Streaming Media - April/May 2008 - (Page 32)

At this dinner, I found myself face-to-face with people I’d done go-to-market strategies and business analysis cases for during the 1995–1999 time frame, as streaming was just taking off, videoconferencing was figuring out H.264, and ISDN/T1s were slowly being replaced by DSL. These same people are now back in the mobile video space in a large way, because they’re in turn selling to the same people they once sold to—or partnering with those people on VC deals. Discussion at the table ranged from the political (should the Green Line in Turkey be abolished?) to the nostalgic (Rembrandt II VP videoconference codec devices about the size of a college dorm room refrigerator) to the here and now (whether watching high-definition movies on a Blu-ray Disc-equipped laptop was even worth the time, or if you really needed a home theater system to fully appreciate them: “It’s all about the sound!” one of the dinner guests emphatically stated). But the discussion kept coming back around to the opportunity faced in streaming video, especially in a mobile play. The players at the table had been there during the glory days of the mid-‘80s and the late-‘90s and were now back in the game for the late 2000s. While the streaming story goes several years beyond the last decade, at least from the various roles I’ve had in startups and consulting projects, we’re going to focus on the last decade surrounding the StreamingMedia.com website, the trade show events, and the first and second right time, launching a website, a trade show series, and making plans for a trade publication called, appropriately, Streaming Media magazine. The shows were as frenetic and fast-paced as the industry growth. The parties were equally interesting, whether at The Agenda in downtown San Jose, Calif., the Queen Mary in Long Beach, Calif., or—a personal favorite—the Ministry of Sound in London. The shows in those days attracted an extremely high level of industry attendees, as well as industry luminaries. Mark Cuban, after starting Broadcast.com in his dorm as a way to listen to sports games from distant cities— the streaming audio equivalent of the decades-old shortwave radio—would entertain us all with his predictions of where the industry was heading, before heading off to buy his own sports team and roll into high-definition broadcast. Martin Tobias, founder of Encoding.com (which later became Loudeye, then was broken into several pieces), was always popular at the shows, although the entourage could get to be a bit much. He told me in an October 1999 interview that we’d never see real-time encoding in his lifetime; when I asked incredulously if he really thought that was true, the entourage started murmuring—no one questioned Tobias in those days. He corrected the statement to stay it wouldn’t happen in his lifetime in the industry, which turned out to be true. a decade of streamingmedia.com J. Geils and his jazz combo (near right) play a reception at Streaming Media East in New York in 2005. (Unfortunately, all the attendees were at the bar when this shot was taken!) Brightcove's Jeremy Allaire (far right) keynoted at Streaming Media East 2006 in New York. coming of Streaming Media magazine. Along the way, we’re going to explore a few of the unsung or forgotten heroes of the streaming media story. Pax Romana In the early days, the shows were hopping, the official parties were much more than a show-floor cocktail hour, and startups abounded, including some who have continued through the downturn and come out the other side with business models intact, a continuing vision, and, for a few, a key patent or two. Richard Bowsher, CEO of First Conferences, hit streaming media at the 32 STREAMING MEDIA April/May 2008 Tobias left the industry in 2000, missing faster-thanreal-time transcoding by about 10 months. Even Bill Gates got into the act, followed closely by Rob Glaser’s point-counterpoint approach during the beginnings of the antitrust suit by RealNetworks and several other companies. Consider this announcement from late-December 1999, following the Streaming Media West 1999 show in San Jose, Calif.: Microsoft Chairman and CEO Bill Gates used his keynote address on Tuesday, December 7, at Streaming Media West 1999, to showcase streaming media as the next major wave of computing that will bring entirely new benefits to consumers worldwide as digital http://Broadcast.com http://Encoding.com http://StreamingMedia.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Streaming Media - April/May 2008

Streaming Media - April/May 2008 Table of Contents Beyond the Bottom Line Technology and Business Trends by the Numbers (Not So) Instant Karma MSN Autos Revs Up Video Production Dow Finds the Right Streaming Chemistry Why Video Is Changing the World A Decade of StreamingMedia.com What's Your Digital Media Strategy? Blasts From the Past: A Decade (Almost) of StreamingMedia.com Headlines Analyze That A League of Their Own: Streaming Media All-Stars Where Are They Now? Wanted: Sexy HDTV That Connects to the Internet and Services All DVRs Anystream Agility Inlet Technologies Spinnaker S3000

Streaming Media - April/May 2008

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