Price Inflation Hits Net Video Advertising

By Adweek.com
网络视频广告价格暴涨

Search may have been Web advertising's belle of the ball, but online video is now the new darling. But despite media companies, including the big four networks, moving content online and YouTube feeding a healthy appetite for user-generated clips, advertisers are facing a shortage of usable inventory. The result: Prices for net video ads are being pushed above those seen for TV spots.

Agency execs said 30-second pre-roll spots, which play before video content, now cost from $25 to as much as $40 per 1,000 plays. That's a 25 percent increase in the past year, making it rival the cost to run the same spot on many network programs, media execs say. And inventory on some high-traffic video destinations is sometimes unavailable, according to buyers.

The high prices have led some agencies to question if they're getting their money's worth, while others are searching for alternatives and anticipating new ad-worthy models that give consumers high-quality content.

"The default [thinking] is there's a lot of video being watched online, [so] there must be a lot of supply," said Jeff Lanctot, vp of media at aQuantive's Avenue A/Razorfish. "But most of that video being watched isn't being monetized."

That's because top video site YouTube, which accounts for one of every two videos online, does not run pre-roll ads. This leaves the likes of also-rans such as Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, ESPN.com and CNN.com to provide the entire video inventory.

While Web video sellers believe prices should be higher because they offer an engaged, actual audience rather than a passive, estimated one on TV, others are not so sure. Publicis Groupe's Starcom, for one, is conducting an evaluation to determine if it's overpaying. "Is my :30 that runs as a pre-roll on ABC.com worth the same as on ABC?" asks Tracey Scheppach, video innovation director at Starcom. "Is the view worth more?"

The price hikes and inventory shortages have caused some brands to turn to the much-maligned Web standby: the banner ad. Brands are placing assets in ad units, some that play when a user clicks and others that play automatically when a visitor lands on the page. Such ads cost about a third to half the price of pre-roll ads, according to media executives.

Not only are lower prices an obvious draw, but in-page video ad creative has improved as more brands up their budgets for it. In a campaign launching this month, Levi's is embedding
interactive options in video banners that let users roll over the video for more information about the Redwire DLX jeans.

"Rather than just repurpose a TV spot, which we've done with pre-roll [ads], this allowed us to showcase the product in a new way," said Patrice Varni, Levi's director of Internet and consumer marketing.

Cracking the code for incorporating video ads with user-generated content would offer the biggest near-term inventory bump, agency execs said. YouTube's executives have said they are opposed to allowing such ads, which they claim would be overly intrusive. Yet some said it is only a matter of time. "If they ever really want to become wildly profitable, they're going to need in-stream advertising," said Nate Elliott, a JupiterResearch analyst.

The biggest opportunity for advertisers online, though, might lie with their old partners, traditional media companies. Agency execs point to Viacom hooking up with Google to distribute content and NBC's plan to move to a distributed model as good steps. Companies like Broadband Enterprises and Brightcove are building similar syndication models with professionally produced content, said James Kiernan, associate director of digital media innovation at MediaVest.

"All of a sudden, they'd figure out a way to monetize the long tail of the Web," he said.

Warner Bros. Cuts Its Online Division

华纳兄弟撤消其在线部门
To slash costs, the studio closes its Internet unit, which was a pioneer in Web entertainment.
By Dawn C. Chmielewski and Claudia Eller

Warner Bros. is shuttering an online division that was among the first studio-backed ventures to create original entertainment content exclusively for the Web.The closing of Warner Bros. Online, confirmed Wednesday, is part of a series of cost-saving cuts at the Burbank studio that began in earnest last fall.

As a result, Warner is laying off 19 employees from the online unit. Forty people will be redeployed into the 1-year-old Warner Bros. Digital Distribution unit, or into another group responsible for cutting-edge technologies. And an additional 22 open positions will be reallocated throughout the company.

"It's not really an elimination of what online has done or did do," said Kevin Tsujihara, president of Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group. "It's really more of a realignment of and redeployment of people."

A Warner Bros. spokesman declined to comment on the financial savings the studio will realize. The realignment comes at a time when the studio has been under pressure to slash costs and shore up profit.

Warner Bros. in November cut 400 employees in Burbank and in the studio's overseas operations.

