Overview
VidZone, worldâs largest internet music video service provider is owned and operated by VidZone Digital Media, a company headquartered in London in association with Sony Computer Entertainment services. VidZone specializes in serving free display of music videos from VidZoneâs online portal VidZone.tv apart from distributing music applications through partnerships with a number of mobile networks situated all over the world. The VidZone inventory proudly boasts of having a collection of more than 1.5 million tracks, 25,000 music videos and 15,000 real tones that include complete access to exclusive music and video inventories belonging to industry bigwigs like Sony Music and EMI.
Pricing and availability
On November 9, 2011, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe decided to unveil a revamped version of VidZone, a free online music video displaying service that was extended to the PlayStation 3 video gaming consoles in June 2009. The new look VidZone has been made available for download on PlayStation stores across Europe free of cost. Users, who have already installed the application, need to load the application on their gaming consoles to enjoy the new features.
Whatâs great?
VidZoneâs new platform provides users with an enhanced, flawless, effortless music experience. The designers opine that the updated navigation systems have made it easier like never before for users to locate, and listen to more than a thousand music videos in mesmerizing high definition full-screen quality. The other brand new features include:
1. Zones: Enable the users to avoid browsing through a cluster of songs; instead by directly sorting videos according to the genre they represent which makes viewing new videos according to individual tastes a more pleasurable experience.
2. My Zone: Provides a completely customized experience with the option of creating a virtual library to enable users to add their favorite music video playlists or Television channels. This enables the user to access directly the desired content from their VidZone home screen.
3. V-Mix: Adding another feather to the list of smart apps, the V-Mix showcases a list of music videos by artistes similar to that which a user may currently view.
4. Social Connectivity: dedicating oneâs personal likelihood to a music video never became any easier with the option of sharing personalized video suggestions on the Userâs Facebook page. With just a few clicks a user can invite his play station community friends to share and view videos of their choice.
5. Optimized Search: VidZone has come up with fully updated application that provides easy shortcuts to the most viewed content, as well as a new customized search option that includes tags like âsimilar artistâ which enables locating videos swiftly and easily. The new search option also allows for quick display of results for artistes and their videos by simply typing a few letters of the name of the searched artiste or video.
What is not so great?
There are some lingering problems with the setup of the smartened up version of VidZone that is on offer with PS3 XMBâs. Before starting to use the application, it takes more than a minute to become operational. But, what has perplexed many of the users is the incomplete line up of artistes whose videos make up a combined number of more the ten-thousand. Although Sony has assured its customers that it shall revise the content in a weekly schedule. The user-interface is glossy and fits satisfactorily with the technique that the users are used to viewing elsewhere in the other models of PS3. The navigation is quick but is not fast enough since the sluggish loading of the home page and search results might cause some amount of unease to the new users who would have had high expectations from the navigation speed of the new model. The merit of the music videos is satisfactory but they do fluctuate. If a user intends to enlarge the size of the video screen to the maximum, one might find that it doesnât cover the whole of the screen, a problem which many users have chosen to ignore conveniently since the inability to cover the entire screen helps to reduce the high intake of bandwidth from their respective internet connections.
Things to watch out for
Moving beyond the initial lure of a virtual library having more than ten thousand videos that contribute to a combined viewing of more than twenty one days, there are a host of other features that make the refurbished VidZone application even more attractive. Some of the features include automatic viewing of videos and the option of rewinding and fast-forwarding coupled with the option of creating oneâs own library of streaming music and customized playlists suited for specific occasions. Whether a user want a playlist for a family room workout or a break night party at their house or simply when a user wishes to check out the dance moves of his/her favorite dancer VidZone has equipped itself with features that cater to every such unique demand of its users. If this was not enough the hardware matching between the configurations of PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable allows the VidZone to create playlist contents via Sonyâs hand held digital console and have them played back on their home console. Supported by major music companies in addition to Sony and EMI there are thousands of independent labels promoting prominent artists including the likes of Black Eyed Peas, Dizzy Rascal, Britney Spears, Fatboy slim and The Pussycat Dolls etc.
Verdict
Apart from a few technical glitches that have been mentioned before, VidZone in its newest offering packs an all included entertainment package that includes not only music videos from some of the music industry bigwigs but it also offers live feeds from various live performances organized all across the globe. Furthermore, there are hosts of restricted videos that are on offer like behind the scenes view of recent live performances of artistes like Kasabian. VidZone has assembled a lot of frills to showcase its prowess in ample doses that it forms an integral part of what the fans call the âPlayStation Experienceâ. It is fervently hoped that this newest offering from VidZoneâs stable goes beyond Europe and crosses over to other parts of the world at the earliest since such a delightful service would surely be a disgrace for other people to miss.
Further readings or Word around the web
The European arm of the global electronic consumer goods giant Sony has announced that VidZone, the innovative free music video streaming offering for PlayStation 3, will receive a sizable overhaul. The service will get a face-lift in addition to changes in the navigation that has been promised to be made less complicated, glossy, more common and amusing to use with the addition of various customized features like Zones, My Zone, V-Mix and social networking connectivity. A new VIP Zone has also been added to try out playlists from artists belonging to a broad genre and style of singing that includes Snow Patrol, Blink 182, Pixie Lott, Professor Green, Big Sean and a lot more. Similar to the other zones on offer, the user can view these videos and add them to his/her customized My Zone. It was after receiving the comments of the VidZone users spread all across Europe, the management took the decision to recreate the service with an objective of providing the users with a world class online music video streaming experience.
