12seconds aims to be the true Twitter of video

When online video messaging service Seesmic first emerged last year it was dubbed by many (including us) as the “Twitter of video.” It’s an easy comparison to make, both are micro-messaging services of sorts. However it’s obvious that Seesmic is much more time-consuming than Twitter. Seesmic videos can be several minutes long. That’s an eternity in a Twitter world limited to 140 characters or less. A new video messaging service called 12seconds aims to fix that “problem.”

As you might imagine, videos posted to 12seconds are limited to 12 seconds in length. Why 12 seconds? “Because anything longer is boring,” reads the service’s about page.

It goes on:

The scientists here at the 12seconds dodecaplex have conducted countless hours of research to determine the precise amount of time it takes for boredom or apathy to set in during typical Internet video viewing. Our patent pending Electro-Tear-Duct Prongers have determined that exactly 12 seconds of video is the ideal amount of time to keep anything interesting.

The site is a side project by Yahoo employee David Beach, according to NewTeeVee, which stumbled upon the site earlier today.

If you hate Twitter — and I know there are quite a few of you out there — then you’re really going to hate 12seconds. I cannot wait for people to start using it just to watch them get abruptly cut off when they don’t realize just how short 12 seconds actually is.

The site has a clean, easy-to-read UI as compared to Seesmic which is rather cluttered. It’s also almost entirely white compared to Seesmic, which is almost entirely black. I smell a rivalry a-brewin’.

The Santa Cruz, Calif.-based 12seconds is currently in private Alpha testing mode.

Here’s someone showing off their $700 shoes. In 12 seconds!

http://12seconds.tv/players/remotePlayer.swf
Mobile/E-Mail Video on 12seconds.tv

update: Fellow writer Dean Takahashi saw this product’s 12 second limitation and immediately thought it was simply to save on high costs of serving video over the Internet. An interesting take, I think.