About LiveRail's Beta Period
What is LiveRail?
LiveRail is an online video distribution and advertising platform. We help video publishers like you to monetize and distribute their content on the web. LiveRail works by serving your videos directly onto your own website, with highly-targeted relevant, unobtrusive advertising and sharing the revenue with you.
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What do I need in order to use LiveRail?
Well, other than a computer and internet access (obviously!), you'll need some video files, and a website where you want those videos to appear. You'll also want a way to cash the cheques we send you for any ad revenue you earn. (Please note that during the beta, LiveRail will NOT be paying publishers for revenue earned in the period)
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What are the benefits of using LiveRail?
LiveRail helps publishers in a variety of ways, by helping you to distribute your content online in the popular flash video format, covering your bandwidth bills and monetizing your content by serving up relevant, highly-targeting advertising that not only pays the bills, but actually enhances your viewers experience.
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What will change when the Beta period ends?
During LiveRail's Beta period, the system will operate quite differently to once we launch fully for the public. Most noticeable for publishers will be the fact that although we are tracking ad-views and ad-revenue for videos in your account, this money is not actually "real". Since we aren't actually charging advertisers a penny during the beta, you will not receive any ad-revenue share from your LiveRail account during the Beta period. However, to say thank you for your involvement at this early stage, all publishers who signup and use LiveRail during the beta will qualify for their account for 65% revenue share (versus 50% normally) once LiveRail launches for the public and begins charging advertisers. There are a few other things that will change too, for example we'll be rolling out more servers for launch to make the system faster and your videos look better, plus of course anybody will be able to join - not just those with invitation codes.
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How long will the Beta last
We're still not exactly sure when LiveRail will leave Beta and open to the public - however we are aiming for full launch in late Summer. Once we are confident that the system works flawlessly and that the performance is up to the high standard our publishers and advertisers expect, we will launch fully.
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Account Management
How I Register for the Beta?
Simply fill in the form at http://www.liverail.com/publisher/request-invitation to request an invitation to the beta. If selected, you will receive an email explaining what to do next.
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How do I close my account?
There is no need to "close" your account, simply archive all your active videos from within your account and this will label your account as dormant.
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How do I get paid
Once we leave Beta, and start sharing revenue with publishers, payments will be made by cheque and sent out to the name/address given within the account area of the LiveRail site.
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I've forgotten my password
Well done! Email support@liverail.com giving us your username/email address and your registered physical address and we'll send you your password by email to your registered email address.
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How do I change my password?
Your password can be updated by clicking on the "Account" tab once you've logged in to the LiveRail site
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How do I change my email address/login
All these details can be updated by clicking the "Account" tab once you've logged in to the LiveRail site
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Why do I keep getting logged out?
LiveRail uses cookies to store certain key information about your use of the system. If cookies are disabled, or other security settings on your browser are set too high, then you may be unable to use the LiveRail site as expected. Try enabling cookies and/or changing your security settings. Temporarily stopping other security software on your machine may also help, although should not be needed.
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Content Guidelines
What sort of videos can I use LiveRail with?
Any type of video you like - just keep it clean, keep it legal and make sure you are the copyright holder. We love innovative content so go on, surprise us!
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What sort of videos aren't allowed on LiveRail?
We're open minded people, but as a general rule of thumb we do not allow things that include: Copyrighted material (of which you are not the copyright holder), pornography, material that promotes violence, discrimination or hatred or that exploit children or animals, or that may be considered extremely offensive. More information is provided in our terms of service.
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What video formats can I upload?
Supported video formats include: wmv, mov, mpeg, mpg, mp4, 3gp, avi and flv
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Earnings and Payments
When do I get paid?
LiveRail will constantly display the amount of money owing to you as a publisher via the "Account" area of your website. Once you are ready to make a withdrawal, please click on the "Withdraw Now" button and follow the instructions on screen. N.B. During the Beta, we are NOT charging advertisers for using the system, and therefore you will NOT receive any share of ad-revenue for using LiveRail during this period. Any figure displaying "earnings" is a notional figure based on what your account WOULD earn once LiveRail opens to the public.
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How do I get paid?
Payment is made by cherub that will be sent out to the name/address given within the account area of the LiveRail site. Withdrawals can be made by requesting a withdrawal from the "Withdraw Now" section of the Account area. N.B. During the Beta, we are NOT charging advertisers for using the system, and therefore you will NOT receive any share of ad-revenue for using LiveRail during this period. Any figure displaying "earnings" is a notional figure based on what your account WOULD earn once LiveRail opens to the public.
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Does LiveRail guarantee revenues?
No, the amount you earn depends entirely on how many people watching your videos click on the ads.
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How much will I earn?
How much you earn will most likely vary proportionally to the popularity of your videos and the frequency with which your viewers click on the ads. It also depends on what category of content you're publishing, since advertisers compete to have their ad shown, those advertisers targeting particular demographics may be willing to pay more if your content is being watched by those types of people. N.B. During the Beta, we are NOT charging advertisers for using the system, and therefore you will NOT receive any share of ad-revenue for using LiveRail during this period. Any figure displaying "earnings" is a notional figure based on what your account WOULD earn once LiveRail opens to the public.
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Will I have to pay tax on my earnings?
You may. LiveRail is unable to advice on the individual tax requirements of your country of domicile and so we suggest consulting a local tax advisor/accountant to advice you.
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How do I earn money?
