Confusion Reigns Supreme When It Comes To P2P Delivery Networks

I got a lot of comments from my recent blog post entitled "List Of P2P Delivery Networks" and the comments only reinforce that delivery networks, especially those who don't want to be thought of as traditional CDNs, are not making clear to customers what exactly they offer. Like customers, I don't get it either.

Stevan Arychuk from HP commented that, "BitGravity isn't a P2P network at all; they are a CDN service (with a twist), but don't do any P2P delivery." Ok, maybe not, but then what is the twist? Good luck finding out. Their website says their technology is  "the next generation of content distribution" with no info at all on how they deliver content. And I'm not picking on BitGravity, all of the networks that call themselves "next generation" really don't say what they do.

Move Networks does not use the term P2P on their website, but are classified as a P2P provider by everyone I talk to. Are they really? Only they can say. Their website says their delivery technology is based on "Quantum Streaming" but then don't define anywhere on their website that I can find how it works.

Grid Networks gives more info than some of the others but then confuses me even more by saying they have a hybrid approach that overcomes the challenges faced by P2P and traditional CDN networks. So if I understand this right, they are saying they are not a hybrid of both but rather of something completely different than the two.

Swarmcast calls their technology "grid-delivery" so I think that is P2P based but the first sentence on their technology page uses the term streaming and then says how their technology allows you to "always achieving the maximum possible download speed." So is it streaming or is it download, or is it both?

Itiva calls their technology "Quantum transport" and says it works "by taking every advantage of proxy and node contribution". Their website says that their Quantum transport technology "is similar to that of a controlled peer to peer model." So then it's not P2P?

Also, each one of the value propositions of the P2P (or non-P2P providers) has the exact same message on their websites which makes it hard to distinguish providers offerings:

- Move Networks: Highest Quality, Scalability, Low Cost, Reliable
- BitGravity: Performance, Reliability, Service, Price
- Grid Networks: Highest Quality, Performance, Scalable, Cost
- Swarmcast: High Quality, Reliable, Faster, Low Cost
- Itiva: High Quality, Low cost

Is anyone as confused as I am here? Don't get me wrong. I think it's great that there are new companies in the space who are looking to improve the user-experience for video based on a different way of delivering content, but if I can't understand it, how are customers expected to? It's not your technology that you are selling but rather the value you can show in the technology, translated in terms that are valuable to the customer.

Delivery networks needs to do a better job of education the market and customers on exactly what you do and don't support. How do you deliver content? What forms do you deliver it in? What formats can you deliver? Can you support live or just on-demand? These are the types of questions customers are asking.

Vendors,you need to help customers cut through the confusion. Make it simple. Deliver a clear message. Give them the information they need to make informed and educated decisions. Because if it stays this confusing in the market, it will not be adopted in the volume you want.

YouTube Content Coming To Apple TV, Changes Nothing

Yesterday, Apple announced that they will be making YouTube content available on the Apple TV in mid-June. In the initial beginning, only select content will be available with the entire YouTube catalog available by year's end. While some seem to think this is a big deal, it changes nothing in the way of either companies business.

Some have predicted that this is now the first real integration of web video and the TV but I beg to differ. Is there any business model behind it? No. Will Apple they sell more Apple TV's now? No. Does this give YouTube some sort of way of monetizing their content? No. Yes, YouTube will get some more viewers to select pieces of videos but the lack of traffic to YouTube is not what's stopping them from creating a revenue stream from their traffic. The only reason Apple and YouTube did this deal is is because they could. It's does nothing to change the dynamics of the business models or the industry.

This deal also highlights the lack of standards in the market as all of the YouTube content currently in the Flash format is going to have to be transcoded to be able to play back on Apple TV since the Flash videos would look bad on a TV screen. And if YouTube is going to make available however many tens of millions of clips they have, we're talking about a lot of work to do so. No, it's not rocket science, but it's not like YouTube can easily just re-purpose what they have. There is a direct cost to having to transcode millions and millions of clips to another format, not matter how big you are.

Am I the only one that is getting tired of hearing about YouTube? Ok, I get it YouTube, you're really cool and you got bought by Google. But what about a business model? How about discussing what your video advertising strategy is going to be? You have been saying for the past two years that you are "experimenting" with advertising models. Less talk, more action.

