Windows Experience Blog : MSN Video

Add MSN Video Feeds to Zune as Video Podcasts

Brandon LeBlanc — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 08:09:00 GMT

The MSN Video folks have updated Soapbox on MSN Video to allow users the ability to subscribe and add someone's video "stream" to Zune. You'll notice a new Zune icon next to the RSS icon on people's profiles on Soapbox for MSN Video.

When you click the Zune icon, it adds the video feed to the Zune software. For example - when you go to my profile on Soapbox for MSN Video (where I host my videos I post here) and click the Zune icon - my video feed will appear in the Zune software.

Any new videos I publish to Soapbox on MSN Video will then be downloaded into the Zune software which can also be synced to a Zune device. When I post video demos of cool Windows or Windows Live features and announcements - you can put them on your Zune and show your friends.

I expect to be doing more videos in the coming weeks so definitely pay attention here of course and my video feed on Soapbox for MSN Video.

Check out these new Sidebar Gadgets for Windows Vista

Brandon LeBlanc — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 06:49:00 GMT

Today I've got some pretty neat new Sidebar Gadgets to tell you about for Windows Sidebar.

If you're into Baseball, you'll like this new Gadget. Fox Sports on MSN is offering a Fantasy Baseball Gadget brought to you by People-Ready Business from Microsoft.

With this Gadget, you can check up on Fantasy Baseball news, check player stats, and create your own roster. This Gadget requires Adobe Flash so if you're running Windows Vista x64 (like me), you'll need to run Windows Sidebar under 32-bit. To do that in Windows Vista x64 - just go to C:/Program Files (x86)/Windows Sidebar and execute sidebar.exe from there.

Download the People-Ready Fantasy Baseball Gadget here.

Another new Gadget to check out is the brand new MSN Video Gadget for Windows Sidebar. The MSN Video Team announced its availability today along with some highlights as to what you can do with the Gadget on their blog.

Download the MSN Video Gadget here.

Got a Sidebar Gadget recommendation? Would love to hear them!

MSN Video V4 Launched with new Soapbox features

Brandon LeBlanc — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 04:23:00 GMT

Here on the Windows Experience Blog, I use Soapbox on MSN Video to embed and share all my videos for my blog posts. Tonight, the Soapbox and MSN Video Team has launched MSN Video V4 with new features to Soapbox worth taking note of:

Enhanced Copyright violation. Soapbox users will now be explicated told one of their videos has been flagged for copyright violation versus previously the video would simply not show up without any sort of message.
Improved encoding time. This is a HUGE plus for me because it lets me get videos uploaded faster when writing a blog post. Previously, it took quite a bit of time to get a video completely uploaded to be embedded into a blog post.
New Mini-Showcase. The Mini-Showcase is a new area on the landing page where the video team editors can show you what's hot on the site. I'm hoping to get one of my videos flagged for the Mini-Showcase sometime in the next few months.

There are a few more notable changes to take into account. When going to soapbox.msn.com - you will be directed to MSN Video. Soapbox is now directly part of MSN Video. In the menu you will see a new addition of "Soapbox user videos" where you can access user generated content from Soapbox including your profile via a new drop down menu. Also: you will note that MSN Video now consumes the most out of the browser window instead of being a fixed width at the center.

Congratulations to the MSN Video Team for pushing out an excellent new release of MSN Video and Soapbox and I look forward to continuing to use the service to share videos with my readers.

Users using the new Windows Live Photo Gallery beta can also now publish videos directly to Soapbox on MSN Video. This feature continues to work absolutely wonderful for me especially with the improved encoding time from tonight's release.

Be sure to keep your eyes peeled on the Soapbox on MSN Video Blog for more on tonight's update.