Warner Bros. Online — whose ambitions and resources have diminished in the years since AOL acquired Time Warner Inc. in 2001 — was a vestige of the former dot-com boom.

Created to promote Warner Bros. movies and TV shows, it expanded in the late 1990s into a full-blown entertainment destination called Entertaindom.

In its heyday, Entertaindom featured original content such as "God and the Devil Show," an irreverent celebrity talk show featuring the Almighty and Satan. It leveraged other studio assets, such as "Superman" and such classic Looney Tunes characters as Marvin the Martian, to create original short-form entertainment. It even enticed some top-name Hollywood stars such as Adam Sandler to do Web-based skits including "Peeper."

But former insiders said AOL's acquisition of Time Warner forever changed the fortunes of the online division. The studio didn't offer the same support for Entertaindom, and budgets were cut.

Such key executives as Jeff Weiner and Jim Moloshok left to join former Warner Bros. Co-Chairman Terry Semel after he was hired in 2001 to turn around Internet giant Yahoo Inc.

Since then, Warner Bros. Online returned to its roots, promoting the studio's TV shows and movies on the Web and creating content for mobile phones.

After the division's closure, original digital content for the Web will be produced under the studio's TV and movie units.

中国IPTV提供的内容缺乏吸引力

首先，内容源与其他频道类似，不能促使用户为IPTV买单。另外，现在转录电视节目的方法很多，成本也很低，IPTV和其相比在价格上存在一定劣势。

IPTV可以提供暂停、回放等功能，这对于观众来说的确很方便，但用户愿不愿意花钱买这些功能呢？大家知道，现在电视节目中经常插播广告，而且一个节目持续时间也不会很长，因此，在观看电视节目的时候比较容易安排其他事情，因此，暂停、回放等服务也不能成为其杀手锏。

此外，目前IPTV所提供的内容性价比相对不高，很难赢得用户的青睐，如果不能提供更加具有吸引力的内容，发展将比较困难。

根据国外运营商的经验，人们对IPTV的最大需求就是其交互性，用遥控器进行电视聊天、投票等。因此，国内运营商也应发扬IPTV交互性的优势，找到适合中国IPTV的赢利模式。

GE Invests in Video Syndication Platform Brightcove

In the first of what execs are calling several investments in emerging tech media, GE's commercial finance group has taken a small stake in video syndication startup Brightcove.

In a world where every company is digging for online video gold, Brightcove is selling shovels. Basically, the company is a middleman, providing a way for content owners like Reuters, NBC and AOL to syndicate their content. Brightcove inserts ads into streams and distributes the revenue to the content owners and syndicating Web sites. Big competitors include Akamai and thePlatform.

Brightcove was founded in 2004 by Jeremy Allaire, the former CTO of Macromedia (acquired by Adobe last year). The company has signed some pretty impressive agreements in the last year, including a multi-year partnership with the New York Times, a distribution agreement with National Lampoon, and deals with Reuters and AOL. The company also has big name investors, such as AOL and IAC. IAC Chairman and CEO Barry Diller sits on the board. For more info, check out this WSJ article from February.

Video Search: Big Changes Are Coming

By Kevin M. Ryan

Video, image and vertical search are all the rage but how does the data really stack up? Our search editor reviews search tactics beyond the box.

The search box has forever changed how the consuming public views information. That is to say, information as it is interpreted, indexed and ranked according to popular search sites.

Today's marketing dynamics include bells and whistles in the search engine marketing (SEM) or search engine optimization (SEO) worlds that must include tactics that go beyond the directive search box.

Video has been the next great thing in the interactive world for some time. Formerly known as rich media, the use of video has crept into the online world as broadband activity has increased. And, you guessed it, people are searching for video. Video is just the beginning, there's also image search

The valued proposition

The highly publicized lonelygirl115 stunt ruined the video online marketing concept for everyone. To be fair, lots of marketers have used the "accidental release" model of initiating viral marketing, but it won't be too long before the consuming public wakes up to these little video tricks and dismisses them-- much in the same way they have begun to dismiss the thirty-second spot on commercial television.

So let's pass on the hypothetical theory and move into the practical aspects of what the search and video interaction can do for you.

