Obviously, the bigger the picture, the greater the bandwidth cost unless I use free hosting. But free hosting is going to come with strings attached, most likely, so I need to be prepared to self-host even if I use free hosting for now. So that’s making me think of going with something small.But, on the other hand, as society goes further and further into broadband, larger videos will become the norm. So probably I should “future proof” my content by going with a larger size than what is popular now.

The viewable area of a youtube video is 450×335, but they tell you to upload videos as 320×240, so they’re doing some kind of upconversion to save on bandwidth.

(…Okay, it’s later in the day and I’ve discovered that SWF/FLV is definitely the format of choice when the video is of an instructional nature. This format gives great clarity and only has the drawback of not handling motion as well as WMV. So I’m definitely going with FLV. )

I’m seeing that FreeIQ also recommends 320×240 and does a similar upconversion like Youtube, but they favor the SWF/FLV format. I just uploaded a test and it was crystal clear. I believe my choice is made. I’ll probably use FreeIQ to host it as well (After all, it’s free!).