Overlay.tv - Adding Glitter and Commerce to Net Videos

New fangled video oriented startups are a dime a dozen, however Overlay.tv has entered the cramped arena offering something actually cool and entertaining. The concept is fairly simple: users can overlay stuff over videos. There are animations, graphics, icons, pointers and text all available so that you can add some shimmer and glitter to the video of your choice. Simply pull in a video from Youtube, Google Video, Myspace, etc., and use the Overlay dashboard to start piecing things together. Besides making for some pretty amusing jokes, Overlay also targets the advertising sector. Items in a video, a shirt, someone’s skirt, a musical instrument, whatever, can be highlighted and put up for sale. Create your own online store based on a video and viewers will be able to purchase directly from the video itself. Of course all that stuff sometimes becomes annoying and tiresome, so Overlay gives you the option to switch it off.

“Overlay.TV is an interactive media company that provides a video commerce platform that enables Internet users, content owners and e-commerce sites to monetize and customize their video assets by overlaying contextual information directly onto online video content and linking to external websites. Overlay.TV is a private company headquartered in Ottawa, Canada.”

This Canadian company has come up with a noteworthy and flexible product. It’s fun, for one-- great for sharing overlayed videos on Facebook and other social networks-- and it’s got a number of valuable tie ins and market affliations. It turns videos into vehicles of commerce. Good idea and they’ve got a catchy video to boot.

Will people actually be prompted to buy items they see in a video?