There are only a couple things left to do this summer. For instance, I have a gnawing project at home that I just haven't finished. I've been busy painting the house (how's that for a fun 'staycation'?). It's all finished, except for one spot; the ceiling in the entry way. Started it, just haven't finished the edges. It really wouldn't be so bad, except when I turn on the light at night for the front door and welcoming someone in. Then I suddenly remember, "oh yeah, I need to finish the ceiling in here..."

Well, luckily TechSmith is a little better at getting stuff done than I am. This week we're pushing a handy little feature that we've been meaning to get to all summer; the ability to send custom email invitations.

Here's a little Jing video showing how this works:

What's nice is that we're still working on a lot of other features for Screencast.com. And, we really appreciate the feedback many of you gave us recently in our customer survey. We're looking at what you want closely. More than a few mentioned multiple user accounts (which we're working on) and viewer statistics and analytics.  Those are the top features on our list too.

So, keep the feedback coming and let us know what you think of the new custom email invitations. Happy screencasting!

We've talked about RSS (Real Simple Syndication) a little bit before, but I wanted to added a little more information to help everyone know how to use it, since it can be so helpful.

Kelly Mullins posted early the Screencast.com and RSS article a few weeks ago. As a follow-up to that article, here is a video (2:58 minutes) that will walk you through the following:

* What RSS is

* How content owners can use RSS

* How viewers benefit from RSS

* How users can subscribe to content using RSS

You can watch a larger version here: http://www.screencast.com/t/OAems4p9W

I know RSS has been a great tool for me to stay up to date on the blogs and sites that I like to regularly follow, but don't want to have to visit to find out what's new.

If you've never used RSS before, it's super simple to use. If you decide that you no longer the subscription, you can always get rid of it.

You can even subscribe to this blog to make sure you keep up to date on lots of tips, tricks, and news about Screencast.com. Click on the RSS icon to get started.

Did you know you can hide the Screencast.com branding on your view page? When the branding is hidden, your content is seen in a plain white wrapper and only a small Powered by Screencast.com logo is visible.

If the Commenting feature has been turned on for a piece of content, the comments will be still be available.

When the branding is turned off:

• The ability for your viewers to download content and attachments is disabled.

• The Details tab is hidden from view.

• The breadcrumb links leading back to your library are removed.

Note: Branding is turned on or off on a folder basis - individual pieces of content in the library or in a folder cannot have the branding turned on or off.

To turn off branding for a folder:

1. Hover over a folder in the library.
2. Click the Edit icon.The Edit Folders Properties dialog box appears.
3. To hide the branding, click the Viewers see content only option.
   
4. Click Done.

One of the most frequently asked questions we get here at Screencast.com is "Can I see how many times my video has been viewed?". The answer is a resounding "Yes, you can!".
And, it's quite simple to do - just toggle the view from Tile to Details while in a folder. The Tile and Detail icons are located in the upper right corner of the screen.

When in Details view, you can also see the:

• Last modified date for a content file in a folder or playlist
• Privacy level assigned to a piece of content.
• Number of files in a folder or playlist
• Total size of all the content in a folder or playlist

This Help Center article tells you more about viewing your content statistics in a folder or playlist.

I recently discovered one of the powers of screencasting. From the end of September until the second week of November I had been traveling a ton. As it sometimes happens when I travel my family tends to miss me, and in this case particular my eight-year old son was not happy to have me leave so much. It was especially tough when I traveled to California with a three hour time difference. (We're in Michigan)

During the last week of my travel schedule (only if I had thought of it earlier), I decided I would put the power of the screen to work. In the evenings when I had a little free time I would record a short screencast. In this case it was me playing a video game on Lego.com along with a web cam of myself. I would talk through the process of what I was doing and thinking.

Well, he loved it. My wife said that he was happier and I know I felt more connected.

Incidentally he's learned how to make recordings with Jing, and I look forward to seeing his screencasts when I go on future trips.

So, now it's your turn. Do you have a great use for screencasts that you want to share? Maybe you have a great screencast that you want to share. If you do, let me know.

