Saturday, March 03, 2007

A rose by any other name...



Ruminations on why content is king:

There are lots of articles this week on how media is converging. YouTube penned a deal with the BBC to host three BBC channels - one news, and two entertainment. YouTube is under fire for struggling to meet valuation expectations and failing to appease media giants - like Viacom which pulled its content a while ago. The FT is heralded for its multimedia approach on Poynter.

Great. But the article I found most interesting was on Joost - the brainchild of two Scandinavian internet wizards (think Kazaa and Skype)

“It’s not Web video; it’s TV,” Mr. Friis said. No user created content, just old-school TV, albeit with more channels... and a retro TV Set portal to boot.

The sheer brilliance of reinventing 1950's broadcast television online is explained in the Time article:

Bringing TV to the Web


I think it's interesting that broadcast television has become so ravaged by Nielsen ratings and Ad dollars that the internet may actually be the saving grace of content. Americans will get access to international correspondents and many more international viewpoints via YouTube and the various deals they have in the works...

The BBC... would smell as sweet (online).

Hey nonny, nonny.
LT

2 Comments:

At Saturday, March 03, 2007, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, LT! You slay me. I think if my last name was Hearst or Hilton, I'd make sure you had your own column.

 
At Sunday, March 04, 2007, Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is awesome!

Joost is a great counterpoint to YouTube, to broadcast TV. And I think it incorporates (in a legal way) the best of things like TVU player and Channel Chooser. Those put up TV from around the world online - various different stations depending on the day or time.

I'd love to see where Joost goes. And the retro TV set!

 

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