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MSN Soapbox Review

  • CNET.com, Friday, September 22, 2006 11:45 AM
CNET offers a review of the nuts and bolts of MSN's Soapbox, leaving commentary on its merits, for the most part, aside. Soapbox has some nice features, like the ability to tag other people's videos and comment on them, which makes the most popular videos easy to find. Unlike YouTube, you can also browse the site's video catalog without stopping the video you're watching. Obviously, Soapbox uses Windows Media Player technology for those using Internet Explorer. For those using Mozilla's Firefox browser or Apple's Safari, it uses Flash. Uploading is easy, just like it is on YouTube. Videos can be of any length, as long as the file is fewer than 100 megs. Also like YouTube, the service takes almost any format and converts it to Windows Media or Flash. Sharing videos is also easy, but you can't edit them once they're uploaded, like certain sites. You can't post videos into blogs, like VideoEgg, or use privacy controls, like Vox. You also can't make any money from videos you upload, like you can with Revver. "Soapbox has plenty of features. What it's missing is content and community," CNET says--which are the very elements that make a viral video service successful.

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