Let's say a viewer discovers your video content, and they enjoy it so much they share that video with their friends. Those friends then view your content, and share it with their social network as well. Each successive "round" of sharing increases the number of viewers exponentially. This is the nature of viral sharing; by leveraging the power of your viewers’ social networks, you dramatically raise the visibility of your content.

Let's say a viewer discovers your video content, and they enjoy it so much they share that video with their friends. Those friends then view your content, and share it with their social network as well. Each successive "round" of sharing increases the number of viewers exponentially. This is the nature of viral sharing; by leveraging the power of your viewers’ social networks, you dramatically raise the visibility of your content.

Brightcove players offer you a choice of settings that viewers can use to share the video. Two of them are closely related and easy to confuse:

• The Get Link button presents the viewer with a direct link to the player and a button that copies the link to the clipboard, so it can be pasted into an email or instant message:

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Check out - Bitly.tv

Nice new site from the folks at Bit.ly to showcase popular videos based on their twitter mentions. Chances are, if you are like me, you are pummeled daily by friends and co-workers with the latest and greatest that viral video has to offer... if not, or if you just need a little instant levity, I would recommend bookmarking this page ;).

A ranting teen. A sleep walking dog. These are the top "long tail" videos of 2009 and YouTube has a great little countdown here

Short, funny videos have always ruled viral traffic but maybe we can pick up a few lessons for our own content creation?  Let's face it, what video initiative wouldn't benefit from a puppy or kitten.