• by July 25, 2008

As advertisers continue to look at the Internet through traditional lenses, they will continue to ask for "scale."

There simply aren't enough good user-generated and uploaded videos that achieve millions of views. There is the occasional viral hit, but those are one-in-a-million -- i.e., not enough to build a "media buy" on. Further, even if produced content is delivered through broadband, the audience has fragmented so much that no single piece of great content will have the same mass scale as an episode of "Seinfeld" did years ago. Again, not enough to build a "media buy" on.

So while you accurately point out that industry standards are necessary -- "the ability to accept any ad buy, any format, and create any ad avail on any player," etc. -- the entire Internet ecosystem will NOT support the type or quantity of advertising that traditional advertisers want. Not to mention, users will be turned off if forced to watch pre-roll, post-roll, or interstitial video ads in the videos they want to watch.

Great piece, though.