We'd love to hear and pass on your stories. We'd also like to show off some of the screencasts that you all are making and hosting on Screencast.com. You can either leave a note for me here in the comments, email me at m.pierce [at] techsmith.com, or find me on twitter @piercemr.

On the heels of our most recent update, I wanted to make sure I provided an example of moving media around without breaking the links.

Here's a short (1:24 minute) video:

This video was made on-the-fly with Camtasia Studio 6 (mpeg-4 encoding), a Rode Podcaster microphone, and recorded at my messy desk... although I like to think that the mess absorbs some of the ambient sound in my office.

One point to remember as you organize your media is that changing your Display Name or the name of the folder/playlist will cause your URLs associated with that name or folder/playlist to break. This includes embedded links, embed code, and the MediaRoll.

If you weren't aware of this, If you're having problems or want to learn more about Screencast.com you may want to check out the Help Center. Kelly Mullins, the Help Center Guru, has been hard at work adding tutorials and tons of useful information.

Matt Pierce, TechSmith Training Manager
I Screencast - do you?

If you didn't see the blog post previous to this about the new commenting feature on Screencast.com, here's a second chance. We've created a short tutorial video to walk you through some of the basics of the commenting feature.

Video (2:59 minutes, 5.54 MB)

View the larger version of the video here: http://www.screencast.com/t/ZGNhvOvnv

A couple of key points: Commenting is off by default, so if you would like to use comments, you'll need to turn the feature on. You can control whether you're notified of new comments or not. You can remove comments, and then if you need, reinstate them. And finally, you and your viewers can have an RSS feed for the comments.

Here in the training department at TechSmith, we're super excited to use commenting on Screencast.com. We use Screencast.com to host our videos for review and then send each other lots of feedback about how to improve the video tutorials trhough email. With the new commenting feature we can say goodbye to the back and forth emails and start posting comments! This not only cuts the clutter in all of our in-boxes, it also puts the comments all in one place.

How will you use the new commenting feature?

I wanted to share an updated video with everyone about some fundamentals of screencasting. Here at TechSmith, especially in the training department, we make a lot of screencasts.

Its been a goal of ours to share more of what we do and how we do it. This 3:25 minute video is an introductory look at how to improve your screencasts. In particular, this video goes through the basics of preparation, including scripting, story boarding, and more.

We'd love to hear if you have any tips that you use to make your screencasts better.

Some of you may have already noticed that on Screencast.com we have video tutorials. We try to create tutorials on functions and features that will help you out if you get a little confused or aren't sure of what to do. We also try to point out some of the things you may not know are possible.

If you haven't seen them yet, there are couple ways to find them. When you signed up for an account you could choose to get the Screencast.com Tips emails.

Didn't get those or missed it when you were signing up? Go to your Account and click on Tips and Tricks: Manage Subscription. Check out this quick how to video (15 sec. no audio):

See we even make tutorials about getting tutorials.

Don't want to mess with email - well you can see all of the training videos here: http://www.screencast.com/t/oUKFzJH6dSn. You can even subscribe to the RSS feed to be notified when we add new content.

We'll also post them to the blog. But due to some size constraints, the version you see here will be smaller than the ones in the training folder. But either way you still get the same content.

What Kind of Content is available?
Most of the tutorials are about using Screencast.com, but a few of them are about making better screencasts. These are things that we find a lot of people struggle with - us included. So we're taking what we learn and are trying to share them.

For instance - getting good quality audio that sounds really good is tough. To help we created a video about getting better audio: http://www.screencast.com/t/ee7qBLFUBv

Now the best part is- we're not done making tutorials. If there's something that you want to learn how to do with Screencast.com or there's a general topic that you're interested in that is related to screencasting, let us know. I can't guarantee that every suggestion will get a video, but we look at each suggestion and do what we can to help.

Screencast.com can host any file for download, but can only embed certain file types on the view page. Below is a table that describes the video formats that can be embedded on Screencast.com along with common extensions.

Video

For the complete list of files types, including audio and image formats, check out this tutorial in the Help Center.