Hitwise places the top video destinations at MySpace and YouTube with a little over 20 percent and 46 percent of the video search destination market share, respectively, as of September 19, 2006. The top three search sites, Google, MSN, and Yahoo! round out the top five in the category with about 11 percent, seven percent, and five percent, respectively.

Comparing August 2006 to mid-September, MySpace actually showed a decline of two percent, while YouTube increased slightly about half a percent. The search sites increased their presence slightly in this time period, and only one, Yahoo, slipped by a fraction of a percent.

So what does all of this tell us? One possibility is that while MySpace and YouTube duke it out for top honors, search engines are creeping into the market as audiences migrate back to trusted search sites for visual input.

What to do with this new information

There are plenty of other ways to dissect information in the hopes of uncovering future trends. Separating Google traffic, for example is a great way to do that.

According to Hitwise, nearly 78 percent of all users conduct a search on Google. The remaining 22 percent of Google visitors separate their time between video (1.16 percent), image search (8.62 percent), and mail (5.59 percent), among other activities.

As users continue to create some distance between the search box and other search functions, marketers need first to recognize that a shift is occurring and then actually do something about it.

Often, users conduct multiple searches; the web of how consumers connect with products and services via the search box often includes visits to other search areas. Key optimizing techniques include following the guidelines set forth by Google and other search sites to make sure that video and audio assets are included and labeled appropriately.

Why not be in front of the user regardless of which type of search is performed?

Broaden the band

Video, audio and several other types of information that appear on websites are all-too-often afterthoughts in the world of search marketing. Worse, site designers rarely consider search when preparing content.

The practice of search or search engine marketing has never led the interactive revolution. Search has always been reactive, and the proliferation of other applications for search means the landscape is changing.

Now is the time to be prepared.

Broadband's critical mass combined with video that goes beyond a URL passed along with the subject line title "funny" is yet to come, but the writing is on the wall.

The Importance of the :05 Video Ad

网络视频广告限制在5秒的重要性
By Eric Picard

The :05 video ad format is rapidly gaining momentum, so today I'll call out the reasons it's such an important development.

DVRs

The :05 standard is beginning to take hold in broadcast TV because of the DVR. DVR users frequently fast-forward through advertising. Being human, they typically fast-forward too far into the content. So they rewind. Research shows they're seeing the last five seconds or so of the last ad in the pod.

Logically, the last ad is becoming more valuable. The new trend is for networks to place a :05 ad at the very end of a pod. Expect to see more :05 ads in that position.

The Annoyance Factor

When it comes to broadband video, there are even more compelling reasons to begin investigating the :05 format, especially when you consider new video consumption in emerging media such as portable video players.

We've done significant research into video ads' consumer annoyance factor. One of our strongest findings is consumer tolerance for ads lasts five to seven seconds then immediately turns to annoyance:

Given the very short durations of typical broadband video, this format provides a short brand and message exposure opportunity within a consumer's tolerance range. This should drive video consumption in a streaming Web page scenario as well as acceptance of video advertising. We're currently doing research on consumer acceptance of :05 video ad pods within longer-form content. I'll probably be able to share results with you in the coming months.

When you extend the video annoyance factor to other video media, such as mobile phones and portable video players, we believe (and should have data in coming months to back up) that video ad tolerance will be a significant hindrance factor to growth. Certainly other factors must be addressed, such as counting, tracking, and cross-media frequency of video messages.

Frequency by the Numbers

I'd also like to see research on the value of the :05 format as it relates to frequency. When a consumer's exposed to a :30 brand message in broadcast and the advertiser's goal is a reach of 3-5, is there enough impact in extending those frequencies through online video?

What about long-form video content (e.g., TV shows) offered either through streaming Web views or in portable video scenarios? Will consumers tolerate a :30 pre-roll ad, followed by content with several :05 ads by the same advertiser (and perhaps others) spread throughout with extensions of the original message? We saw ABC inserting just a few ads in primetime content offered streaming from its Web site. It denoted in the player exactly where the ads would show up. But it limited the number of ads to just a few.

Clearly, ABC is monetizing online content less effectively with only a few video ads, compared to the 20 or so ads per half hour of content on TV. Say the publisher is getting $40 CPM (define) for a primetime commercial. It has 20 commercials in a 30-minute show (a conservative estimate) and reaches 10 million households. That breaks down to about $400,000 per ad, or $8 million per 30-minute show.