Blog Readers Can Get Discount On New Book In My Series Entitled "Hands-On Guide To Flash Video"

Last month, the newest book in my series came out entitled "Hands-On Guide To Flash Video", written by Stefan Richter and Jan Ozer. My publisher Focal Press has been kind enough to offer anyone who reads my blog to get a copy of the book at a discount.

The book covers Flash Video production from soup to nuts, beginning with how to configure your camcorder and ending to advanced server techniques like bandwidth detection and FMS logging and reporting. Real word lessons from case studies of successful Flash Video deployments are also included.

I always felt that authors should stand behind their books more than they do, so I will make this commitment. If anyone who buys the book with the discount link feels they did not learn anything from it or that reading it wasted their time, I will personally provide a full refund if the book is returned to me. I don't want anyone keeping anything they feel does not help them so I'll take it back and refund your money. Yes, I know that is odd for an author to do, and some will say I am crazy to do it, but I think more authors should stand behind their work.

Also, anyone who posts a review of the book on Amazon will get a free copy of the next edition of the book when it comes out. This goes for bad reviews of the book as well, as all reviews are welcomed.

NY Video 2.0 Meetup On Wednesday Will Focus On P2P Video

If you are going to be in the NYC area tomorrow (Wednesday May 30th) the monthly NY Video 2.0 Meetup will be having a discussion on P2P video and will have presentations from CacheLogic, ROO Media, ooVoo and Pando Networks. The event starts at 7pm and is located at the Columbia Business School and is free to attend. All the details are at the www.nyvideo.org website.

I have been asked to moderate the June meetup and am currently accepting topic ideas. If there is a subject you want to see the June meetup focus on, please let me know.

P2P Coming On Strong: BitTorrent Launches New Enterprise Content Service

At the Streaming Media East show earlier in the month, there was a lot of talk about how/if P2P distribution will disrupt the world of online video delivery. For me, it's not a disruptor, but rather a compliment to other forms of video delivery. As some forget, P2P is not best suited for every type of content and every kind of distribution. That said, we're starting to see some serious interest now when it comes to P2P, yet there is a huge learning curve that is going to have to take place with customers first.

At the show, I had the chance to sit down with BitTorrent and had an in-depth conversation with them about what content companies are asking for in the way of delivery and what trends they are seeing. They brought up a good point. On last year's P2P panel at Streaming Media East, the vendors on the panel were making the case for P2P. But this year, it was the two customers on the panel, MTV and Turner who were saying how they needed P2P solutions. That shows a shift in the market and a move towards content companies at least being willing to now listen to what P2P based solutions may have to offer.

I also had the chance to hear about the new enterprise solution that BitTorrent just recently started offering in the market. While they call it an enterprise solution, and in our industry enterprise usually means Fortune 500, their solution is really tailored to the media and entertainment companies who are pushing serious traffic where a P2P solution would make sense. This new offering is one that is service based and separate from the BitTorrent Entertainment Network, which is their portal where you can purchase content. BitTorrent has spent most of the past few years working on technology and is now ready to aggressively promote and sell their service in the market. They've been on a hiring spree lately to be able to support this new offering from a marketing, business development and sales perspective and are still have a few more positions open to fill out the group.

Their new service is based on their technology they call BitTorrent DNA that they describe as "a disruptively effective content delivery technology". Their selling point is that of all P2P based solutions, reduced bandwidth cost, increased performance and scalability and an improved end-user experience. While their marketing pitch is still pretty high-level and is the exact same as all the others, BitTorrent's solution really does stand out from the others from a technical level as well as how the company operates. For starters, they have an install base of over 150 million clients worldwide, far surpassing any other P2P based client out there. Also, they have a device certification program to ensure compatibility between a hardware solution, whether at the chip level or a consumer electronic device. In addition, customers have told me that BitTorrent's P2P solution integrates better with other content delivery networks than some of the other P2P services on the market. BitTorrent also mentioned that one of their biggest advantage is that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) recommends their solution to content owners since BitTorrent has worked over the years to make the MPAA happy.

