Remember Flip, the diminutive digital camcorder whose short life was snuffed out by a combination of mismanagement and the advent of smartphones that could record higher-quality HD video? The cameras are still six feet under, and as of this week, so is the companion FlipShare service.
Flip Video master Cisco Systems has sent an email to users of FlipShare announcing that the sun is finally setting on the video sharing service, which was a companion to the hardware itself and allowed users to share their videos with loved ones as sort of a more private kind of YouTube. It’s a bit of a sad ending to cap off the once-mighty Flip camcorder that just a short time ago revolutionized on-the-go video recording.
“Thank you for your loyalty and support of Flip Video,” the email begins. “Starting March 15, 2012, videos shared through email or FlipShare groups will only be available online for viewing and downloading for 30 days after being sent. At the same time, older videos that you might have shared more than 30 days in the past will also expire.
“Remember, the original videos that you have stored on your computer are not affected and you can use FlipShare to re-share these videos, as well as allowing your friends and family to download these videos for permanent storage at any point in that 30 days,” the notice continues.
While FlipShare may be going away, they’re handing the keys to their castle over to Givit, a mobile video sharing service currently offering an iOS app as part of their business model.
“We know that many of you are looking for a way to store your videos online for a longer period of time,” Cisco explains. “Today we are happy to announce a new offering called Givit, an alternative service to FlipShare, through which you can share and store videos online for more than 30 days. You can also import your previously shared FlipShare videos to Givit to keep them online for your friends and family to view. Givit is a long-standing technology partner of Cisco, but Givit is not part of Cisco.”
More information on the FlipShare to Givit transition can be found on the Givit website, including full details on migrating videos to their service, which comes with 2GB of free cloud storage. Additional premium packages are also available ranging from 10GB ($29.99 per year) to 50GB ($99.99 per year), and FlipShare users will get double the storage space with any paid upgrade.
Meanwhile, Cisco will continue to provide technical support for Flip cameras as well as the FlipShare service until December 31, 2013; a FAQ page documenting the changes is available on the Flip support website.
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