If that same show ran online with the same number of ads, we can expect a $35 CPM for premium broadband video pre-rolls. If there's just one pre-roll and 5 million additional people watch the show online, we get an incremental $125,000 in revenue for the network for that show. With four additional ads inserted, that's $625,000.

What happens if we sell pods of :05 ads similar to the broadcast experience? With a conservative $10 CPM, we get $150,000 per ad in incremental revenue for the network. It's also a more palatable user experience. What if we turned those :05 ads into ads with enhanced targeting or with the ability to let the user telescope into a long-form ad? If we just get a 50 percent CPM lift, this would turn into about $225,000 of incremental revenue per ad per episode. It turns a dud of a show into a much more interesting investment. With targeting and enhanced ad formats, we could easily double revenue.

The industry must focus on pushing the :05 format to increase the amount of inventory available to advertisers and they can start creating short edits of ads for use in other media. Right now there are very few 1:05 video ads available to run on broadband, let alone :05 ads. We need creatives to master this format.

We must also lock down the definition of this short-form ad format. There's work going on in the EU toward an :08 standard (about half of a :15). If we're going to go short, we should do it in a way that will make consumers happy while retaining brand value.

微软MSN Soapbox视频实例

By Ken Wong

微软推出的新服务限制很多。比如早前的视频服务MSN Soapbox，不但需要邀请才能试用，还限定只有美国用户才能使用。虽然微软表示会在"数月"后向更多用户开放MSN Soapbox，但到底什么时候才出来，还是未知之数。

不过我们还是可以看看MSN Soapbox的视频实例的。InsideMicrosoft上放出了相关的实例，除了上面的截图外，你还可以进入下面的网址亲自观看来自MSN Soapbox的视频实例。不过很不幸的是，和Yahoo! Video及Google Video一样，大陆地区用户还无法观看，除非自备代理：　　

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_movies.asp　　

类似YouTube，微软的MSN Soapbox也是通过<>标签实现嵌入的。不过MSN Soapbox播放器的界面就要复杂一些，会显示视频及作者的相关信息。另外，YouTube及Google Video的播放器界面都突出立体感，而MSN Soapbox则刚好相反。

Omnicom Media Group, Intel Partner on IP-Delivered TV Ads

OMG，Intel合作测试IP发布电视广告
Experiment Will Include OMG Clients FedEx, Hilton, Nissan

By Abbey Klaassen

Published: September 25, 2006

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Omnicom Media Group and Intel have inked a deal in which OMG will use money from its Next fund to experiment with advertising in IP-delivered content -- video delivered to TVs via the internet. The first Omnicom clients involved in the test are FedEx, Hilton and Nissan.


Ads from PCs to TVs

The goal, said executives from both companies, is to develop models or templates that make it easier to bring ads from PCs to TV screens. Intel's Viiv has marketed itself on being a chip that allows users to send internet content to the TV.

"Think about all of the content available on the internet being available in a living-room environment," said Daryl Simm, CEO of Omnicom Media Group. "Development of broad-scale distribution of this kind of content is a certainty and so appealing to consumers and advertisers."

He said a core part of the appeal of such a system would be "making TV as accountable as the internet" by using customized messages and with the potential to get feedback from the viewer. Today there is no industry standard for IP-delivered ads to a TV.

The deal shows a desire on behalf of media companies and advertisers to experiment with various video business models but it also might signal a wish to get in early on the technology and make sure there are more possibilities for ad models. By contrast, cable operators' video on demand systems were not created with advertising front of mind and a lack of standards and compatibility has slowed VOD advertising growth.

Omnicom Media Group's Next fund pools clients' money to allow it to experiment in digital/emerging-media space.

First partnership

Intel said it had been talking to several different agencies and holding companies about experimenting in the space, but Omnicom signed the first nonexclusive partnership. (The partnership is unrelated to Intel's advertising account, the company said. Its agency of record remains Interpublic Group of Cos.)

"We do plan to open it and bring in other agencies and other technology companies and others needed to make this broad-based," said Kevin Corbett, VP of Intel's Digital Home Group. "But we felt it was important to get started."

