iStockPhoto, a leading community-powered marketplace for stock photography and illustrations, is expanding into video, and will be selling indie video at a new site, iStockVideo.

Anyone can apply to become a video contributor at the site. iStock videographers will collect downloads, earn royalties and receive “video reels” like photographer canisters to show their sales levels.

Public radio producer Stephen HIll, host of the popular electronic/space music show Hearts of Space, thinks that High Definition Radio, a standard for near CD-quality radio, is dead on arrival, and that podcasting and other Internet audio options dug its grave.”HD reminds me of DCC (Digital Compact Cassette),” notes Hill, “another attempt by a mature industry to administer life support to a sunset format. That didn’t work either, and today almost no one even remembers it.”

“Of the major usage trends that are driving the growth of Internet radio — new “long tail” niche and alternative content, on-demand delivery, user-created content, podcasting (subcriptions and portability), and time-shifting — only time-shifting is even doable with HD, and then only in a relatively crippled way due to memory and interface constraints,” notes Hill. “Even this undermines the one incontestable advantage of conventional radio: ease of use.”

Director Kevin Smith is using iPods and video podcasts to promote his latest film, Clerks II.

Smith joined Superman’s Bryan Singer and other directors by creating a Clerks II video podcast that provides an insider’s look into the making of the film.

The Clerks II podcast looks at mullets, Ben Affleck’s thoughts on being in a Kevin Smith movie, The Tongue Song, why Rosario Dawson would be in a filthy picture like Clerks II and the movie’s premier.

Recently Apple announced that they were revising the podcasting categories at iTunes and asked that podcasters update their RSS feeds “as soon as possible”.

If you’re a podcaster and haven’t updated your feed yet, ProfCast has released a free online tool that may help. The converter allows you to enter the URL for a published podcast feed which it will read, and convert the old categories to the new.

Earlier in the week, Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris was quoted in a Chicago Tribune article on iPod failure rates as saying that Apple designs them to last four years.

According to a post at iLounge, Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris is now saying that she was misquoted in the Chicago Tribune article. The article quoted her as saying that iPods have a low failure rate and that they are designed to last four years. Kerris said she told the reporter that the iPod was designed to last “for years”—not “four years.”

It’s unclear whether Kerris’s latest comment is an ad hominem….or an ad homonym.

IBM has introduced the ShortCuts podcast series, a podcast that provides technology tips on current trends and issues such as computer security, instant messaging etiquette, and email management. The four-minute audio shows are intended to give listeners short, practical advice that can be applied at work or at home.The latest episode looks at Beating Spyware (MP3).

Love her or hate her, Paris Hilton seems to be everywhere. And now she’s going to be showing up on iPods.E! Entertainment and Apple today announced that programs from E! Entertainment Television are now available for purchase on the iTune Music Store. New episodes of the second season of the series The Girls Next Door, which debuts July 30 on E!, The Soup, E!’s irreverent look at the week’s biggest, best and most bizarre moments and events in the world of pop culture, the new season of Dr. 90210, as well as all new episodes of The Simple Life: ‘Til Death Do Us Part starring Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, will be available the day after broadcast for $1.99 per episode.

A Chicago Tribune article (subscription) takes a look at failure rates of Apple’s popular iPod music players, and reports that Apple designs them to last four years.

Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris assured the Tribune that iPods have a failure rate of less than 5 percent, which she called “fairly low” compared with other consumer electronics.

“The vast majority of our customers are extremely happy with their iPods,” she said, adding that an iPod is designed to last four years.

BBC News has launched several video podcasts of highlights from their news broadcasts.The BBC video podcasts will include ten ‘best of the week’ packages from Ten O’Clock News – called Ten Weekly – as well as subscribe to Newsnight reports and investigations from the previous seven days. Also available in the first phase of the trial is a tongue-in-cheek look at the last week’s news download called STORYFix.

Adrian Van Klaveren, deputy director of BBC News, said: “This trial aims to give people a range of great BBC News content that they can enjoy watching in a completely different way on new portable devices.”

Facebook, a social directory that allows people to share information, announced today a back-to-school promotion to give away 10 million music samplers to Mac and PC users from the iTunes Music Store.

Starting today, Facebook will give away one million, 25-song music samplers from iTunes each week for the next 10 weeks. Each iTunes music sampler will feature select songs from a different genre ranging from Alternative to Rock, Hip-Hop to Dance and Electronica.

“We’re always striving to provide people with the things they care most about, and with over half a million bands listed on Facebook we know that listening to and downloading music is an integral part of our users’ lives,” said Owen Van Natta, chief operating officer at Facebook.