UberChannel, another new video site, tried to have a super-secret launch. They succeeded: they've been around since late October, and they've been mentioned in precisely zero blog posts since then. I only stumbled across the site last night after seeing a link on Bebo labeled "check out our friend's site". Now that the Bebo team are promoting it, Uberchannel can't stay off the radar for much longer.
Another interesting feature: they offer three types of widget to share on MySpace, hi5, Piczo, Multiply and other networks...a square widget, a horizonal banner and a vertical banner. It seems these are updated when you add new clips to the channel. Users can already create channels on YouTube, of course, but on UberChannel these can be collaborative - you can allow anyone to post videos, and moderate all the submissions so nothing offensive gets posted.
Just like YouTube, you can explore the featured, most popular, most recent and most subscribed channels. There's also messaging, profiles and the ability to track your channel's stats. The question, of course, is whether these "channel" sites add any value on top of what YouTube already supplies. You'll remember that ChannelMe.tv wants to do a similar thing, although the advantage there is that you'll also get your own domain name. Uberchannel, meanwhile, doesn't even offer memorable URLs. So I think it has limited appeal, but it's certainly worth checking out.
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