The Videogram Creator software application is designed to let users create, edit and send video emails over the Internet. These video emails combine text, graphics and up to 5 minutes of video which is compressed into a self-contained HTML file. The recipient can view the ‘Videograms’ using any standard browser or email application on either the Windows or Macintosh platforms. When the HTML file is opened, it looks like a normal web page and the video immediately begins to play within a window on that page. Creating a Videogram is a simple 3 step process. First, you select your video (video that has been captured or pre-recorded). Next, you edit your video and include a text message or graphics. Finally, you send your video email to the recipient of your choice. The Videograms are played back by small Java applets that download in seconds over the Internet (smaller than 15 KB for the audio and video player combined). Regarding security issues, the Java applets do not access a user’s hard disk or other resources, making this a secure way of delivering video messages.

The Videograms are highly compressed files. As an example, a 30 second video clip with a resolution of 160x120 can be compressed to 500 KB. And while you could send AVI or MOV files, they are cumbersome and may not be deliverable using standard email programs.

The technology behind the Videograms is the proprietary encoding provided by Rightbits. Their Littlebits codec creates highly compressed video, optimized for video transmission and Internet streaming. The audio portion of the message is compressed using the MUZIP2 codec which also utilizes a Java player. The MUZIP line of codecs deliver MP3 audio at four times the compression rate.

Using the MUZIP audio codec, audio streams from 10-64 Kbps can be used to produce mono and stereo streams. An audio stream compressed at 32 Kbps is close to MP3 quality, while streams at 48-64 Kbps equal or exceed MP3 quality.