What if you could flip the mass media power of the TV industry funnel, making your viewers your producers, and then using communities to source, distribute and promote professionally curated content? Well, then you might have something that looked a little bit like user-generated video portal YouTube combined with a traditional television network. That appears to be what Current Media plans to introduce soon, Chairman Al Gore hinted at during the closing keynote Tuesday at MEDIA magazine's Outfront Conference in New York. "Soon we will unveil a new, related concept that we call Crowdsourced TV," Gore disclosed during a speech that focused largely on the concept of a "sustainable advertising" marketplace, and what advertisers, agencies and the media could to do to help make it a reality. The industry needs to, Gore asserted, because, "the consumer is way ahead of us on this." Gore was alluding to the fact that consumers have already embraced social media platforms and new, inexpensive, professional quality technologies that have made them as much a part of the conversation as any marketer or media conglomerate, and that the best option for the media industry is to embrace it. "I want to keep the anticipation, but we're very excited about it," Gore said about Crowdsourced TV. While he declined to elaborate, he implied that it would be a new iteration of what Current Media already does with its online community and its cable and satellite delivered television network, Current TV, which reaches 60 million U.S. households, and also operates in a number of major markets around the world. In fact, Gore said he was leaving the Outfront conference to travel to Johannesburg, where he was going to open a Current TV network in South Africa today. Gore, a former Vice President of the United States, said he and his partner Joel Hyatt originally launched Current to "democratize" the business of media, giving consumers more of a say, and direct involvement, in the creation and distribution of content. And in some ways, Current was ahead of its time, paving the way for a user-generated revolution that was ultimately seized by YouTube, and fueled by legions of social network platforms that promote and distribute it. Gore, who is a senior advisor to YouTube owner Google, did not imply whether it might play a role in Crowdsourced TV, and he did not give a specific time frame for unveiling details of the plans. But Mark Rosenthal, the savvy, long-time MTV Networks president who was brought in last year as CEO of Current Media, has quietly been retooling the network and its Web site to leverage the best of both its fervent user/creator base, as well as his personal ties to Hollywood and professional TV and film producers. During his speech, Gore implied that the next iteration of Current TV would expand on its users' ability to create information and entertainment content, as well as advertising on behalf of marketers and brands. Current was one of the first networks to utilize consumer-generated advertising campaigns on behalf of marketers, and showed campaigns that were recently developed by its users to help introduce a new, biodegradable package design for Frito-Lay's Sun Chips. "What if we let them create content and the advertising," Gore told a roomful of top advertisers, agency and TV industry executives attending the Outfront conference. "We're pretty excited about this."
Verizon announced an array of expansions and new capabilities in its digital FiOS TV service Tuesday, which should make it easier for subscribers to consume Internet media via their TVs. First, Verizon said it is adding YouTube videos to its FiOS TV Internet Video offerings, which is accessible via Verizon's Media Manager. YouTube joins several major video-sharing sites already available on FiOS TV Internet Video, including blip.tv, Dailymotion and Veoh. Simultaneously, Verizon said it will also make Media Manager available to all FiOS TV HD subscribers. (It was previously only available to DVR subs). Finally, Verizon said it is introducing Internet Radio for FiOS TV subscribers, which will allow them to access hundreds of radio stations around the country and stream music from their PCs to their TVs. All these features can be controlled by Verizon's new "Mobile Remote." The system, introduced in February, allows owners of Motorola's Droid phone or the HTC Imagio to use their mobile devices as TV remote controls. The service also lets users transfer photos from their mobile devices to their TV screen. Shawn Strickland, Verizon's vice president of consumer strategy for Verizon, stated: "We are working with some of the most popular companies on the Web to create a high-quality, engaging Internet-to-TV experience that will only grow richer with time." The expansion of Verizon's Internet content-on-TV services comes after July's launch of Facebook on FiOS TV.