Add all of this up and the fact that BitTorrent raised $20 million back in December and it's clear that BitTorrent will become a major player in the content delivery market. And if they do go public later this year, like many on Wall Street are speculating, they'll become even more legit overnight.

For a list of P2P delivery providers, you can see my earlier post on 4/24:

List Of P2P Delivery Networks
http://blog.streamingmedia.com/the_business_of_online_vi/2007/04/list_of_p2p_del.html

DirecTV's Version of Mobile TV Is A Briefcase

Came across this story on Yahoo! from last week talking about how DirecTV showed off its version of Mobile TV, named Sat-Go, at CES earlier in the year. Who is going to carry around a briefcase, to be able to have a portable TV where they go? What are these companies thinking? The article says that the application for this device would be "ideal for tailgating, backyard viewing, and a number of other scenarios." I'd love to hear what those "other" scenarios would be that pertain to consumers. Tailgating, maybe. For the backyard, highly unlikely.

What I completely disagree with from this article is their notion that Sat-Go will somehow challenge video on the mobile handset as it says, "...Sat-Go and similar products from the satellite TV companies could offer a very compelling alternative to what we've seen from cell phone-based mobile TV thus far."

Sure, it's an alternative, the same way VHS tapes are to DVDs. But I think we know the answer to the question of what consumers will want to carry around for video, a briefcase or a mobile phone.

Customers Tell Content Delivery Networks What They Want At Streaming Media East Session

One of the topics that I presented on at Streaming Media East was entitled "Costs for Outsourced Hosting And Video Delivery". (on-demand video here) It was a packed room, with over 150 attendees listening to what the going rates are today for video delivery via outsourced delivery networks for both large and small volume.

It's a session I do every year and enables me to track the pricing from one presentation to another each year. It also gives everyone an opportunity to hear from the customers in the room on what problems they are having and also what they think the vendors need to improve on. The biggest disappointment to me was that of the nearly 10 delivery networks that were exhibiting at the show, hardly any of them showed up to this session to hear from their customers. I never understood why they miss that opportunity to get direct feedback.

The session went well, with a lot of questions and was very interactive with audience participation. Of all the questions and comments we discussed, the following are the ones that were asked about most often or were pain points that they are experiencing:

• Why is it so hard to find out from a service provider what formats they support, from what geographic regions, for streaming and/or progressive downloads both live and on-demand? Case in point, someone brought up the example that all delivery networks websites show large network maps with lots of locations and peering connections but none of that tells the customer exactly what is supported, where and in what form.

• Why don't more networks give you an incentive to push more traffic on their networks instead of penalizing you when you do overages? I'm discouraged to see that as of late, some providers seem to be going back to the early years with their pricing models where they charge you a premium if you do more than you committed to. We know why the providers do this as they have to estimate how much capacity they themselves have to buy and plan for each month, but this is a broken model. You won't keep a customer this way, especially when some of them are then using a second provider just so they don't pay overages. That's a horrible business model when your overage pricing model sends your customer to your competitor.

• Why is online reporting still so poor? I asked for a show of hands in the room if anyone was satisfied with the reporting they are getting from their current service provider. Not a single hand went up in the room of over 150, the majority of which were all large and small content owners. And talking to specific customers after the session, nearly all of them complained about reporting with their current provider, of which they were all using multiple providers. So this is an industry wide problem and not specific to just one provider.

Those were the biggest points of frustration for customers along with why the pricing varies so much from one provider to another. But that's something that has been and always will be case. The subject of P2P came up regarding the role that it may play in delivery but we didn't dive too deep into that discussion since we had a specific session at the show on P2P they could go to. However, it was clear that more customers are looking at P2P and have a lot of questions around it.

The other thing they asked for was a list of service providers, both large and small, for which I pointed them to this list on my blog. The content delivery space is becoming more crowded for the first time in years which is a good thing as far as I am concerned as it helps the customers and more importantly, puts more exposure on the content delivery market and helps the industry as a whole.

UPDATE: As an update to my post from two weeks ago about the size of the CDN market, I have almost completed all of that data and will have it up on the blog shortly. I apologize for not being able to get to it faster but I have a lot of follow up items from the show last week.

What Are The Going CPM Rates For Online Video Advertising?

