 Hey, this is David with The Verge and this is the Sony Bloggy Live. It's reminiscent of the flip cameras that Cisco killed, but it's actually better looking than a lot of the flip models were. It's made of brushed metal and it has the heft of a cell phone as you hold it. It's got a power button and a shutter button for taking still photos on one side. And there's a USB arm and a tripod mount on the bottom. The USB arm is nice to have, but it's actually really small and it takes up a lot of space on your computer when you plug it in. There's an extension cord for the USB arm, but it's kind of a pain to have to lug around another cable and kind of defeats the purpose of having it in the camera anyway. There's a micro HDMI port underneath the port flap. The LCD is touch enabled and actually works pretty well. It's not the best screen we've seen. It mutes colors a little bit and its pixels are really easy to identify, but it gets the job done fine. And the touch experience is actually better than we thought it might be. The camera actually has Wi-Fi inside, which lets it do things like share your videos and photos to Facebook or YouTube or Picasa. And doing all that is really simple. You just connect to a Wi-Fi network and then with a tap or two can put a video straight to your YouTube account if you want. There are a couple of annoyances with doing that. To save battery, the Wi-Fi radio actually shuts off every time it's not being used. So anytime you want to upload anything, there's about a 10 second wait while you connect to the network before it'll even start uploading. You can earmark videos or photos to be uploaded when you connect so you can set it to do them all at once and then only deal with connecting once. You can upload photos and videos to Facebook, YouTube, Picasa, Flickr, and Dailymotion. Or you can use Sony's new PlayMemories Online service to upload and store everything in Sony's cloud and you can access it from any web browser. But the most unique thing the Bloggy Live can do is actually live stream footage from the camera. It connects through quick and once you set up an account you can start streaming from the camera really quickly and you can see it in a web browser or on mobile apps. Users can share the stream or even can comment on the stream as they're watching it and you see comments on your camera as you're filming. When you're done live streaming, your footage automatically gets uploaded to Quick so you can see it later as a video. There are a couple of challenges with the Quick live streaming. One, it obviously requires Wi-Fi and two, it only will live stream at a 320x240 resolution. Other than the connected features, the Bloggy Live really is as simple and as good a camcorder as most of the flip cameras were. It'll shoot video at 1080p at 30 frames per second or 720p at 60 frames per second plus a lot of different lower resolutions. Video is occasionally too contrasty which makes the whole video look a little bit darker than it should but generally, especially for such a small and expensive device, it looks really good. The camera can also shoot 12 megapixel photos but it doesn't do it as well. Photos are fine in good lighting as long as you don't have any motion but as a still camera, it's not nearly as good and in low light, pictures are basically unusable. The Bloggy Live comes with as much as 8GB of storage which is enough for about 3 hours of 1080p video and that works out because that's about as long as the battery lasts too. Overall, the Bloggy Live is a great camcorder. It's as simple to use as any of the flip cameras and is probably better made but unless you really want the live streaming or the sharing features, you probably don't need a camera this expensive. At $249, it's pretty expensive for this range of camcorders and Sony's made other Bloggy cameras like the Touch and the Bloggy Duo, both of which shoot video and photos that are at least as good as the Bloggy Live but they don't have some of the connected features. So if you don't need the Wi-Fi and the connected features, you're probably better off saving your money and going with one of those or looking for a flip cam.
 Hey, this is David with The Verge and this is the Sony Bloggy Live.
 It's reminiscent of the flip cameras that Cisco killed, but it's actually better looking
 than a lot of the flip models were.
 It's made of brushed metal and it has the heft of a cell phone as you hold it.
 It's got a power button and a shutter button for taking still photos on one side.
 And there's a USB arm and a tripod mount on the bottom.
 The USB arm is nice to have, but it's actually really small and it takes up a lot of space
 on your computer when you plug it in.
 There's an extension cord for the USB arm, but it's kind of a pain to have to lug around
 another cable and kind of defeats the purpose of having it in the camera anyway.
 There's a micro HDMI port underneath the port flap.
 The LCD is touch enabled and actually works pretty well.
 It's not the best screen we've seen.
 It mutes colors a little bit and its pixels are really easy to identify, but it gets the
 job done fine.
 And the touch experience is actually better than we thought it might be.
 The camera actually has Wi-Fi inside, which lets it do things like share your videos and
 photos to Facebook or YouTube or Picasa.
 And doing all that is really simple.
 You just connect to a Wi-Fi network and then with a tap or two can put a video straight
 to your YouTube account if you want.
 There are a couple of annoyances with doing that.
 To save battery, the Wi-Fi radio actually shuts off every time it's not being used.
 So anytime you want to upload anything, there's about a 10 second wait while you connect to
 the network before it'll even start uploading.
 You can earmark videos or photos to be uploaded when you connect so you can set it to do them
 all at once and then only deal with connecting once.
 You can upload photos and videos to Facebook, YouTube, Picasa, Flickr, and Dailymotion.
 Or you can use Sony's new PlayMemories Online service to upload and store everything in
 Sony's cloud and you can access it from any web browser.
 But the most unique thing the Bloggy Live can do is actually live stream footage from
 the camera.
 It connects through quick and once you set up an account you can start streaming from
 the camera really quickly and you can see it in a web browser or on mobile apps.
 Users can share the stream or even can comment on the stream as they're watching it and you
 see comments on your camera as you're filming.
 When you're done live streaming, your footage automatically gets uploaded to Quick so you
 can see it later as a video.
 There are a couple of challenges with the Quick live streaming.
 One, it obviously requires Wi-Fi and two, it only will live stream at a 320x240 resolution.
 Other than the connected features, the Bloggy Live really is as simple and as good a camcorder
 as most of the flip cameras were.
 It'll shoot video at 1080p at 30 frames per second or 720p at 60 frames per second plus
 a lot of different lower resolutions.
 Video is occasionally too contrasty which makes the whole video look a little bit darker
 than it should but generally, especially for such a small and expensive device, it looks
 really good.
 The camera can also shoot 12 megapixel photos but it doesn't do it as well.
 Photos are fine in good lighting as long as you don't have any motion but as a still camera,
 it's not nearly as good and in low light, pictures are basically unusable.
 The Bloggy Live comes with as much as 8GB of storage which is enough for about 3 hours
 of 1080p video and that works out because that's about as long as the battery lasts
 too.
 Overall, the Bloggy Live is a great camcorder.
 It's as simple to use as any of the flip cameras and is probably better made but unless
 you really want the live streaming or the sharing features, you probably don't need
 a camera this expensive.
 At $249, it's pretty expensive for this range of camcorders and Sony's made other Bloggy
 cameras like the Touch and the Bloggy Duo, both of which shoot video and photos that
 are at least as good as the Bloggy Live but they don't have some of the connected features.
 So if you don't need the Wi-Fi and the connected features, you're probably better off saving
 your money and going with one of those or looking for a flip cam.