Video ad network Tremor Media reported Wednesday securing $40 million in venture capital funding led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson Growth Fund, with participation from DFJ and Triangle Peak Partners. Canaan Partners, Meritech Capital Partners, and SAP Ventures also participated in this financing. Today's round brings the total to $82 million in VC investments during the past few years. The company became profitable at the end of last year, doubling the size of its video advertising network from 2009 to 2010. The investment could put Tremor Media on a new path to success and support for a variety of media, such as set-top boxes. The capital puts the company on a road to accelerate product development for a variety of platforms that also includes mobile, according to Jason Glickman, the company's chief executive officer. "We will aggressively build new products and features into our technology platforms, Acudeo, which powers it all," he says. The features being built into the platform for publishers will help monetize their inventory and content. Advertisers will see features that allow them to take advantage of online video beyond standard pre-roll and untargeted campaigns. Part of the push aims to move online some of the dollars historically invested in television. Tremor Media's network, made up of 1,700 publishers, will expand to support set-top boxes, Glickman says. Part of the road map involves working with set-top box or Wi-Fi connected television makers to support online video advertising through Internet protocol (IP) addresses. There are several ways that consumers will interact with these televisions, and Glickman believes the ad inventory will port nicely from one medium to another. Tremor Media also plans to build in support for HTML 5, the next major revision of the HyperText Markup Language for the Web. It looks similar to Apple's iPad format, Glickman says. "As we see users move that way, we'll release innovation there as well," he says.
Sponsorships -- they're not just for athletes anymore. Great Wolf Resorts, Inc. has selected Northwest Natural Products' L'il Critters Gummy Vitamins as its "exclusive official children's vitamin of all Great Wolf Lodge brand resorts." Other well-known brand products that Great Wolf Resorts has partnered with include Starbucks, Pizza Hut, Pepsi, Aquafina, National Geographic Kids, Nestle USA, Pampers Splashers Swim Pants and Enterprise Rent-A-Car. The resort chain has a dedicated page on its Web site detailing each of the partnerships. In some cases, the product is available at the resort, while other partnerships offer discounts at the resort if a product is purchased. For example, consumers can save $25 off best available rates at Great Wolf Lodge when they purchase any Splashers product. The year-long partnership with the vitamin company will include promotional and retail activities that will focus on the importance of childhood nutrition, says Julie Stokes, vice president of sales and marketing for Madison, Wis.-based Great Wolf Resorts. Children's nutrition will be at the forefront of the partnership through several initiatives, including a "My Healthy Habits" video contest that will award a family with a three-night vacation package to Great Wolf Lodge. In addition, L'il Critters will be promoted through Wolf Tracks, Lodge Life Guides, sampling, social media and electronic communications. The family-oriented lodging chain offers indoor water parks. The hotel chain is soliciting new brand partnerships on its Web site. "All year round, Great Wolf Lodge delivers an audience whose average length of stay is two days," according to the site. "In the clutter-free environment of Great Wolf Lodge, your brand has access to a wide array of marketing programs, ranging from those of a National Partner or simply a Supplier. As a National Partner, your brand can come to life before the eyes, ears, fingertips and imaginations of the millions of Great Wolf Lodge guests and visitors, focused on adults ages 25-49 with children in the household."
For video consumers, it's not only a case of more new digital screens from new video devices, but more traditional TV screens in the home. Nielsen says the number of TV sets in 2009 had its largest-ever year-over-year increase since 2006 -- now just under three TVs per home, 2.93 TV sets per household. In 2009, the number of TV sets averaged 2.86; 2008 was at 2.83; 2007 tallied a 2.79 average; and 2006 was at 2.73. According to Nielsen's Television Audience Report, the number of U.S. homes with three or more TV sets is now at 55% -- an all-time high -- up from 54% of a year ago. This seems to come at the expense of those homes with one and two sets, which have moved up. Those with two sets are now at 28%, the same versus a year ago, but declining in recent years. Those with only one TV set -- now 17% of TV homes -- have also dropped. In 2005, for example, 21% of TV homes had only one TV set. Nielsen also notes the unusual situation that exists between people and TV sets: There are more TV sets than people in the average TV home. The number of people per TV home is at a 2.5 average. Other results: According to Nielsenwire, which first published the TV set results, total advertising broadcast network spending was down 10% in 2009 versus the previous year, while national cable advertising grew 16%. The report also says 34% of TV homes have a DVR, 46% are able to receive an HD signal, and less than 10% of homes receive TV programming via over-the-air signals.