A reader of the blog reminded me that one of the questions that was not answered in detail last week at the Streaming Media East show is what sites are getting in regards to CPM rates for video ads running on niche sites with professionally produced video content. We've seen numbers mentioned that all over the place in articles and mentioned at conferences, ranging anywhere from $15 - $40. And trying to get real numbers from people seems to be data they don't want to share. As an industry, we've at least got to give people an idea of what is possible depending on the type of content they have and the kind of site it is on. So what are the real numbers out there? What are you paying or charging?

Creative Artists Agency To Scout Programs For Joost

Today, Joost announced that it had signed up Creative Artists Agency (CAA) to scout and secure new content for distribution on the online entertainment platform. This agreement shows the importance that online video distribution is going to play over the coming years for professionally produced content. CAA clearly represents some of the best music, movie, sports and media talent on its roster and potentially provides Joost with access to a vast amount of new content. I expect this deal will also enable some brand name stars to use the Joost platform to launch their own channel or online content offering. They should have more success via this route as opposed to another online video network as Joost will make sure the content is professionally produced and has nothing to lose by giving some stars a shot at creating their own programming.

On2 Acquires Video Technology Provider For Mobile In An Effort To Extend Reach To Devices

On2 announced yesterday that it had acquired Finland based Hantro Products Oy in a cash and stock deal valued at around $58.4 million. Hanto provides video compression technology for mobile, consumer electronics and IPTV devices. The press release says that Hanto's technology has been implemented on more than 200 million devices and in mobile phones produced by 5 of the top 6 handset manufacturers.

On2 said the Hanto business is expected to generate between $8.1 and $12.2 million in revenue this year which should really help On2's bottom line. For a company that has excellent traction in the market, a set of really robust products and many happy customers for its Flix product line, I always found it odd that On2's revenue has always been so low. For Q1 of this year their revenue was only $2.8 million.

On2's move of focusing on the chipset comes as no surprise considering how mobile devices are finally starting to become adopted in the States and already have better traction overseas. If On2 can give increased video quality with lower power consumption demand and lower silicon costs for manufactures like they say, then this will be an interesting product offering to watch.

Limelight Networks Starts Roadshow, Prices Shares For IPO

Limelight Networks has started its roadshow this week and investors have started calling asking for details on the content delivery market as a whole and what the competitive landscape looks like. Limelight has also set its proposed IPO terms and will be offering 14.4 million shares between $10-$12 a share. It plans to trade on the Nasdaq under the symbol LLNW.

The real question is what Limelight plans to do with the money once raised. Speculation is that they need to do some small acquisitions and increase their service offering by providing more in the way of content management and they clearly need to improve their media reporting options. Acquiring a company who has a content management solution is possible as there are a few small players on the market who could easily be taken out. But on the reporting side, there is not much on the market when it comes to reporting, so expect them to spend some of the newly raised capital to improving their own reporting product.

Everyone keeps asking, but I don't know the date when they are going public. I don't think an exact date is really decided till after the roadshow. But I'll make a guess and say July 9th.

Video Technologies Are Converging, People Aren't

While we see many of the online video technologies converging across the media, broadcast, publishing, advertising and entertainment industries, I don't think there are enough companies and executives in those verticals who are converging with one another.

While it is great to see just how many new people from multiple verticals were at the Streaming Media east show this year, all shows still seem to be made up of people from different industries who don't talk to one another. The broadcasters don't know the publishers. The media guys don't know the advertisers. I see this at all shows. The same holds true for how all these executives network with one another and where they go to get their news. The broadcasters don't know about the blogs and news outlets the entertainment guys know about and vice versa.

For instance, I was asking many attendees if they knew of local networking events here in NYC and in most cases, they only knew of them if they were from the industry the event was about. For instance, the publishers and broadcasters know about the NY:MIEG events, but the media and advertising guys don't. And the media and content companies know about the NY Video 2.0 MeetUp, but the advertisers and publishers don't.

The technologies are becoming less fragmented and more intertwined but I don't see many of the executives in all of these verticals really crossing over to other shows, blogs, networking events in the way I think they need to be.

Online Video Distribution Requires A Hybrid Approach

Been a busy past three days at the Streaming Media East show, which ended today. I'll be following up on a lot of meetings and conversations I had at the show and will be posting in more details some of the more interesting things I talked about and heard from others.

