourites
• your videos
• a single video (one of your own or another person's), or,
• a search term to find a particular video

from the Soapbox library.

The different embed codes are on this post at the Soapbox space.

You get the embed code from below the video you choose to play on the right-hand side of the screen by right-clicking and copying into the Video Player for Soapbox textbox (in edit mode on your Space, naturally).

Remember you only want the stuff between <embed> and </embed> so delete the extra stuff that gets copied over that's after the </embed>.

Soapbox on MSN Video is currently being trialled and to get access through your Windows Live ID (the new name for the old-fashioned Hotmail and Passport accounts) you need to ask for an invite.

Go ahead and try because it seems that in the past week or so any webDotWizard who has applied has been granted an invite. Go to Soapbox on MSN Video and request an invitation and wait for a reply in your inbox .

While you're waiting, get out Photo Story or Movie Maker and begin putting together a movie of your photos  or some of your home movies.

(Above screenshot from the Xbox 360 Video Marketplace)

From the press release at XBox.com:

With a robust library of 160 high-definition games expected by holiday, Xbox 360™, the video game and entertainment system from Microsoft Corp., will get even better today (Nov 22, 2006, U.S. time)...

Xbox Live Marketplace will now provide gamers with easy access to hundreds of full-length TV shows for download to own and movies for download to rent from CBS, MTV Networks, Paramount Pictures, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. (TBS, Inc.), Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and Warner Bros. Home Entertainment with more content rolled out through Xbox Live Marketplace every week. Xbox 360 is the first gaming console to offer standard and high-definition TV shows and movies via digital distribution.

and from Major Nelson's blog:

A couple of weeks ago we announced that you would be able to download complete HD and SD versions of your favorite movies and TV shows from the Xbox Live Markeplace. That day is now here…moments ago we flipped the switch and the service is now available for all U.S. Xbox Live members...

Edit: To everyone complaining posting about why this is not available in their country, please listen to show #201, specifically the interview with Ross. He explains it quite nicely. If we had our way, we’d make it available to as many people as possible.

Those in Australia with real high-speed broadband might be feeling sad and frustrated but take a moment to think of those of us who are still using 1920's phone lines to get, at best, what is now considered barely broadband (those living within 3-4 km of a phone exchange) and those of us further away from an exchange (up to 10 km) who have to survive with 1990's ISDN.

For a look back at webDotWiz last ten years on the 'Net, see his column for this week (23-Nov-2006).

webDotWiz is doing something wrong when he's copying and pasting the code to play a Soapbox on MSN video because he's still getting Dare's default Google video in there .

webDotWiz noticed on the Soapbox team space that he has to be careful in copying and pasting the embed video code for a particular Soapbox video:

If you are cutting and pasting the embed code directly from Soapbox, make sure you remove any of the link code that is added to the bottom of the html.

This is what you get when you right-click, copy then paste the embed player code:

<embed src="http://soapbox.msn.com/flash/soapbox1_1.swf" quality="high" width="412" height="362" wmode="transparent" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" flashvars="c=v&v=1d2d76a5-57fe-4d26-94bf-3ab43fb56900" ></embed><br /><a href="http://soapbox.msn.com/video.aspx?vid=1d2d76a5-57fe-4d26-94bf-3ab43fb56900" target="_new" title="Windows Movie Maker Video Tutorial">Video: Windows Movie Maker Video Tutorial</a>

That bit in bold above (after the </embed>) is the extra stuff that the Soapbox team say has to be removed. So the only stuff to be pasted into the text box in the Embedded Video Gadget is:

<embed src="http://soapbox.msn.com/flash/soapbox1_1.swf" quality="high" width="412" height="362" wmode="transparent" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" flashvars="c=v&v=1d2d76a5-57fe-4d26-94bf-3ab43fb56900" ></embed>

Oh well, back to the drawing board to give it another try.

From the Soapbox team Space - there's now the Soapbox on MSN video gadget that you can add to your Live Space (and/or your Live.com page) that ToddOs has created to

Watch Recent, Most Commented, or Tag search videos

Yep, it's the one at the top right of this page. Scroll along to choose a video to watch, click the image, and the module opens to make room for the Soapbox player to appear with your chosen video. The other two options, Most Commented and Tag Search, can be accessed from the other two tabs.

You can download and install the Soapbox on MSN video gadget from this page at the Live Gallery.

This is quite a snazzy gadget because it gives you access to the Soapbox on MSN videos without a whole lot of humbug on your part.

In an announcement on XBox.com news:

On November 6, Microsoft Corp. announced agreements with CBS, MTV Networks, Paramount Pictures, Turner Broadcasting System Inc. (TBS Inc.), Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), and Warner Bros. Home Entertainment to bring an initial lineup of more than 1,000 hours of hit television shows and movies to Xbox 360™ consoles in the U.S. by the end of the year. Additionally, Xbox 360 will be the first gaming console to bring standard and HD TV shows and movies to the customer via digital distribution over the Internet.
Beginning on its first anniversary, November 22, Xbox 360 will become the first gaming console in history to provide HD TV shows and movies directly to gamers in their own living rooms. Xbox 360 gamers will be able to download full-length TV shows to own, and will be able to rent movies via download from the Xbox Live® network, the world leader in online distribution of high-definition gaming and entertainment content.

Sadly this service won't be available for Australian XBoxers until some time in the future  - just like we won't see the Zune until 2007 or 2008 :(.

In a post thanking those who contributed to the feature requests on Windows Live Local/Virtual Earth team space, the team mentioned a Live Local collection of famous locations that make up the history of rock and roll in the UK.

Windows Media Player 11 for XP, Home or Professional with Service Pack 2 installed, can be downloaded from the link on the Windows Media homepage. The download is 24.5Mb in size so it'll take a while on a dialup Internet connection.

One of WMP 11's new features is Media Sharing. Another webDotWiz noticed is that when burning CDs, there's now an option to burn your data across multiple CDs if more than one CD is needed (it's called Disc Spanning). Read about these features, and others such as improved syncing between different devices, on the Enjoy Everywhere page.

To get started with new features in WMP 11, check out the how-to's on the Using Windows Media Player 11 page.

webDotWiz should mention, too, a feature he's become accustomed to, namely the use of album art to display your library of music, videos and photos, and the quick search feature to find a particular song or album.

Happy listening and playing.

According to Bink (via Neowin), the final release version of Windows Media Player could be this Tue, Oct 31 (probably a day later for Australia, assuming the rumour is correct).

All this started from a Microsoft Press Release of Oct 12 which states:

Windows Media Player 11 will be available via free download beginning Oct. 24 and will enable users to take advantage of an elegant and intuitive user interface, a new level of online store integration, especially with MTV’s URGE service, and improved navigation for larger music libraries.

Having used the WMP 11 trial version, webDotWiz is eager to get his hands on the final release - he'll be a happy boy .