Mr. Corbett gave a hypothetical example of how the experiment would work:

"Let's make a big assumption that we decide the hottest thing in advertising would be to click a button and get an e-mail sent to you," he said. "Omnicom leads in creative and ad design experience. Intel would build the tech needed to implement that. Then Intel would work with our partners where we can take that new tech and implement that in various portals -- AOL or Yahoo or movie companies -- and work with them on Viiv, and we'd prove it out and test it."

NYC test facility

To test such scenarios, Intel has set up a facility at a Manhattan CompUSA store. The first content company involved in the experiments is AOL. The group also is using ZeTools, a content-publishing solution.

Mr. Corbett estimated they'll be testing it on a broader scale using market pilots by the middle of next year.

The partnership will not try to create the economic model surrounding such deals -- how high cost-per-thousand rates should run or how much a particular type of sponsorship should cost. Other questions include whether the deals would require longer- or shorter-length messaging or more exclusivity than a typical TV pod.

"All that is part of biz models that get developed over time ... [and] we don't see any obvious issues in terms of developing business issues," Mr. Simm said. "That will happen thanks to a competitive marketplace over time."

Area of ad opportunity

He said he is certain "10-foot" IP-delivered video -- as opposed to the two-foot viewing experience on a PC -- is going to explode as an area of ad opportunity, and figuring out how to monetize that through advertising will accelerate the process.

"User-generated content exploded because it's free," Mr. Simm said. "Now there's an avalanche of content that's premium, but it's often pay-per-view. We believe what's really going to explode premium content is when advertisers support it. The majority of consumers watch ad-supported channels. There's rich ground to be harvested for ad-supported media."

Omnicom Media Group, Intel Partner on IP-Delivered TV Ads

OMG，Intel合作测试IP发布电视广告
Experiment Will Include OMG Clients FedEx, Hilton, Nissan

By Abbey Klaassen

Published: September 25, 2006

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Omnicom Media Group and Intel have inked a deal in which OMG will use money from its Next fund to experiment with advertising in IP-delivered content -- video delivered to TVs via the internet. The first Omnicom clients involved in the test are FedEx, Hilton and Nissan.


Ads from PCs to TVs

The goal, said executives from both companies, is to develop models or templates that make it easier to bring ads from PCs to TV screens. Intel's Viiv has marketed itself on being a chip that allows users to send internet content to the TV.

"Think about all of the content available on the internet being available in a living-room environment," said Daryl Simm, CEO of Omnicom Media Group. "Development of broad-scale distribution of this kind of content is a certainty and so appealing to consumers and advertisers."

He said a core part of the appeal of such a system would be "making TV as accountable as the internet" by using customized messages and with the potential to get feedback from the viewer. Today there is no industry standard for IP-delivered ads to a TV.

The deal shows a desire on behalf of media companies and advertisers to experiment with various video business models but it also might signal a wish to get in early on the technology and make sure there are more possibilities for ad models. By contrast, cable operators' video on demand systems were not created with advertising front of mind and a lack of standards and compatibility has slowed VOD advertising growth.

Omnicom Media Group's Next fund pools clients' money to allow it to experiment in digital/emerging-media space.

First partnership

Intel said it had been talking to several different agencies and holding companies about experimenting in the space, but Omnicom signed the first nonexclusive partnership. (The partnership is unrelated to Intel's advertising account, the company said. Its agency of record remains Interpublic Group of Cos.)

"We do plan to open it and bring in other agencies and other technology companies and others needed to make this broad-based," said Kevin Corbett, VP of Intel's Digital Home Group. "But we felt it was important to get started."

Mr. Corbett gave a hypothetical example of how the experiment would work:

"Let's make a big assumption that we decide the hottest thing in advertising would be to click a button and get an e-mail sent to you," he said. "Omnicom leads in creative and ad design experience. Intel would build the tech needed to implement that. Then Intel would work with our partners where we can take that new tech and implement that in various portals -- AOL or Yahoo or movie companies -- and work with them on Viiv, and we'd prove it out and test it."

NYC test facility

To test such scenarios, Intel has set up a facility at a Manhattan CompUSA store. The first content company involved in the experiments is AOL. The group also is using ZeTools, a content-publishing solution.

Mr. Corbett estimated they'll be testing it on a broader scale using market pilots by the middle of next year.

