NSV was created in late 2002/early 2003 by Justin Frankel while working at Nullsoft. Originally designed as a demonstration of the potential that newly developed streaming technology Ultravox could offer, it has since become an accepted format for AOL streaming media, with many promotional videos available on both Winamp.com and the AOL website. Nullsoft Streaming Video (NSV) is a media container designed for streaming videocontent over the internet. NSV was developed by Nullsoft, the makers of Winamp.

The NSV format is another example of streaming video formats, offered by various companies and media players. Windows Media, QuickTime File Format and RealMedia streams are just a few examples of these, and each havetheir benefits and shortcomings.

One of the shortfalls of most streaming formats often comes from the difficulty in finding streams, or at least some form of directory service; and in some cases, none are readily available to the public at all. With Nullsoft's SHOUTcast service, a media streaming and directory system, the NSV format has become popular, along with SHOUTcast's listings of Streaming Audio, which reach well into the thousands.

The "Media Library" offers integrated listings of both audio and video streams, returned directly from the SHOUTcast service.

WARNING: The NSV Format and associated NSV Tools is beta software. Therefore streaming video is not currently recommended for the novice computer user or novice SHOUTcast DJ. This tutorial assumes knowledge of how to use command line tools in the Windows environment. The tutorials also assume basic knowledge of setting up the SHOUTcast DNAS. Refer to the streaming audio tutorials for information on the SHOUTcast DNAS, these tutorials use the default configuration, though. Both the command line tools and GUI tools are explained (excluding FLASK currently). NSV SHOUTcast is not currently meant for general end-user use, so if you are not willing to put some effort into this stop reading now. If you want to stream video and are willing for a challenge then keep reading.