The concept of Jing is the always-ready program that instantly captures and shares images and video…from your computer to anywhere.

Those of you recording Jing Videos may have encountered the 5 minute time limit. Some folks have asked about that limit and why it's there. I wanted to share some reasons behind the 5 minute limit.

1. We think Jing is for quick and simple sharing. Record, send. No scripts, no editing, few retakes. Anything over 5 minutes starts to become a tutorial and we thought things like that are better suited for Camtasia Studio and the like.
2. File size. Depending on what you're recording, the file size can start to get massive. Once I recorded live video from a web cam and I was up to 55 meg in under a minute. This sort of relates to quick sharing in that we wanted to be friendly to viewers on less-than-ideal connections.
3. Our video format is SWF. One good thing about SWF is that the quality is lossless (no degradation between what you record and what viewers see). Learn more about SWF near the bottom of this post.

What are your thoughts?

Do you have a "magic number"? What I mean is do you ever launch a video and see it's 2:13 and say, "Sheesh, that's too much of an investment," but you see 1:58 and think, "I just might watch this." We aren't saying we have the answers. We're mostly curious to learn how people who want more than 5 minutes are using Jing. Do you care about file size? What is your viewing audience like? Do you save videos locally or put on an FTP server or Screencast.com?

The new Screencast.com: Bigger. Better. And Orangier. (We ate dozens, even hundreds of orange donuts to celebrate! I should have stopped at 3.)

Some of you might know a little about Jing’s relationship with Screencast.com. TechSmith makes Screencast.com, and TechSmith makes Jing. When Jing wanted a place to store video and images (Screencast.com’s specialty) so anyone could share Jings with others, we put two and two together, and made it so all Jing users got free Screencast.com accounts.

I know what some of you are thinking: This is the day when the other shoe drops and now we’re going to charge for Jing or your Screencast.com account or something. Nope. No fine print here my dear sirs and madams. HONEST. Everything that’s currently free is still free, and we love how people are sharing visual information all over the world.

So why should you care about the new Screencast.com? It’s better to show you instead of tell you. Over the next week I’ll make a few videos to show you how you can do things like:

• Manage your content like never before
• Create a Playlist or MediaRoll to display your content in a really convenient way. (Especially cool if you have your own blog!)
• Use the spanking-new desktop uploader to take bunches of content from your computer and get it on Screencast.com

You don’t have to wait for me! Check out Screencast.com and log in with the email and password you used to install Jing. Poke around and check things out. You can send feedback to the Screencast.com team too. Important: If you move content out of the Jing folder, Jing links will no longer work. (You can always re-share the new links/location.)

We’ve been holding off sharing how Jing can be even more useful by leveraging Screencast.com, but now is the time! The release is here! Enjoy!

Hey there,
If you're using Jing on a Mac, you might have asked yourself:

• How do I start using Jing?
• Why can't I run Jing from the dock?
• Do I have to use the sun? Can I move it?
• How do I turn this thing off?

Fortunately, Casey in TechSupport put together a 2 minute video to answer some of the most common questions people have about Jing for the Mac..
Enjoy!

If you have specific questions about Jing, you can also Contact Support directly.

Edit:I was asked how I edited and resized the video. This was done with Camtasia Studio, one of the other screen recording tools that TechSmith makes.

Hi everyone,

We’re aware of the confusion about the 60-day trial thing with Screencast.com and how it relates to Jing. The Screencast.com trial period does not apply to Jing users. The worst part is a lot of people probably tell their friends that this is some kind of trial and others probably take one look at Jing and don’t give it a try.

We are working on a solution that will be less confusing in the future.

I hope this eases some fears or confusion. Don’t worry, we've got your back.

Mike Curtis and the Jing Team

Wouldn't it be great if you could have one URL that would direct users to a whole folder of content? Maybe you have a series of video tutorials or a few dozen images of a new design you're considering.

You can do it!

I made a short Jing showing how you can make folders and manage Jing content (3:27) on Screencast.com. Note: Moving content out of your Jing folder will break existing hyperlinks.

I'll share some more Jing and Screencast.com integration tips soon!