It’s new year, which means it must be time for the
ubiqutous year-end list?
This best of 2007, which we hope captures the
excitement and rapid change that the industry has experienced over the
past 12 months, brings us the best and worst IPTV moments.
If you think we missed anyone, probably your company,
let us know. We’ll be happy to add it to our upcoming list of
Notable Mentions.
The Top Ten
10) Craziest Online Content Idea of the Year: ModMyLife
The Subservient Chicken meets reality TV. The SIMs in
real-time. Second
Life for the Non-Furry set. There are many ways to describe the
not-quite-launched ModMyLife.com, which sets improvisational actors
armed with Justin.TV-style minicams loose on the streets of NYC to do
the bidding of their keyboard-bound masters.
There’s no
business plan we could possibly conceive of connected with this
property, but for sheer madness and originality and pure interactivity,
ModMyLife scores high on all accounts. Ladies and gentleman, this is
the future of TV, assuming, of course, the writers’ strike
ends sometime soon.
9) Product Launch: Wowza
Media Server Pro
Launched in February of 2007, Wowza Media Server Pro has since
racked
up over 3,700 global licensees and won numerous kudos from the likes of
Streaming Media Magazine, while going head-to-head with streaming
Goliaths like Adobe and Windows Media Server.
On the heels of a recent
cost reduction, which prices the software at $995 for the Unlimited
package, the Wowza team has not only built a great product, but they
have brought it to the people in a way that makes it irresistible to
anyone who wants to move into the arena of large-scale Flash streaming.
8) Independent Web Property:
Ask a Ninja
Sure, the Chocolate Rain kid landed a deal with Dr. Pepper and
Comedy
Central. And, yes, Chad Vader has propelled its creators down the same
path of success as fellow Madisonians, The Onion.
But, as far as
we’re concerned, Ask a Ninja is the upstart Web property with
all the answers. Creators Sarine and Nichols have not only inked a
six-figure book deal, they’re currently working on a
“Ninja” TV show and have been reportedly raking in
over $100K a month in advertising and merch.
So much for big budgets
and product placements. (Bud TV, are you listening?)
7) Best and Worst Scripts for Digital Rights: Major
League Baseball and the WGA
If you were a Major League Baseball owner, you would be
wishing you could go to the instant replay right about now, because the
deal owners made for Digital Rights back in 2000 is going down like a
ballpark beer, flat and with an aftertaste.
Owners thought that the
Internet might be a good vehicle for promotion, but certainly not for
watching a game online. OY! Today, the Major League Baseball Advance
Media organization (MLBAM) will generate about $360 million from online
viewership. Score one for the other team!
In the game-still-in-progress category, we have the
Writer’s Guild of America (WGA), who are so steadfast in
their call to Studios that they share in the revenues from current and
future online sales that they’ve held back our fix of junk
TV.
The Guild has also employed the very online technology they
are
fighting about in their Speechless
campaign, this to scare the public about the consequences of
a protracted strike.
In addition, with the Screen Actors Guild (SAG)
President Alan Rosenberg piling on with his unions voice of solidarity,
the whole mess does not bode well for a happy holiday season, or New
Year for studio owners.
6) The Jury Is Still Out Award: Google, Joost, Slingbox, Etc.
The last mile gets longer by the day, and makes the Browser
Wars of Web 1.0 look like a pleasant afternoon spent at Gate D of a
Jets game. How will we get all the great content from the Web to our
fancy new HDTV’s?
The choices are endless and still endlessly
confusing. At the moment, the battle is being fought between a host of
proprietary technologies, none of whom have succeeded in capturing the
excitement of the broader world
the way the iPod has done with digital music.
And perhaps
that’s the problem right there: whether you’re
talking about Joost, or Slingbox or Apple TV, or Microsoft’s
dreadful LIVE service, it’s still too darn hard to get things
going. Are we just a slick commercial away from Digital Entertainment
Nirvana? Only time, and money, will tell.
5) Best Re-Birth of a Technology: P2P Pando
Networks, Yaron Samid, Co-Founder & CMO
If you thought P2P had gone the way of the sock puppet from
Pets.com
you’d be wrong.
Peer-to-peer is fast-becoming the darling for
moving large online video SD and HD content with companies such as
Pando Networks’ recent deal with a major network, rumored to
be NBC as the engine behind Hulu.
Let’s hear it for the
Little Guy, while at the same time remaining cautiously optimistic that
consumers will be able to take their eyes off YouTube long enough to
seek out their favorite content elsewhere.
4) Most Old New Media of the New New Media and
All-Around Swell Guy:
Dan
Rayburn, Streaming Media
Dan Rayburn has been in the streaming biz while most of us
were
debating the benefits of PointCast and getting gushy over blink tags
and animated banner ads.
A pioneer and a visionary and a dude who has
been through it all and seen it all and somehow managed to maintain his
integrity, Dan is one this industry’s best advocates and
champions, no matter what coast you happen to be on or what platform
you prefer.
In a business environment that still seems to favor kids
who just started shaving; it’s nice to see an old dog rock
some new tricks.
3) Best Independent Web Video and Use of Online
to Drive
Sales: The
Tribe, Tiffany Shlain
A priest and a rabbi walk into B&H Video. The priest
says, “I’m going to make a movie and get it sold in
Blockbuster video stores.” The rabbi, has a different idea.
“I’m going to make a movie and sell it myself and
not have to share any of it with anyone else.”
Well, this is
not exactly how it happened with Tiffany Shlain, and it’s
just as good an excuse as any to attempt and priest-and-rabbi joke.
But, all the same, Shlain deserves props for not just doing it her way,
but also helping to bring the independent film market into the 21st
century.
iTunes – it’s not just for music anymore.
Of course, it helps if your film is excellent and is something people
want to watch in the first place. Our
panel at Streaming Media West, with Tiffany
2) Analyst of the Year, Who Seems to be Familiar
with Pop
Culture and Has
Recently Seen the Sunlight: James McQuivey, Forrester Research
In a field populated by people who get their jollies reading
the latest
page-turner from O’Reilly, or else so divorced from
real-life™ that a two-ton anchor is required to keep them
from floating away into the Ozonosphere, James McQuivey of Forrester
Research is a guy who truly gets the proverbial BIG PICTURE.
Anyone who
has ever seen him in action, particularly in an interview
he did with us back at Streaming Media East, knows that he can switch
from the high to the low, from the micro to the macro, from the serious
to the absurd, in a moment’s notice, while somehow tying it
all to this crazy and exciting and sometimes too-geeky-for-words world
of streaming content.
1. Best Imitation of a 14th-Century Monk,
William of Ockham
The scientific precept known as Occam’s Razor is
often
paraphrased as “All other things being equal, the simplest solution is
the best.” The words of William of Ockham, a 14th century
Franciscan friar, are not lost on the simplest of truths –
namely that market forces coupled with a prudent hand from government
will foster growth.
Companies such as Neuf in France have aggressive
priced IPTV with a significant uptake in consumers singing up.
Regulations have loosen restrictions on Telco’s and
what
services they can offer and concerns of Net Neutrality regulation have
subsided for the time being, offering industry the opportunity to
rollout services and content to as wide an audience using bundles and
tiered pricing to bring people along such as with Verizon FIOS.
Lastly, consumers are beginning to employ different solutions
then simply passive OTA/Cable in their homes with devices such as the
Sandisk Sansa TakeTV player and
platforms from companies like Ensequence, which recently teamed
with Spike TV to offer interactive programming for the 2007 Video Game Awards.
Let’s hear it for Choice, even if it’s a
matter of
figuring out our own choices!!!
