Comcast, the nation’s leading cable operator, is making its fellow operators a little nervous by its tentative embrace of online video. After all the industry has been a cozy club since its inception because no traditional cable company really competes with its fellow operators.
All that is shifting slightly as the forward-looking Comcast sticks its toes into the video-over-IP waters (Emerging Media Dynamics and IP Media Monitor will release a report later this week on Comcast’s TV 2.0 efforts). The latest example: Comcast and Turner Broadcasting, which is owned by Time Warner, the nation’s second largest operator, have participated in video sharing site Revver’s series B funding round.
Revver is part of the burgeoning crop of video sharing sites, but with a twist. The company offers what it calls a “sponsorship marketplace” to video sharers, connecting them with advertisers and promising the prospect of revenues. Comcast, through Comcast Interactive Capital, and Turner Broadcasting were late-comers to the round, which was announced in April.
At that time, the funding raised was $8.7 million, with Bessemer Venture Partners, Draper Richards and William Randolph Hearst III joining Draper Fisher Durvetson as backers. The inclusion of Comcast and Turner boosts the funding round to $10.2 million.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 6:01 PM | Print | Comments (0)The Denver Post’s Kimberly Johnson has this trenchant piece today on how the FCC’s August 9 broadband wireless auctions are crucial to the future of DBS providers DirecTV and EchoStar. As I mentioned yesterday, the two companies have put up $972 million to bid in the auctions in order to get their hands on two-way terrestrial technology.
It’s also part of a dance by the nation’s number one and two DBS providers to join hands as their one-way video service offerings get eclipsed by the razzamatazz triple-play and quadruple-play interactive voice, video and data services delivered by cable and phone companies.
Gaining ownership of wireless networks that can deliver phone, TV and high-speed Internet access is crucial for the satellite TV companies.
It could also be part of a courtship leading to a merger between EchoStar, based in Douglas County, and DirecTV, based in El Segundo, Calif. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. controls DirecTV.
Investors are clearly warming to the idea of a EchoStar-DirecTV combination, even if the feds may still hold some objections to the idea. Without a merger, and with no two-way technology, both companies are at great risk of sinking into the sunset.
Satellite may lose even more of its appeal, as consumers increasingly demand TV, phone, and Internet services from a single provider. A Bear Stearns report says satellite is “structurally challenged (vs. cable) given its inability to offer a bundled package of communication services.” Citigroup chimes in, saying that they face “acute risks of slower subscriber growth and higher churn [customer turnover].”Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 8:57 AM | Print | Comments (0)
Either today or tomorrow (depending on which news report you read), CNN will announce a new initiative that formalizes the citizen journalist contributions it uses. The news network will launch CNN Exchange, a one-stop shop for users to submit and share their videos and other news submissions.
The site features a program that allows users to upload their “I-Reports,” which will be reviewed by editors before they appear on the site. The move comes as more and more content recorded by amateurs hits the airwaves and as professional news organizations grapple with just how to treat this material. Last month, CNN relied on video it obtained from YouTube for part of its coverage of the fighting in Lebanon
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 8:09 AM | Print | Comments (0)AOL’s PR shop has been busy — the ailing online giant, slated to announce Wednesday a radical new business model for the service that includes abandoning paid member fees, is promoting new, beefed-up video offerings. Every major news organization (NYT here, Reuters here, Washington Post here, AP here) this morning has the advance word of AOL.com’s revamped site, which will be announced on Wednesday and launched on Friday.
AOL will sell commercial-free downloadable videos a la Google or Apple, including shows from MTV Networks, A&E Networks and Warner Brothers. Programs such as “Pimp My Ride,” “South Park” and “SpongeBob SquarePants” will be available for $1.99/each the day after they air. In the fall, AOL will offer a subscription service when such popular MTV Networks programming such as “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” will become available.
AOL will also provide free, ad-supported programming, including shows from TNT (owned by AOL parent Time Warner) and classic TV shows. When it relaunches, AOL will have 45 VOD channels. The site will also offer pumped-up video search capabilities, aided by AOL’s acquisition last year of video search companies Truveo and Singingfish.
Taking its cue from YouTube, AOL will also offer an area, called UnCut, that allows viewers to upload and share videos.
All of the press reports put a positive spin on the development, hailing the new video-centric service as a possible turn-around move. In truth, this development is nothing that hadn’t been in the works at the company all along and is clearly being puffed-up to soften the blow of Wednesday’s announcement. I’m with Staci when she writes
But AOL has been a beat or two behind, leaving it vulnerable to suggestions of copy-catting or “me, too” even when its plans already were in the works. That might explain why the WSJ article (sub. req.) leads with the idea that this is AOL’s “latest attempt to resurrect its online fortunes” when it’s actually a continuation of the ongoing portal strategy. The expansion coming this week has been expected for months, particularly the downloads-for-sale aspect.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 7:05 AM | Print | Comments (0)
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