I think the biggest theme from the show is that content creators and content distributors are finally starting to see all forms of video distribution as being equal. Yes, we call the show "Streaming Media" but it's really about all forms of video based IP. Streaming, progressive downloading, webcasting, P2P, podcasting etc....all these forms of distribution should be used or at least considered depending on who you are trying to reach and what type of content you have.

The biggest thing I saw at the show is that the industry as a whole is progressing, customers are becoming more educated and there is growth on all sides. The question is what it will take to get us to the next level as an industry and how we can push the business side of the equation forward.

Mogulus, Vator.tv, ScanScout and Black 20 All Get Funding

Another busy week for investments, this time from small content startups.

• Vator.tv has announced some funding, details of which can be read about at VentureBeat.com, a great site for those of you who don't know about it. Bambi Francisco, the founder and CEO of the company is speaking at the Streaming Media East show this week on a panel about "consumer-generated video sites".

• Jeff Jarvis announced on his blog that he has invested in Black 20, a company he is calling a creative small-TV content company. Jeff and Black 20 are speaking on a panel at Streaming Media East this week about "creating the new television".

• Mogulus, a service currently in beta that allows for personal webcasting online, announced that it has raised just over a million dollars. I've been looking into the service and last week chatted with the CEO Max Hoat and I expect to have a demo account to play with over the next week or so. Max will also be at the Streaming Media East show this week.

• ScanScout, a company that monitors video content announced it had received $7 million in funding.

• It's been reported that WallStrip.com is going to be acquired by CBS for around $5 million. While it has not yet been confirmed by anyone at CBS or WallStrip.com, other sites are reporting it as a done deal. Adam Elend from WallStrip.com is speaking at the Streaming Media East show on Wednesday so I'll see if there is anything he can talk to by then.

I know of a few more investments announcements that will come out this month as well so expect this to be a really busy month for funding.

Level 3 Could Become A Major Player In The Content Delivery Market

A few weeks ago, I posted on the topic of content delivery providers with a post entitled "Comprehensive List Of Stream Hosting Providers". I put an asterisk next to Level 3 as I had not heard much from them as to where they stand in the CDN market since their acquisition of the SAVVIS CDN assets about four months ago.

This week I got an opportunity to speak to Level 3 at length and got an overview of what they plan on doing with regards to their content delivery product offering. As anyone who follows this industry knows, it's a good time to get into the content delivery market due to the high demand for delivery services and the fact that there are only about half a dozen providers or less who truly provide global delivery via streaming and progressive download.

After hearing Level 3 give their take on the what they want to accomplish, they are an interesting one to watch for a few reasons and should have a few unique advantages when they bring their product to market:

• They own and operate their own network and data centers. I know this model well from my days at Globix where we owned and operated our own network and data centers and use to sell to customers that "we can control your content from creation to distribution". It's a different value proposition and one that resonated well with our customers at the time and I expect still does with many content creators today.

• They own the Vyvx business which allows them to be able to ingest content directly into the Level 3 network. Add a few encoding studios, and customers have the ability to ingest, encode, host and deliver their content through one provider. That's something that no other delivery network has the ability to offer today.

• They have contracts with many of the big media companies already for other services like data and networking that gives them an immediate sales pipeline for a content delivery offering or any new product for that matter. In addition, they can provide customers with the build out of smaller networks for some of the content creators who are building out their own private delivery networks.

That's not to say they can do all of this tomorrow or that they will automatically be successful, but I think they have a good shot at being a serious player in the industry if they put the right pieces in place and move fast enough. They are going to have to roll out functionality of the network in phases and I expect they will start to talk about what they have to offer very shortly, if not next week at the Streaming Media East show where they are exhibiting.

When it comes to the CDN business and assets that they bought from SAVVIS, the only real value there was the assets for the delivery of static content, not video. Anyone who knew the SAVVIS streaming network knows how old and outdated it was since it was mostly the legacy infrastructure from the Cable & Wireless days which is who SAVVIS acquired it from. So Level 3 has a lot of work to do building out basically a new CDN for streaming as well as adding all of the services that goes along with it like reporting, storage, content ingestion etc.... not to mention all of the internal work that needs to be done to sell and support such a service. But done correctly, with all of the right pieces, it will be a valuable offering in the market.

