Streaming Media - 2008 Industry Sourcebook - (Page 28) industry update and no discussion of entertainment and media would be complete without a discussion of the continued rise of social media sites. From Facebook, which had a late-2007 valuation equivalent to that of Ford Motor Co., to MySpace, with its vast user-base, and YouTube, with its de facto launch pad for public relations, political campaign, and general video content, social media attracted significant attention in 2007. When a television broadcaster’s new media representative said at Streaming Media West 2007 that he liked YouTube because it provided a place to put all the stuff that they didn’t want to broadcast, a counterargument was offered by Mark Hachenburg, CEO of Metacafe, who said that usergenerated content (UGC) will play an even more extensive role moving forward, not just provide a place for broadcast media’s castoffs. “Fragmentation is an important— and inevitable—trend in the overall consumer video viewing microcosm,” said Hachenburg, “which means that very few sites are going to be considered ‘must-view’ sites. It’s about a dozen sites now, and may rise to a few dozen, but not beyond that. So getting content across many sites is key to both UGC and traditional professional content.” Hachenburg went on to say the appeal of sites like YouTube is precisely because the content doesn’t look professionally done. MySpace TV “User-generated content isn’t successful because it’s quality content,” said Hachenburg. “It’s successful because it appears authentic.” Portable Media Players iTunes TV We’ve already mentioned the iPhone, but two other portable entertainment media players are also in the news. First is the iPod Touch, an iPhone without the phone that has wireless capabilities, integrated YouTube, and a full browser but that still lacks the social and content-sharing options that Microsoft’s Shows Zune possesses. The Zune, launched in late 2006, was further validation that Apple’s iPod Video and iTunes online store were on the right path, and Microsoft struck a royalty-sharing deal with at least one media conglomerate, while also using 2007 to launch Zune 2.0 in a lowerprice, higher-capacity model. Syndication Deals Syndication deals also continued to make news throughout 2007. Two categories, though, deserve special interest: “made for internet” video content and podcasting. Both of these nascent markets have seen rapid growth in the short term. GoFish Corp., which dubs itself as an internet video network, partnered with a syndication network with more than 1,800 affiliate websites called Broadband Enterprises. In addition to providing distribution services to deliver GoFish’s “made for internet” video content, Broadband Enterprises also handled ad insertion, serving, and tracking. Deals like this are interesting because they allow independent content producers to effectively broker their own distribution deals—and to share revenues from both the original programming and accompanying 28 STREAMING MEDIA INDUSTRY SOURCEBOOK 2008
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