The video search engine blinkx introduced behavioral targeting services Tuesday supported by AdHoc, the company's contextual video advertising platform. The updated version of AdHoc targets the ads to the person watching the video. Ads serve up based on information collected in browser cookies and ad tags embedded in Web pages on the site and in the videos. Speech recognition and visual analysis technology pull out information from the videos prior to the piece being added to the pool of content. AdHoc tracks individual browsers and the consumption of video content on the blinkx site. As long as the site visitor doesn't delete the cookie, the targeting information remains available for up to two months. Information to create a customer profile comes from activity on the blinkx site. The technology tracks consumption patterns, building awareness of a consumer's interests, which in turn enable advertisers to match ads with an online video audience based on behavior. "We don't buy data from anyone else," says Suranga Chandratillake, CEO of blinkx. "And we're not following browsers from Web site to Web site." During the past three years, blinkx's speech recognition and visual analysis technology has supported 800 campaigns for more than 585 brands, such as Coca-Cola, Shell and Microsoft. Chandratillake says some companies have run trials measuring click-through rates, but the CTRs on videos typically have more to do with attractive creative than anything else. The company also measures success through surveys, boasting 300% better engagement rates. Blinkx, which charges per impression, has one customer, Scion, testing the service. The next challenge for blinkx is transitioning the technology from the PC to the TV. Chandratillake says between 1% and 2% access blinkx content through a video game console or TV. Although it's a minute amount today, those numbers didn't even appear two years ago, so it's time to thinking about what the site and user interface should look like, and how to track the information. The format is so different, Chandratillake says, that it has become a concern that needs to be addressed. Until recently set-top boxes couldn't support Flash. And what can you do with a remote control verses mouse and keyword, he asks.
Hot on the heels of the NAB Show and the much-anticipated April 3rd arrival of the iPad, Netflix and broadcast networks ABC and CBS recently announced moves to offer video applications for the iPad. While CBS is relying on the HTML5-served video that will allow fans to access shows like "Survivor" and others using the iPad's built-in Safari Web browser, ABC appears to have taken a different approach, relying on a standalone app with HTTP-streaming inside Apple's QuickTime library. ABC's move to launch its own iPad application rather than relying upon a browser-based experience is really a game-changer in the video streaming industry. This gives ABC much more control over the presentation, resulting in an overall better consumer experience. It will enable viewers to browse and stream episodes from shows including "Dancing with the Stars," "20/20," "Lost," "Desperate Housewives" and "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" in its own iPad application. Why is this such a big deal? Consider for a moment how the Pandora app changed the lives of avid fans when it launched mobile applications for the iPhone, BlackBerry and Android. Without having to access the Pandora Web site through a Web browser and risk the hiccups of disrupted or down service, Pandora subscribers are able to stream stations using either their mobile device provider's network or WiFi with uninterrupted steaming -- similar to what ABC viewers will be able to experience through its iPad video app. ABC's move to launch an iPad video app is a sign that content owners are willing to reach out and test different approaches in monetization. Since no ideal system yet exists, vendors like ABC are conforming to Apple's preferred formats, and in some cases using competitive formats to be differentiated in the market so that their content is available on all connected devices. While the iPad does not currently support Adobe Flash, most content providers work with online video platforms that run on Flash. While I am a fan of my recently purchased iPad, what would make it the ideal video streaming device for me, and thousands of others, would be if the iPad supported a wider range of video formats. While ABC's move to create an iPad video application sets the pace for other vendors in the industry, all are now grappling with the balance of creating and storing copious amounts of video in different file formats to suit each kind of connected device, and the politics around a yet-to-be created universal intelligent server that would prevent the forced convergence around certain platforms -- like those that the iPad, for now, only supports. It may be that an intelligent server could be an Apache server or possibly an Adobe FMS server. Either way, there seems to be a need for a unified video delivery platform. This theoretical system would configure the stream with metadata passed in by the connected device. The platform could then instruct the connected device -- such as a TV or cell phone -- how to present the video, and what type of video to expect. All eyes will be watching for the next big studio to launch its iPad application with HTTP streaming. Until then, I am eagerly awaiting the next killer app for video, while I spend some time getting to know my iPad, and reacquaint myself with Web sites only viewable on Flash.
