YouTube founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen released a new app for iOS dubbed as MixBit.

Essentially, MixBit allows users to record, edit and publish video of 1 second to 1 hour straight from their iPhones to the Mixbit.com Web site. This sounded much better than Instagram which only allows 15-second video and Vine which only allows looping of a 6-second video.

"I've always been passionate about video. It's the most powerful way to express yourself, reach others and bring your ideas to life. Today we want to remove the barriers to video creation. That means giving people intuitive and flexible recording and remixing tools so it's easier than ever to tell meaningful stories through video," Mr Hurley wrote in his blog post last Thursday.

MixBit is primarily aimed to build a community of video creators, filmmakers and other media storytellers, according to Mr Hurley and Mr Chen. This objective was inspired by their experience of YouTube with 100 hours of video uploaded every minute.

"We want to encourage more creativity and set people and their content free. Today's release is the first step in that direction. More will come in time," Mr Hurley said in his blog.

From the Analysts

In a report from Computerworld, analysts expressed their different opinions about MixBit.

For Zeus Kerravala, an analyst of ZK Research, MixBit seemed like an interesting service.

"Video is hot and I like how they let users do more, such as editing and clipping. By tying videos together, users can create long, more complex, videos. It's potentially a strong competitor but I believe video is such a fast rising tide that it should lift all the boats now."

As for Rob Enderle of the Enderle Group, MixBit may end up directly competing with YouTube that Vine and Instagram.

"MixBit has addressed a unique need, putting clips together into something better easily. Nice play. This could be big on the creation side."

Michael Muchmore of PC MAG, on the other hand, tried MixBit hands-on.

According to Mr Muchmore, MixBit is available from the iTunes App Store. MixBit runs on the iPhone 3GS and up but more optimised for the iPhone 5. For iPad users, they will have to either view it in a small or 2X zoomed window.

According to his experience, everything went smoothly until he publishes his video. He got an error message instructing him to cut his clips of more than 16 seconds. He later found out that the second readout above each clip is for the whole compilation length, not the individual clip, so it was hard for him to determine which of his videos are longer than 16 seconds.

"MixBit doesn't offer any video enhancements like those you get in Viddy or Instagram, beyond simple trimming and re-ordering - there are no filters, no anti-shake, no time-stretch, or even brightness and contrast adjustments. It is, however, just as easy to create a stop-motion video in MixBit as in Vine - that's app's only video trick."