While it won't put the other content delivery networks out of business (there is enough business out there for everyone) they do have the opportunity to be a serious player in the game with an offering that talks to more than just the delivery of bits. For the most part, it's a different kind of offering where they can sell the service to full-fill more of an entire ecosystem need to content creators, as opposed to just selling the delivery aspect. This is a trend we are seeing all of the CDNs move to as they begin to add more services to their offering like content management and transcoding.

In my opinion, the biggest competitor to Level 3 will be themselves. Many big companies never really get a product off the ground to mass market adoption because they move too slowly, have too much internal politics and red tape and take too long to decide on anything. For the most part, the smaller content delivery networks have been able to grab market share by staying quick and nimble. If Level 3 can combine the advantages of being a big company with the ability to move fast like a small company, then this can be the real deal. We'll be watching.

 

Networking Reception Monday Night At Hilton Hotel In NYC

On Monday May 14th, the night before the start of the Streaming Media East show, I will be hosting an informal gathering at the Bridges Bar at 7pm, located in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel in NYC. (1335 6th Avenue at 54th Street)

Thanks to CacheLogic and Microsoft, they will be providing some free drink tickets. This is a great chance to meet some of the speakers and others before the show. No passes are required and all speakers and friends are invited. We've also extended the invite to those from the industry who may be local to the area.

We always get a great cross section of attendees from the media and entertainment, broadcast, enterprise and advertising industries. No need to RSVP - just come on by and feel free to pass this along to others.

Thanks again to CacheLogic and Microsoft for providing free drinks will they last.         

Beyond Pre-Roll: What's Next for Online Video Advertising?

That's the focus of one of the sessions at the Streaming Media East show next week. We have a couple of sessions dedicated to the online video advertising subject and this panel discusses how as video advertising evolves in the coming months and years, technologies and business models will naturally extend beyond those in practice today.

Moderated by Jeff Marcus, former CTO of 24/7 Real Media, this session discusses the challenges and opportunities that face the online advertising industry in 2007 as it establishes a foundation for video advertising that will help shape the future of the broader consumer advertising industry.

The panelists include:

• Jeremy Lockhorn, Director of Emerging Media and Video Innovation, Avenue A / Razorfish
• Aleck Schleider, Senior Director, Product Sales, Advertising.com
• Richard Glosser, Executive Director of Emerging Media and Partner Integration, CondeNet
• Christian Anthony, Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder, Special Ops Media

Register for the show and come hear about what's next for online video advertising. Are there any topics or points would you like to see discussed at this session? If so, please include them in the comments section.

Joost, ROO and Itiva All Close Funding

We're not even halfway  through the month and already there have been a bunch of funding deals.

• Today, Joost announced that five selected parties have collectively invested approximately $45 million in the company including Sequoia Capital, Viacom and CBS amongst others. They don't say exactly what they plan to do with the money but I think it's a safe bet to say that a good chunk of it will go to expanding their delivery capacity

• This morning, ROO announced that it had completed a private equity financing with gross proceeds of $25 million in a stock transaction involving mostly existing investors. ROO will use the money for ongoing operations, expansion of their video platform and "to pursue previously announced acquisitions."

• Last week, Itiva Networks announced it has secured $7 million in private funding. The company said it plans to use the money for working capital and to expand it's sales and marketing efforts.

In addition, I know of a few more deals that should also be announced this month. Will be a successful month for companies in this space raising money.

NPR: Exploring TV's Takeoff on the Internet

Yesterday, NPR's show "All Things Considered" focused on the topic of Internet television and what is taking place on the web today with video. The piece is a pretty good overview of how both content creators and distributors are approaching the online video market. Myself, Brightcove and the founders of Joost all got some air time.

I would of liked to have seen them talk a little bit more to the business models taking place today, but you can only cover so many details in such a short piece. I would not want to be the editor who has to take a topic like Internet TV and condense the entire business down to a ten minute story.

