Video hosting service

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Types of Internet hosting service

Full-featured hosting services Virtual private server Dedicated hosting Colocation centre Web hosting Free hosting Shared hosting Clustered hosting Reseller hosting Application-specific Blog hosting Image hosting Video hosting Wiki farms File hosting Remote backup service Game server hosting DNS hosting E-mail hosting

A video hosting service allows individuals to upload video to an Internet website. The video host will then store the video on its server, and show the individual different types of code to allow others to view that video. Because many users do not have personal webspace, either as a paid service, or through an ISP offering, Video Hosting services are becoming increasingly popular as the demand for hosting services increases. Especially with the explosion of the popularity of blogs, forums, and other interactive pages.

The mass market for camera phones has increased the supply of consumer generated video. Traditional methods of consumer video distribution, such as making a DVD to show to friends at home, are unsuited to the low resolution and high volume of camera phone clips. In contrast, current broadband Internet connections are well suited for serving the quality of video shot on mobile phones. Most consumers do not own web servers, and this has created a demand for hosting consumer generated video content, which the likes of YouTube are catering for - YouTube serve tens of millions of clips daily.

Wikipedia hosts around 200 videos in the Ogg format on its servers. Wikipedia actively discourages non-free videos and formats: videos added to Wikipedia are supposed to be freely available for reuse. This contrasts with video hosting services such as YouTube, which can hold copyright material, though some rights must be given up to such companies in return for the hosting.