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Scott Stys

The Curbside Investigator

You might have noticed that in the last month, I haven’t done a whole lot of Podcasting over at The Curbside Investigator.  That’s because my caseload has increased dramatically, and I’ve had very little time to research any of the topics I’d like to discuss.  Getting caught up on work means I get to take care of the Podcasts as well and I’ve been looking at a few different sites that should help you get things done.

More and more, I find that information is openly posted on social media sites such as Facebook, MySpace and others.  This information used to be difficult to obtain and now, our subjects are handing it over to us!  The trick is in knowing how to get the information from the internet onto our PC’s.

Download helper sites such as Keepvid.com and Youddl.com allow you to insert a URL and then download and in the case of Keepvid, convert the Flash file to Mpeg format.  These are great sites to download video from any computer at any time.  They don’t require installation of software or any user account.  Both are worth bookmarking.

Firefox extensions are another option, particularly if you use Firefox as your main browser; and you should.  Extensions are plug-ins that increase the functionality of Firefox in specialized ways.  The Firefox video download helper works great and not only saves video, but audio and image galleries as well.

With so many free options out there, I don’t see a reason for a paid solution to saving online videos, however if that’s how you roll, take a look at CamStudio, Replay AV and WM Recorder.  Between these three, you should have all your needs taken care of.

Do you have any favorite solutions for downloading online video?  Have you run into any problems?  If so, let me know.  I appreciate any and all feedback.  You can find out more about the Podcast by visiting the Podcast page on the USAPI website, or go to http://www.curbsideinvestigator.com and you can email me at scott@curbsideinvestigator.com