Video News Briefs

Library Ideas cofounder Brian Downing has spearheaded a pilot program bringing Redbox DVD-rental kiosks to library locations around the country. Participants include the Princeton Public Library, NJ; Henderson Libraries, NV; Charlotte Mecklenburg Library, NC; Orange County Library System, FL; and Lexington Free Public Library, KY. Expansion will depend on the results of the trial, which is expected to conclude this summer. More info at www.libraryjournal.com.

Digital media distributor OverDrive announced plans to grow its download video catalog to more than 10,000 titles, from suppliers including PBS, Starz, HDNet, and Magnolia Pictures. Additionally, new download video content will be added throughout 2010 as a result of recent agreements with Digital 1 to 1, Film Movement, Films Media Group, Independent Film Channel, Sundance Channel, and some dozen other suppliers. More info at www.overdrive.com.

Google is presently building a broadband network with Internet connectivity speeds of one gigabit per second, or 100 times faster than what most Americans experience today. It will make the service available at what it has called "a competitive price" to between 50,000 and 500,000 people in communities yet to be identified. The gigabit-per-second speed would cut the download time of a high-definition, full-length feature film to just five minutes and enable 3-D video transmissions in real time.

And the 2010 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature goes to… Louis Psihoyos's The Cove (www.thecovemovie.com), about an annual dolphin-killing rite in Taiji, Japan. LJ reviewer Cliff Glaviano opined that an Oscar win could bring the film "the wide audience needed to exert political pressure on the [International Whaling Commission] that may reverse the course of humankind's destruction of our ocean ecologies" (LJ Online 3/2/10). The Cove is available on DVD and as a digital download; a tie-in TV series (tentatively titled Dolphin Warriors) has been green-lit by Animal Planet. Visit www.lionsgateshop.com for purchasing info.

Coming to DVD on April 13 from Virgil Films & Entertainment: John Scheinfeld's We Believe, about Chicago's longtime love affair with its national league baseball team, the Cubs. Narrated by actor Gary Sinise, We Believe is the first theatrical documentary to be fully authorized by the Cubs. More info at www.webelievethemovie.com and www.virgilfilmsent.com.