Looking For Moderators: Streaming Media East Conference

While the program is almost complete, I still have a few open spots for moderators at the Streaming Media East show in NYC in May. Below are the details on each round-table session. Ideally, I am looking for fellow bloggers or members of the media who are already covering these topics and can bring their expertise to the discussion. I need folks who are experts in the subject of the session and understand the role of a moderator.

If interested, please e-mail me ASAP and please make sure to detail your expertise of the session you are applying for. In addition to these moderating positions, I will have a few open speaking spots to announce later this week. Keep an eye on the blog as once they are posted, they go quick, usually the same day.

Tuesday, May 12th, 2009

Bridging TV And Broadband And Cutting The Cable
Streaming sites like hulu, CBS, ABC, and others have proven that savvy audiences are turning to their computers for entertainment, and in a way that's profitable. How are traditional and cutting-edge companies capitalizing on this trend? In addition to providing the content, how are they taking advantage of this "connected" platform as they deliver content? And finally, how will this affect cable companies that are losing subscribers to this new content source?

Media Framework: Video Publishing Platforms
A number of vendors offer video publishing platforms, the features and functionality—not to mention cost—vary widely. Some vendors focus their solutions on content management and monetization, while others are geared towards enabling syndication and interactive advertising campaigns. Adding to the confusion is the fact that different platform vendors have different metrics for billing, and costs rise as content owners become more successful. This session will lay the groundwork for content owners to better understand what type of publishing platform they need and what they should expect to pay for managing content.

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

Reinventing The Ad Model Through Discovery And Targeting
While advertising has emerged as the primary business model for broadband video, it remains relatively immature. Key constraints include users' inability to find the videos they seek and limitations on targeting ads against particular content. This panel will explore how industry participants are addressing these challenges and starting to show results. Come hear the factors that are affecting the current business models for online video advertising and the hurdles that need to be overcome to truly allow content to be monetized on the Web.

The Impact Of Broadband-Enabled TVs, Gaming Consoles And Devices
With the influx of new devices, consumers no longer rely on just the PC for their online video consumption. With the number of new broadband-enabled TVs and Blu-ray players expected to be sold, along with devices such as the Xbox, Roku, TiVo, and PS3, consumers now have many ways to get their video fix. So what are the new business models that will be created from these new devices? What hurdles need to be overcome so that content can be monetized for multiple platforms? Explore with this panel the role of current consumer entertainment devices in this new convergent world and how these devices will play together to offer a superior video experience.

How Old Media Is Embracing Online Video and New Media
This session will discuss how converging media technologies are redefining traditional distribution methods; how interactive and on-demand services are changing; and how entertainment and news video is being consumed. Come hear from some of the leading publishers, broadcasters, and advertisers about the impact that video and new media is having upon their business models.

Transit Data From XO and Cogent Not An Indication Of Traffic Growth On CDNs

I do a lot of calls with financial analysts and many of them ask about the rate of traffic growth amongst the CDNs. It's a good question and one that is hard for them to really put a number on since nearly all of the major CDNs don't give out any data about the traffic on their network from quarter to quarter. While most CDNs always say it is growing, we don't know at what rate, even when they say it grew by x percent. Without real baseline numbers to base those percentages off of, it's hard for anyone to really know what kind of traffic growth the CDNs are seeing.

We hear all the CDNs say they are seeing traffic growth, but is it at the same rate as previous quarters? How much of that growth is coming from video? And what percentage of traffic passed on the network comes from video? These questions and more at things we all want to know so we can have a detailed screenshot of exactly what trends are taking place in the market with online video delivery. Since CDNs aren't breaking out these numbers for us, that leaves many financial analysts looking for traffic growth estimates from transit providers like Cogent and XO Communications as an indication of what the CDNs are seeing.

The problem with this approach is that companies like Cogent will have one or two quarters with lower traffic growth and then next quarter, show a spike in traffic. This is typically due to the rate at which they were selling their transit that quarter and not a direct result of how much transit the CDNs bought in the quarter. Using transit providers growth as a barometer for the growth of traffic on CDNs really does not give us any guidance, especially since we typically have no details on how much transit the CDNs are buying and whom they are buying it from. Since the CDNs all buy different volumes of transit from multiple providers, it still leaves us guessing.

