Livelocker is best described as a del.icio.us for rich media content with rating aspects from digg (and a similar interface). It allows users to bookmark, categorize and share links to videos, audio content and photos. The clean interface makes it easy for visitors to explore and find popular content online as well as to attach ratings to content and add them in their own locker.
The content itself is hosted on other sites and your own ‘locker’ and Livelocker itself only stores the link to the content. They have built it like this on purpose so that they can palm off copyright responsibility to the site holders while at the same time providing a community to find and share the latest videos and rich media. This does mean though that they are sending users to other sites and are missing out on long-term advertising potential
The process of adding a bookmark is simple and Livelocker provides a bookmarklet for your browser. The taxonomy of the site is a hybrid approach with categories (the type of content), sub-categories as well as tags. Once submitted other users will be able to see the bookmark and comment on it etc.
Livelocker is based in Los Angeles and was founded by CEO David McClusky, a 26 year old University of California ComSci graduate. It has been in development for 3 months and in private beta for a month prior to recently launching. There will be a broader launch campaign next month and the site is still in very early days with only a small number of users and small amount of links but I am sure this will grow.
Livelocker can serve a purpose as a place to find the latest funny video’s or any meme’s that you have missed out on, as well as a way to bookmark those that you find interesting. What Livelocker provides over using del.icio.us for the same purpose is the focus on rich media, the ratings and a digg-style ranking system where bookmarking a link counts towards it appearing on the front page. I spent most of my review laughing my ass off at some of the top-rated videos and got some fun out of it so you might as well.