IP Democracy: A Work in Progress, N3 Launches Tomorrow

Everybody is trying to figure out how to make this whole Internet video thing work as a business. Even YouTube, the hottest Internet video site out there, is struggling to find a sustainable business model and a steady supply of content.

One start-up, Next New Networks, is launching tomorrow six Internet video channels that feature original content and short videos (3 to 11 minutes.) Headed by Herb Scannell, former MTV Networks Chairman, and backed by $8 million in venture funding from Spark Capital and Benchmark Europe, and individuals including MTV co-founder Bob Pittman, Next New Networks hopes to bring “order out of chaos” by aggregating short clips into “TV channels” so that advertisers can make sense of where to put their budgets.

Along with trying to develop new forms of video advertising, they’re also developing new advertising tracking mechanisms to find out what kind of audiences their short clips generate on other sites such as YouTube. Next New Networks will accept user-generated videos and hopes to create a mass market for videoblogging.

This all sounds intriguing, but vague. Like every other Internet-based video venture, execution is everything and it’s difficult to see how Next New Networks plans to break the mold until it launches.

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on March 7, 2007 12:30 PM to IP Democracy