The way I judge traffic growth on content delivery networks is by speaking to their customers. The content owner is the only accurate barometer on how the CDNs are doing and if you speak to enough large customers each month, you can start to see traffic trends. The good news is that I still have yet to speak to any major content owner who says their traffic growth rate is declining. Content owners are still putting more content online, at higher bitrates, for more devices and in many cases, more long form content as well. While some are speculating that next year we see a real surge in video traffic on the CDNs, I would argue that we are seeing that today. The surge is now. Devices like the Xbox 360, Roku, TiVo and others are creating continued traffic growth on the CDNs. Online video offerings from those like MLB, NFL, NHL, Hulu, Netflix and others are giving us a surge right now since the quality of their video offerings are encoded at such high bitrates.

But today's surge does not seem to be enough for many financial analysts. The question they really want to know the answer to is when does the next tipping point take place in the market that results in the CDNs seeing tremendous traffic growth? While that's a question we all want to know, it's pretty easy to see from what is taking place in the market that the next real tipping point does not come this year or even next year. While there are a bunch of devices out in the market today, it will take a few years before the install numbers are large enough to make a real impact. New offerings like broadband enabled TVs and Blu-ray players show promise, but are really only just being offering by multiple manufactures in the second half of this year. HD video is starting to gain some traction, but is still far off from being thought of as a "default" setting in your video window.

The good news is that it's all on the way, but lets be realistic and not expect it to happen overnight. While many talk about the surge of 05' when YouTube started to take off, keep in mind that didn't happen overnight as many make it seem. It took a few years before YouTube and Flash video really started to impact the market and it will take a few more years before devices and HD video impact the market in a big way again. In the mean time, traffic growth on the major CDNs is good, is still ticking up and content owners say that they see no signs of it slowing down.

Related Posts:

- Content Owners See Their Video Traffic Growing 2-4x Over Last Year

- Economic Conditions Not Affecting Video Traffic On CDNs, For Now

- CDNs Getting Ready To Benefit From Higher Bitrate Content

Speakers Announced For Streaming Media East, Some Spots Still Open

I'm happy to announce that I've now confirmed 80% of the speakers for this years Streaming Media East conference and exhibition, taking place May 12-13th in NYC. I still have some open speaking spots left and have a few positions for those who may want to moderate. Keep an eye on my blog over the next few days as I will be announcing what I am still looking to fill.

Here is a partial list of confirmed companies speaking at the show. Speaker details will go online next week.

 

I'm still working on the CDN Summit agenda and hope to have that online next week. I'll be posting open speaking spots for that as well as the few remaining spots for East over the next few days.

Updated List Of Carriers and Telcos Entering The CDN Market

There's been a lot of changes in the CDN industry in the past few quarters with many carriers and telcos entering the market, mostly via partnerships with other CDNs. Here's an updated list of CDNs in the market, broken down between pure-play CDNs versus non pure-play vendors like carriers and telcos. (To make the list easier to find on my blog, all you have to do is go to www.cdnlist.com for the latest update)

Non Pure-Play CDNs

• AT&T
• Broadmedia
• BT (will launch by year's end)
• Deutsche Telekom (partnered with EdgeCast)
• Global Crossing (reselling Limelight and EdgeCast)
• Internap (acquired VitalStream)
• Level 3 (acquired CDN assets of SAVVIS, acquired Servecast)
• NaviSite (reselling EdgeCast)
• NTT Communications
• Pacnet (partnered with Internap)
  
• PCCW
• Reliance Globalcom (partnered with Internap)
• Tata Communications (partnered and invested in BitGravity)
• TeliaSonera (will launch in April)

Pure-Play CDNs

• Accelia
• Abacast
• Advection.net
• Akamai
• Amazon Web Services
• BitGravity
• BitTorrent
• CacheFly
• ChinaCache
• CDNetworks
• Cotendo
  
• Conviva
• Digital Fountain (acquired by Qualcomm 2/09)
• EdgeCast
• EdgeStream
• Grid Networks (merged with GMS 4/09)
• Highwinds
• Itiva
• Limelight Networks
• Mirror Image
• Move Networks
• Pando Networks
• Panther Express (acquired by CDNetworks 2/09)
• PEER1
• Real Broadcast Network
  
• Technicolor
• Velocix
• Voxel.net
• Vusion

Before anyone starts saying it's not fair to put all these folks on a list, please read my disclaimer in my last CDN post which explains many of the differences between the CDN vendors in the market.

