Tracking the Best Videos On the Web

The history of web video is complex. There was no exact date when web video became a standard part of the end user's Internet experience. There are, however, a variety of factors that contributed to the rise of web video into the staple it has become today.

Just a few years ago three technologies dominated the playback of video on a web page: Apple's QuickTime format, Microsoft's Windows Media Player format, and Real's RealPlayer format. At the time, video was viewed by web designers as "video," and not as part of the web page's content. Increasingly, web designers now view video as "content" and have adjusted how they use, view, and manipulate video for use on web pages. In addition, websites and services such as YouTube and MySpace have brought web video and viewers closer together and with greater numbers than ever before.

Factors influencing the rise of web video include general growth of the web, greater numbers of people with faster/high-speed/broadband Internet connections, and the Standards Movement. The Standards Movement pushed for standardized best practices to be applied by web designers when developing websites.

Another huge component in the history of web video is the purchase of Macromedia, who developed Flash and its accompanying Flash Video Player, by Adobe in late 2005. Since then, Flash Video Player has become the dominant industry standard for playback of web video. Most of the web video streaming or hosting services make use of the Flash Video Player for playback of their videos. Examples include, YouTube, Google Video, MySpace, AOL Video, and Yahoo! Video. Since Flash Video Player has become a relative industry standard, the use of web video itself has continued to grow.

With the current ease of use and continually developing technologies, anyone can create and then upload video to hosting or streaming services making their video available to anyone who has a high-speed connection and the Flash Video Player. Not all web video uses the Flash Video Player, but it is unquestionably the most common video format used currently.