Do I Need to Rip the DVD? How?

I have a video camera that records onto a mini DVD. But to do anything at all with the DVD other than playback on the camera, I have to finalize it, which I did. I wanted to get some clips off the video to put up on Facebook or YouTube or even just send to a friend in an email or something. The problem is that i cant get the clip I want because none of by Video Editing software i have will recognize the file type. I don't know what to do. Do I need to rip it? And if so, how? Or is there something else I need to do to convert the file type?

P.S. i know nothing about this kinda stuff, you'll have to dumb it down a little for me. I don't even know if i chose the right category names, lol.

Question should probably be posted in the Consumer Electronics section of the forum. Not actually related to Graphics Cards or Displays.

You should probably add more detail such as the video camera make and model. The file format type of the finalized video. And the video editing software than you have. When you "finalize" the DVD what options do you have for the type of file created (like WMA, MPEG3, AVI).