European Carrier TeliaSonera To Enter The CDN Space Next Month

With all the carriers and telcos entering the CDN space of late, it's no surprise that European carrier TeliaSonera plans to enter the CDN market and will probably make the announcement at the MIPTV show in Cannes next month.

TeliaSonera is the number one carrier of IP traffic in Europe and their website says they provide direct connections to their network for more than 80% of all European broadband service providers. They basically own the vast majority of eyeballs in Europe. Currently, many of the CDNs who have delivery services in Europe buy from TeliaSonera and it appears as if they now want to cut out the CDNs and take that business on themselves.

I'm also hearing that they plan to offer a video content management service across their network and plan to make an acquisition in the market to add this functionality to their offering, although I don't know who they plan to acquire or how close a deal may be.

TeliaSonera will need to do a lot more than just be able to deliver bits if they want to truly enter the CDN market and if they do plan to add some applications to the network to help manage video assets, it's a similar approach that Level 3 is taking in the States. The CDN market is going to look very different 24 months from now and while it will take many years for the shift to take place, we're already starting to see a lot of the carriers and telcos lay the ground work for what it to come.

Is There A Shortage Of Online Video Advertising Inventory?

I didn't get a chance to see the premiere episode of Late Night With Jimmy Fallon on TV Monday night so last night, I checked out the archive online. Over the course of the entire show, NBC delivered the exact same 30 second Windex commercial five times. While I have been complaining about the lack of targeted online video advertising for some time, this isn't even about targeting.

Why is NBC delivering me the same ad five times in a row? I find that hard to believe that NBC has no other ad sponsors for the premiere episode of Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. I know it says Windex is the sponsor, but if I play back other clips from the same show, I get an ad for FedEx. And even if Windex is the only sponsor, what impact do they think their ad is going to have when played five times in a row? Now it just annoys me and makes me want to not buy any Windex products. What's the problem here? Is there a shortage of online video advertising inventory? Do advertisers just not get it? Clearly, this isn't working.

Related Posts:

- Lack Of Ad Targeting Keeping Publishers From Making Money With Online Video

- Yahoo! Video Shows Us The Problems With Online Video Advertising Today

BitGravity Announces Live HD Streaming, But Traction Will Be Hard To Come By

On Monday, BitGravity announced their new live HD streaming offering dubbed "BG Live HD" which will be available in April. The technology supports 720p or 1080p at 30 frames per second with 1080i support in future development plans. While the demo I saw of the service looked excellent and had very good quality, I think traction could be hard to come by even with BitGravity's low pricing in the market. While I agree that the total cost of ownership for BitGravity's live system could be cheaper than some of their rivals, customers are not buying on price alone.

Over the past year we've seen many CDNs and live video offerings come to the market saying they can take share from guys like Akamai, Limelight and Move Networks. But to date, the big vendors still have nearly all of the live event business and content owners have yet to flock to any of the smaller players simply based on a cheaper price.

BitGravity's new live offering is not going after customers who outsource the need for a broadcast video platform to someone like Move Networks, but rather is targeting the content owner who wants to do their own encoding in-house and is not just looking at how much it costs to deliver some bits. That could be BitGravity's advantage, targeting a smaller segment of the market others aren't focusing on as hard, but it's too early to know if they can get any traction. BitGravity has been out in the market for over a year now and we have yet to hear if any major broadcasters are using their service.

In that time, BitGravity has already been offering very low prices in the market, usually half of what Limelight or Level 3 charge and many times, with no commits. I have not yet seen that aggressive pricing strategy pay off in the way of large customers and anyone who follows the CDN market knows that trying to grab market share with low pricing never works out in the long run. That said, BitGravity does not license or run their network using Adobe's Flash Media Servers, so it is possible that their costs are lower than others, but no one truly knows.

