All heck is breaking loose over here on the forums. We got some video storage needs and we are looking at Amazon's S3 (Simple Storage Service) to do all our dirty (and what used to be expensive) video hosting. There is a tutorial in the tutorial section on how to set it all up using the free Firefox extension that puts a S3 compatible FTP client in Firefox.

As proof of concept I uploaded a few flv's and I'm playing them back in the jukebox flv player. Un-REAL! Yes, it will deliver video!

OK, I got S3 fever baby! Take a look at this guy's site: http://www.howdoimakeit.info/index.html

Notice anything? It's running on S3! Shoot, you can do it too. Throw up a page, put some video up and monetize using adsense.

OK, why am I, and others, so jazzed? Well, how does $.15 per month storage and $.20 per month transfer per GIG sound? Got video? Now you got hosting too!

More? OK, the S3 api is very simple and there are a lot of programmers using it to develop code for their aplications. I put a CFM file up and can upload files from my website! SmugMug (photo hosting) claims they implemented S3 in a matter of days and saved $500K by using S3 to host their photos.

So, there's a great tip for you this week. Go on over to Amazon and get a free account. OH, I forgot to mention. There are free applications that will allow you to mount S3 like a network drive. Google the phrase S3Drive and JungleDrive. I recommend JungleDrive as it is MUCH easier to set up.

Perry