 

Newsweek Does Q&A With Joost Founders

Newsweek just posted an article by Steven Levy where he got to do a sit down Q&A session with the founders of Joost. Nothing revolutionary in the article, but I do enjoy one of Niklas Zennström quotes as it is dead on, "New technologies very seldom completely replace things—they’re usually complementary."

Fox, Scripps Networks, Wall Street Journal, nbbc and MediaZone to Discuss What Consumers Want With Rich Media

We have some great sessions at the Streaming Media East show next week talking about what consumers want when it comes to rich media. One of the sessions on May 16th is entitled "The Streaming Disconnect Between Consumers and the Major Media"

Moderated by Tejpaul Bhatia, formerly of ESPN, this session discusses current consumer demands for video and new content platforms, as well as the new media efforts being taken by the major media companies.

The panelists include:

• Ron Berryman, Senior V.P., GM Television Stations, Fox Interactive Media
• Jeff Kaufman, VP, Content and Programming, >nbbc
• John Jurgensen, Digital Entertainment Reporter, WALL STREET JOURNAL
• Jim Sexton, SVP, Interactive Brands, Scripps Networks
• Mariana Danilovic, VP, Business Development, MediaZone

Register for the show and come hear the steps that content creators and major media companies need to take to adapt to consumer behavior and the benefits they can get from diversifying their content offering across multiple platforms. Are there any topics or points would you like to see discussed at this session? If so, please include them in the comments section.

Analysts Data On The Size Of The Content Delivery Market Is Completely Flawed

When it comes to many facets of this industry, there are many data points missing, the biggest of which is reliable metrics and analysis that is backed up by real data. I am constantly getting copies of research reports from analysts and research houses that give size of market numbers for a particular product or service which is based on no data or completely wrong data. Yes, I know much of it is a guessing game when it comes to predicting numbers based on growth and trends, but there is enough hard data out there today when it comes to content delivery that would allow you to see the size of the market today and estimate the size of the market for 2008.

One of the questions I am always asked is what is the size of the content delivery market for outsourced hosting and delivery as it pertains to audio and video, both downloading and streaming. The answer is simple - no one knows exactly as the majority of the delivery networks do not give revenue numbers or break out their revenue based on their product line. Yet, research houses continue to put out reports that they want you to spend thousands of dollars on that are complete junk.

While reading a story on TVover.net about "Content Delivery Networks Gear Up for the Online Content Surge" there is a reference to a report from Frost & Sullivan that says, "New analysis from Frost & Sullivan, World Content Delivery Networks Market reveals that revenues in this market totaled $0.50 billion in 2007 and is likely to reach $2.50 billion in 2013." Am I the only one that finds something wrong with the idea that the report says how much revenue was done in 2007 when the year is not even half way over yet? Mind you, this from a report that costs $6,000 for a single user license and does not say what the $0.50 billion number is comprised of or like others, does not spell RealNetworks correctly.

Then I go and read a story on Forbes that says "Limelight and competitors like Akamai Technologies, Level 3 Communications and Internap Network Services collectively generated about $600 million in revenue last year from their content delivery services, according to Accustream Research."

Say what? Level 3 did not provide any content delivery services at all in 2006. Level 3 didn't complete the acquisition of the SAVVIS CDN assets until January 23rd of this year. So how is Level 3 even included in the list? And Internap didn't complete the acquisition of VitalStream until February 20th of this year. So that should say VitalStream, not Internap. Internap did not have any revenue associated with content delivery for 2006.

Later in the week The Week of the 21st, I am going to detail in a blog post what the real size of the content delivery market was last year and share with you the data I use to achieve the numbers. I'll also show how the industry can realistically estimate what the market will be for this year and 2008 for content delivery, and it won't cost you $6,000 to read.

15 Second Pre-Roll Video Ads Will Become The Standard

Yesterday, there were a bunch of interesting announcements that came out at the IAB Digital Video Leadership Forum in NYC, the most interesting being from NBC Universal.

NBC announced that it would no longer run or accept pre-roll ads longer than 15 seconds for short-form content. They did not define what length "short-form" is to them, but also said they would still run 30 seconds pre-roll ads in front of full-length episodes. This is a smart move on their part. I know a lot of sites already run 15 second ads, but in most cases, the advertiser really ends up deciding the length of the ad as opposed to the site.