BitGravity's live HD service looks really nice, but so do a lot of others and each day it is getting more and more difficult to see the quality difference from one HD video over another. BitGravity is selling their live HD service with the value that it has very low latency, around six seconds. That's good to hear, but it still does not beat Adobe's Flash Media Live Encoder with FMS that has a default of only two seconds for a non multi-bitrate encoding. BitGravity may truly have a cheaper offering in the market but for me, the proof is seeing if BitGravity can sign up customers to use the service. If BitGravity can show that major broadcast customers are using their live HD platform, they might be able to get some traction. But until we can see if that happen, it's all speculation.

Since BitGravity is a private company, it's hard to really gauge how much money they are burning through. They raised $11.5 million from Tata Communications about six months ago and raised a smaller round of $2.5 million a few months before that. In that time, BitGravity has been doing a lot of development work and has expanded their headcount so clearly they are spending a good amount of the money they have raised.

For me, like many of the new CDNs in the market, the verdict is still out on BitGravity's potential success as we don't really know enough about their business to judge if they might have the staying power to survive in the market. Adoption is the key. If they can get customers signed up and scale their business, they have a chance. But if they can't grow revenue quick enough, they will be like a lot of the other CDNs in the market who have enough cash today, but come 12-18 months from now, will be hoping to sell their company if they can't raise more capital. Right now, it's too early to know where BitGravity may end up until we hear more concrete details about their business.

Review: Hands-On With Amazon On The Roku, Close To 300,000 Units Sold

This morning, Roku officially announced that the Roku digital video player can now stream movies and TV shows from Amazon's Video On Demand offering. I've been playing around with the beta for the past few weeks and while the interface is very nice, HD quality videos from Amazon aren't offered. That said, if Roku can continue to add more content partners for the device and improve the video quality, I think they have a very good chance at having a total of half a million boxes sold by the end of this year.

Setting up the Roku box with your Amazon account is easy and requires you to add a five digit PIN. Once done, you're up and running and searching through movies and TV shows is pretty simple. The Amazon offering on Roku allows you to browse Amazon's Video on Demand menu right form the TV, which is something currently not available for Netflix content. The only real problem I found was that there is no way to skip through a long list of movie titles. You have to scroll through them one by one and if your list is really long, it can take awhile.

Unlike the Netflix service on Roku, users who want to get content from Amazon need to pay $3.99 for a 24 hour movie rental or $1.99 to purchase TV shows. Initially that may surprise some Roku owners who have always thought of the box as providing free content via Netflix, but Amazon's Video On Demand offering is not an all-you-can-eat service.

While the video quality was good for most of the videos I watched, it could definitely be improved. I have seen some Roku users speculating on discussion boards that the Roku is not powerful enough to stream HD quality movies, but we know that's not the case. Three months ago, Roku announced that HD quality videos were now available for the Netflix streaming service, so the lack of HD content from Amzon is a content problem, not a technical one. In addition, while the Roku supports stereo audio, there is no support yet for surround sound.

While still priced at only $99, the Roku is a really nice affordable box, but is still quite limited with regards to the content one can get on it. As with any offering, the content available for viewing will dictate Roku's success in the long term. While I expect Roku will announce more content partnerships this year, the key is for Roku to get some major content owners on board. They need to get some major broadcasters or someone like Hulu to agree to make their content available to the Roku. While Roku has talked about going after the major broadcasters, it's a sure bet that they won't license their content for free. That means that any content offering on the Roku from a major broadcaster will enable some form of advertising tied into the service, which might be ok if done correctly.

While I don't have an exact number of units sold, I do know that to date, close to 300,000 Roku's have been sold since it first launched in the market last year. I think that's a pretty successful start, but when compared to the Xbox 360 which to date has sold 13.3 million consoles in the U.S. alone, the Roku still has a long way to go before it is thought of as the primary device one uses for playing back movies and TV shows. While I have a TiVo, Xbox 360, Apple TV, Vudu, Roku and broadband enabled Blu-ray player, the Xbox 360 is still the device that is my first choice, based on video quality and the catalog of content available.

Over time, I think the Roku box will compete less with the Xbox 360 as both devices primary roles and price points are very different. But for now, the Roku is competing with the Xbox 360 in my household.