When you publish a video with LiveRail, we run a series of highly-targeted ad-previews beneath your main video. Any time a viewer sees an ad-preview that interests them, your video pauses and the ad plays. At this point we charge that advertiser a fee for the view. We then share this revenue with you. So the more people who watch your videos, and who click on ads, the more money you'll earn. You can track your earnings from within your account, and payment will be made by cherub which we will post to you by simply requesting a withdrawal from within your account. N.B. During the Beta, we are NOT charging advertisers for using the system, and therefore you will NOT receive any share of ad-revenue for using LiveRail during this period. Any figure displaying "earnings" is a notional figure based on what your account WOULD earn once LiveRail opens to the public.
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Your Videos
Can I filter which ads appear next to my videos?
Currently this feature is not available, however we are working on building additional features to give publishers greater control on the adverts that appear next to their videos.
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What file formats can I upload
Supported video formats include: wmv, mov, mpeg, 3gp, avi and flv
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How do I delete a video?
LiveRail does not actually "delete" files unless you specifically request for it to be permanently erased. Instead, if you no longer have use for a particular video, you can just "Archive" it by clicking the red ARCHIVE button on that video's detail page.
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Where will my videos appear?
Your video will only appear where you place your embed code. LiveRail does not have a "gallery" website or anywhere else where the general public can see your content. So you are always in control of where your videos appear. That said, if you enable the option "Can be embedded by others" then other people who find your video, will also be able to put the video onto their sites too. Please note that once this happens, we cannot make individual people remove your video from their site - so don't enable this option if you don't want the possibility of your video being shared all around the web.
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How does LiveRail choose which ads to display?
Our ad-selection process is based on a carefully written algorithm that balances a large range of factors before coming up with a list of ads to show next to your video. First and foremost we take into consideration each advertiser's targeting preferences, including the categories of video content (i.e. which category of content you as a publisher assigned your video to when uploading it). We also consider issues such as the video language and the location of viewers.
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How quickly will my videos be available?
After uploading a video to LiveRail, our system converts it into the Flash-video format. This is to ensure it plays properly for as many people as possible. This conversion process varies depending on the length of your video, the file size and the traffic on our conversion servers. Once the conversion is complete, you will be able to see the video in your active videos list, copy the embed code and paste it into your website for immediate viewing. If for any reason your video fails to appear or to convert correctly, please contact support@liverail.com
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What is the maximum video length I can host with LiveRail
This is something we're still working on, and would like to hear your feedback on what length videos you feel you need to be able to upload. Feedback can be sent via our support form.
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What details must I provide about each video?
First and foremost, we require that all videos uploaded to LiveRail be given a title, a description and most importantly, assigned to a category. Categories are our primary method of ad-targeting, so if you don't assign your video to an appropriate category for its content you'll receive non-relevant ads that will lead to lower click-through rates, and earn you less. Publishers who intentionally and repeatedly mis-describe their videos may have their accounts suspended.
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My Video failed to appear in my account, or fails to play
Umm… Very strange! Please contact support@liverail.com and we'll do what we can to get the bottom of the problem.
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What type of content can I host with LiveRail?
Any type of video you like - just keep it clean, keep it legal and make sure you are the copyright holder. More information is available in our terms of service and if in doubt we suggest checking before posting.
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Do I have to have my own website to use LiveRail?
In short; Yes. LiveRail is not a video gallery site where members of the public can come to just browse a library of videos. Instead we operate as a content and advertising delivery platform that helps video publishers to distribute video content on their own sites. If viewers want to watch a video that you're delivering with LiveRail they will need to do so on a website where you (or someone you have given that video's embed code to) have specifically inserted that video.
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How do I upload a video?
To upload a video, login to your account at www.liverail.com/publisher and click on the "UPLOAD" tab at the top of the page. Here you will be asked to enter a few key details about your video including giving it a title, a description and assigning it to the category you feel best describes your content. You should then click the "Browse" button in order to select the video file from your computer's hard drive. Once selected the filename should appear in the "Browse for the file" field, you can now click the pink "upload" button and wait as the progress bar goes to 100%. This could take some time if your video file is particularly large, so please be patient as it continues to upload to our servers.
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How do videos I've uploaded to LiveRail appear on my website?
On the "Videos" tab, you will be able to see a full list of all the videos you have uploaded to LiveRail. On this page you'll see a column titled "Embed Code" with one entry for each video you have in your account. Click the embed code field once to select the code, and then copy this (go to your browser's Edit menu and select Copy from the drop-down). With this line of code copied to your computer's clipboard, you now need to go into your content management tool for your website. Find the place on the page where you would like the video to appear, paste the embed code (go to your browser's Edit menu and select Copy from the drop-down), save the page and the video should then be pulled into your site from LiveRail.
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What is an embed code?
An embed code is a snippet of HTML code that tells any webpage you put it into to pull a video file from LiveRail. The embed code needs to be pasted into your website/blog when you edit it using your content management tool (such as dreamweaver/frontpage or via your site's administration area).
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Reporting and Statistics
How do I know how many people have watched my videos?
That's an easy one! Log into your account and click on the "Videos" tab. Here you'll see a list of all your active videos, with a column next to each one showing the number of people who've watched it.
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How do I know how much money I've earned?
The easiest way to check both how much money is currently outstanding and how much you've earned in the lifetime of your account is to login to LiveRail, click the "Account" tab and then "Withdraw Now".
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What sort of statistics can I get on my viewers?
This is another area we're working hard on. We want LiveRail to be the best site for video publishers wanting to track their viewer figures. You'll be able to see how many view your video by hour/day/week/month, where they're coming from, which sites they viewed the video on, what time of day they watch, generate graphs and much more. These features should be available soon.
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Support and Contacts
Who should I contact with billing/payment enquiries
support@liverail.com
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Who should I contact with general or service support enquiries?
support@liverail.com
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Who should I contact with media/press enquiries?
press@liverail.com
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