For once, everyone getting on board with an online video trend is a good thing. Following on the heels of Google’s announcement yesterday that it will add automatic captioning to YouTube videos, PLYmedia today said that it will be providing live captioning to video platforms Ooyala, Ustream, Livestream, Brightcove, Kaltura, KIT digital and Kyte.

Unlike Google’s captioning system, which automatically creates captions using speech recognition technology, PLYmedia’s SubPLY offering does live captioning with national court reporter-certified transcribers. Using this human approach, PLYmedia says it can deliver more accurate results (Google even admitted that its system can make mistakes and is rolling the service out slowly.)

PLYmedia’s SubPLY also offers automatic translation into “multiple” languages, transcript generation, real-time keyword tag generation as well as Twitter and Facebook integration. The social media hooks allow Twitter and Facebook users to follow a live event through text updates to their news feeds.

In addition to making live video more accessible to the deaf and hard of hearing, the addition of captions will help make video more searchable.

Google is making it easier for deaf, hard-of-hearing and global audiences to enjoy YouTube today, by announcing features that make adding captions to videos much easier.

The first feature uses the same voice-recognition algorithms found in Google Voice along with the YouTube caption system to create auto-captions for videos. A Google blog post announcing the feature warns, “The captions will not always be perfect,” but it’s definitely a good first step.

Additionally, you can automatically translate captions into one of 51 languages, making videos more accessible to a global audience.

The second caption feature is automatic caption timing. This is a slightly more manual process for adding captions to videos, but it’s still very cool. Creators just upload a text file with all the words in a video, and Google figures out when the words are spoken to create the appropriate captions.

An example of both in action is embedded in the video above.

Google says both features will be available in English by the end of this week. Automatic captions will only be visible on select partner channels to start as the company works out the kinks. The auto-timing feature will roll out globally for all English-language vids on YouTube.

When the space shuttle Atlantis takes off for its STS-129 mission to the International Space Station later today, space exploration enthusiasts will have a few options for where to watch online.

The launch, which is set to happen at 2:28 p.m. ET, will be covered by NASA TV, the official online video station of the U.S. government’s space exploration program. NASA TV will stream its coverage in Windows Media format, with archived videos from the launch available later on NASA TV’s official YouTube channel.

In addition to NASA TV’s coverage, Spaceflight Now will have live video from the launch beginning at 10 a.m. ET, with commentary from former CNN reporter Miles O’Brien and former astronauts Bob Crippen and Mike Foale. Spaceflight Now, which is a privately owned site devoted to providing live launch countdowns and other space news, is streaming its coverage in Flash with help from live video startup Livestream. With the recent introduction of iPhone streaming from Livestream (which was launched at NewTeeVee Live last week), viewers will be able to watch the video on their iPhones at http://iphone.livestream.com/spaceflightnowmobile.

Spaceflight Now’s coverage will also include photos from the launch, a frequently updated status center blog and a Twitter feed.

Though NASA’s live footage of bombing the moon last month wasn’t quite as dramatic as we might have hoped/feared, it did result in the major discovery of a “significant amount” of water. Today’s launch isn’t expected to be quite as exciting — the mission is a simple equipment and crew delivery and trade — but it will be live, so you can see for yourself.

Update: The shuttle launch can also be viewed on Spacevidcast.com, which is powered by Ustream.tv.

Brightcove is releasing the latest version of its software today with a slew of new features, such as support for live video streaming and mobile distribution, improved encoding and analytics. But what could really shake up the industry is the introduction of lower-priced, entry-level service packages.

The company has introduced a pricing model, called Brightcove Express, that will target organizations that need a video management platform, but don’t have the budget to spend $6,000 a year for its “Professional” package of services. As a result, Brightcove Express will be rolled out with monthly, pay-as-you-go plans that can be purchased with a credit card.

Brightcove Express plans include:

• A $99-per-month plan, which includes 50 videos, 40GBs of bandwidth, and one user account,
• A $199-per-month plan, which includes 200 videos, 100GBs of bandwidth, and two user accounts, and
• A $499-per-month plan, which includes 500 videos, 250GBs of bandwidth, and three user accounts.

By moving downmarket, Brightcove could put pressure on companies like Fliqz, Veeple, and Delve Networks, all of which offer low-price, pay-as-you-go services to small- and medium-size businesses.

While the introduction of lower-priced packages could help Brightcove attain customers that wouldn’t otherwise buy its services, the company also hopes to increase pressure on the competition with new features and capabilities built into the Brightcove 4 platform.

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What does a company that’s built a thriving business off renting DVDs do in a post-DVD, streaming online video world? At this stage, according to Gary Cohen, the SVP of Marketing and Customer Experience at Redbox, a company that rents DVDs through kiosks at convenient locations, you do a whole lotta testing. Cohen told NewTeeVee co-editor Chris Albrecht at the NewTeeVee Live conference tonight that his company is doing a brand-new digital video test with partners.

While Cohen wouldn’t expand on the test of the partners, he said that the company is doing a variety of tests with technology in addition to digital, like Blu-ray, as well as different types of pricing testing. “We’re trying to find out how to leverage this big digital footprint we have,” said Cohen. “We have a lot of data and a lot of customers and we’re listening to our customers.” Read more of this story

Michael Gregory, the creator of the YouTube remixing phenom Auto-Tune the News, (if you haven’t seen it, drop what you’re doing and go watch this clip) expects that remixed online videos will eventually lose their current extreme buzzy status and settle down to just another art form (like ventriloquism and yodeling, he joked). But as long as vocoder and Auto-Tune the News is still at the height of hipness, the team and Gregory are going to take advantage of it. At our NewTeeVee Live conference, Gregory said that Auto-Tune the News would be launching a viral video campaign with Sony “very soon.”

While Gregory wouldn’t give too many details about the Sony partnership and the content, he said that it would still include the “absurd irreverent take,” that Auto-Tune the News fans have come to know and love. Sony approached the Auto-Tune crew and asked them to provide their take for Sony content, said Gregory, which he added is a positive contrast to companies that want to work with you but end up “putting you in a box.” The content will also be “interactive,” said Gregory, which he’s particularly excited about. Read more of this story