NBC also announced that it had partnered with a handful of rich media companies including Unicast, Eyewonder, Pointroll and EyeBlaster to create new forms of online ads that let users direct the playback of advertisers' messages and that enable branding in the video player itself, thereby giving more control to the viewer. Another smart move on their part as it is giving the viewer more say in how the ads are consumed. Instead of just forcing viewers into an experience that you know they don't want, why not give the viewer the ability to customize the ad playback so that it's a better user experience and gets the advertiser better branding. I think I am like many viewers on the web where when I see a 30 second pre-roll ad, I hit mute and go do something else for 30 seconds until the ad is over. If NBC can keep that ad down to 15 seconds and allow me to better customize my experience with the ad, I'd probably sit through it.

NBC set a July deadline for implementation to allow advertisers time to prepare for their new standard.

Streaming Media East Show To Be Webcast/Blogged

The Streaming Media East show is only one week away and we are working hard on all the last minute items. We're going to have a lot of great coverage from the show, much if it in real-time. TVWorldwide.com will be webcasting the sessions, Beet.tv will be doing live interviews from the On2 booth, LostRemote.com will be blogging sessions and IPTVEvangelist.com will be doing on-demand video interviews.

We've also got a bunch of bloggers and writers moderating a lot of sessions who will have show coverage including Jose Castillo, Jeff Jarvis, John Havens, Robert Scoble, Steve Bryant and others.

We also have pre-registered press from Advertising Age, AlwaysOn, Broadcasting & Cable, Business 2.0, ClickZ News, CNET News, eWeek, GeniusDV, Wall Street Journal and  The New York Times amongst many others.

We will be adding links on the home page of StreamingMedia.com to all of the sites that plan on doing show coverage, so if you want to be listed, please contact me ASAP. If you are a blogger or media professional, it's not too late to get a press pass.

The Differences Between Silverlight, Flash, Flex 2, Apollo and Other Rich Internet Applications

Ryan Stewart over at ZDNet has one of the best blogs out there when it comes to the subject of rich Internet applications and the development community. With all the recent announcements from Microsoft and Adobe, many people are not fairly comparing platforms and don't know what each one truly does. In his post entitled "The how and when of Adobe and Microsoft’s Rich Internet Application technologies", Ryan has created a guide for how and when you would want to use different rich Internet applications from Adobe and Microsoft including Silverlight, Flash, Flex 2, Apollo and other tools/platforms.

It's a must read for anyone who wants to truly understand the differences between all of the platforms out there.

YouTube's Chad Hurley Writes Lame Article In Forbes

This week, Forbes published an article written by Chad Hurley on it's website. I don't know if the article also appears in print but I imagine it does since on the website it says it's published date is three days from now.

I expect Forbes to publish a better article than this. Chad spends the entire time talking about how YouTube allows new talent to be discovered and gives people the ability to get in front of a lot of eyeballs and basically just tells us all how great YouTube is. Come on. We all know that YouTube allows new talent to be discovered and allows users to get eyeballs to their videos that normally no one would ever see. Is that the best thing that you can write about?

What about writing an article that explains how you plan to monetize YouTube? Or maybe some details on how the revenue sharing will work for video advertising you plan on rolling out this summer? Why not tell us what it's been like integrating YouTube into the Google infrastructure? Or better yet, talk about when you plan on rolling out your content filtering technology and what that will entail.

There are so many things about YouTube and Google that people want to know about and probably need to know about that could have been discussed in detail in this article. But instead we just get another piece about how great YouTube is. Disappointing.

MCAI Conference Looking For Speakers To Discuss "Evolving Delivery Systems"

Todd O'Neill who is organizing a track on Evolving Delivery Systems for the upcoming Media Communications Association-International conference (ProTracks), is actively looking for some speakers in three areas:

• video production for streaming - SD/HD; production gear; post production
• delivery methods - hosted or not; digital signage; iTunes; Slingbox; Intranet; mulitcast; etc.
• strategies - the "why" of streaming; pitfalls to avoid; enterprise approaches; independent producer approaches; vlogs; etc.

MCA-I (formerly ITVA) is an association of professionals primarily in the corporate and business media space. The show takes place in September in Chicago. Contact Todd O'Neill directly if you are interested.