TV broadcasters made a splash this month at the NAB conference in Las Vegas when they announced plans to create a new mobile video service. The ambitious effort backed by a dozen companies including Fox, NBC Universal and Gannett Broadcasting would use existing spectrum to power news and entertainment programming to up to 150 million U.S. cell customers. But a new analysis from research firm The Diffusion Group is skeptical about the prospects for new the DTV initiative. It points out that broadcast TV shows are already being delivered to handsets but with little success. Through a separate group called the Open Mobile Video Coalition, broadcasters for years have worked to create a national mobile TV standard. So far, 45 U.S. broadcast stations are sending test mobile DTV signals using the ATSC-M/H standard. That group next Monday will kick off a "consumer showcase" in Washington, D.C. demonstrating how people will be able to watch local digital TV programs for the first time on handsets and other mobile devices. There's also Qualcomm's FLO TV, which has its own branded mobile video service as well as versions offered through AT&T and Verizon Wireless. The problem with FLO TV and other mobile TV offerings is that they're not available on many phones yet. "For mobile TV to gain wide acceptance, it must be available on a wide range of popular devices such as the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android-based phones," states the Diffusion Group report authored by analyst Brian Platts. "Instead, Qualcomm and DTV broadcasters are relying on the sale of dongles and other after-market accessories that plug into mobile devices to enable their mobile TV capability and allow consumers to receive the broadcast signals." The DTV receiver called the "Tivizen," for instance, goes for $150. Platts suggests broadcasters should take a lesson from Apple, which made accessing mobile services simple, intuitive and convenient through the iPhone. "For broadcast mobile TV to flourish, there must be widespread diffusion of handsets capable of supporting the service natively, a feat not at all difficult given today's miniaturization technology," he explains. The Catch-22 is that manufacturers won't be eager to add capabilities that aren't likely to be used or drive up costs. The Diffusion report also shoots down the idea upheld by broadcasters that DTV would help relieve congested wireless data networks. It argues that if mobile TV requires adding accessories and is embedded on only a few devices, most consumers will continue to reject it and stick with cellular service for mobile video. "It is thus in the interest of mobile operators and device vendors alike to push for embedded support of digital mobile TV solutions," according to Diffusion. But until they see wider uptake of mobile TV, they won't be likely to take that step, creating a chicken-and-egg problem for the broadcasters. They'll have to hope the DTV showcase this summer by nine Washington-area TV stations will lead to greater demand for watching TV on mobile devices.
I should have bought that socket wrench. That's the conclusion I came to recently when, after discovering that I had no more hot water in my apartment, I found myself on my back, covered in diesel, clutching a pair of 30-year-old vice grips and screaming obscenities at my hot-water heater at five o'clock in the morning. The cause of my frustration wasn't that I'd run out of fuel (that was my fault). It wasn't that my favorite pajamas were now irreparably saturated with fuel and soot. No, the cause of my frustration was the ancient set of vice grips I wielded like an angry toddler with a rattle. Specifically, the cause of my ire was this tool's ability (or lack thereof) to perform the task of loosening the bleed valve on the fuel line leading to the hot-water heater. Anyone familiar with hot-water heater maintenance and repair is asking the question, "What the heck were you doing loosening a bleed valve with vice grips? That's why they invented socket wrenches." Correct. That is precisely why they invented socket wrenches. But the last time I was in the tool aisle of my local hardware store, I looked at the socket sets and said, "You know what? I know I need one of these, but I really can't think of a single thing I'd use a socket wrench for." So again: in retrospect, I should have bought that socket wrench. Why am I telling you this story? To make this point: you never know the true utility of a tool until you find yourself without it at a critical moment. This is true of any tool, including the tools marketers use to engage prospects. A good video marketing arsenal is overstocked at all times. You need to have the tools to deliver a video email to a target audience at a moment's notice, to push a video out to your social network in reaction to some game-changing event in your industry, to inform multiple departments of product changes, and so on. There are lots of tools that specialize in each of these things, and there are appropriate times to use them. But in order to use these tools, you must first own them and be familiar with their operation. Let's test your toolbox. Let's say a small band of over-caffeinated interns created a quirky one-off music video about one of your products. (In my head it's set to Men At Work's "Down Under," but your results may vary.) You think this video has viral potential. So what tool do you use to get it there? Did you answer YouTube? Well, that's a start. But remember that "viral" means widely viewed, and as ubiquitous as it has become, not everyone browses YouTube -- especially not for B2B videos, if that's your market. In order for this video to spread effectively, you'll need to push it out to as many different online video platforms (OVPs) as you can. You can do this manually, or you can use a service like Brightcove's to equal effect. In either case, you need to have accounts with as many different OVPs as you deem necessary -- each of them needs to be a tool in your toolbox. Viral video can also be shared directly through social media, so you have to make sure you possess and can use social media tools as well. For our purposes, the most important of the social media outlets is probably Facebook. Like all tools, you need to understand how video sharing on Facebook works in order to make it work for you. People underestimate the viral potential of email, as well. Yes, people still forward emails to friends and colleagues. Heck, chances are that you have a forwarded email in your inbox right now. To not avail yourself of this targeted method of video distribution would be pure folly. If you don't have a viable video email solution, get one. If you do have one, learn how it works. There are a variety of other tools that can help your video content do whatever you want it to do. The point is that in order for video marketing efforts to be effective, you have to possess these tools and know how to use them. Otherwise you'll end up covered in fuel, screaming obscenities at your hot-water heater.