The partnership will not try to create the economic model surrounding such deals -- how high cost-per-thousand rates should run or how much a particular type of sponsorship should cost. Other questions include whether the deals would require longer- or shorter-length messaging or more exclusivity than a typical TV pod.

"All that is part of biz models that get developed over time ... [and] we don't see any obvious issues in terms of developing business issues," Mr. Simm said. "That will happen thanks to a competitive marketplace over time."

Area of ad opportunity

He said he is certain "10-foot" IP-delivered video -- as opposed to the two-foot viewing experience on a PC -- is going to explode as an area of ad opportunity, and figuring out how to monetize that through advertising will accelerate the process.

"User-generated content exploded because it's free," Mr. Simm said. "Now there's an avalanche of content that's premium, but it's often pay-per-view. We believe what's really going to explode premium content is when advertisers support it. The majority of consumers watch ad-supported channels. There's rich ground to be harvested for ad-supported media."

MTVN Buys Game Developer Harmonix

Anthony Crupi
MTV购买Harmonix游戏开发公司

MTV Networks announced Friday that it will acquire gaming developer Harmonix Music Systems for $175 million in cash in a deal that is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2006.

Harmonix, which specializes in creating music-themed titles for Sony’s PlayStation 2 console, is perhaps best known for developing Guitar Hero, a game that simulates the experience of playing the electric guitar.

Since late 2005, Guitar Hero has been regularly featured on MTVN’s digital platforms, as part of a deal between the MTV Games unit and Harmonix. Once integration is complete, visitors to MTVN Web sites will enjoy a much more dynamic and interactive connection to their favorite music, said MTV president Christina Norman.

“The acquisition ... will deepen MTV’s connection to its audience via on-line, mobile and console music gaming, and expand the relationship with both labels and artists,” Norman said.

Guitar Hero was named the #1 console game of 2003 by Time magazine. A sequel, Guitar Hero 2, is slated for an autumn release.

MTVN said that Harmonix senior executives, including CEO Alex Rigopulos, will remain on board following the close of the sale. At that point, Harmonix will be folded into MTVN’s Music and Logo Enterprises unit, which is spearheaded by executive vp Jeff Yapp.

体验互动：美国空军"Do Something Amazing"

www.dosomethingamazing.com 是美国空军建的一个互动网站，真是一个很酷的互动体验网站，在这里你不但可以看到美国空军训练、战斗以及各种装备的视频，还可以参与其中，感受飞行，参与训练和任务。这些制作精良的互动网站的今天，也就是未来更加精彩的互动电视的雏形。

随着科技的进步，未来电视节目的一大趋势，就是互动（interactive TV）。观众将不再满足于被动式的体验，而是要积极的参与到节目互动中去。互动电视有点像电视和电子游戏的结合，它的本质是看观众如何看待电视，是被动观看电视，还是希望自己也投身于电视节目之中，获得更好的体验。

Web Video Takes Off, Ads Trail

Louis Hau
网络视频起飞 广告拖了后腿

Years after it was originally supposed to arrive, Internet video is here and making up for lost time. Steve Jobs has made it the focus of Apple Computer's new strategy. Nearly every major media outlet is obsessed with figuring it out. And video file-sharing site YouTube, non-existent two years ago, now has buzz rivaling that of the original Napster.

So it makes sense that ad dollars should follow the new medium. Market research firm eMarketer predicts that U.S. online video advertising is expected to total $385 million in 2006, up 71% from a year ago. That's more than twice the growth rate of overall U.S. online advertising spending, which is projected to reach $16.7 billion this year, up 34% from last year. Online video advertising could hit $1 billion by 2010, says JupiterResearch.

But advertisers and Internet video aren't a perfect match yet. The main problem: While Internet users now seem happy to watch clips on their computers--a recent poll says that half of them have done so--they may not be watching the kind of stuff that marketers want to buy ads on. YouTube boasts that it has stored 100 million video clips on its site, but the anything-goes nature of them--home-brewed stuff mixed with clips of copyrighted, unauthorized material--makes some advertisers wary. Meanwhile, professionally produced content you can find at established Web sites has a harder time drawing eyeballs.

"Advertisers and Web publishers have been waiting for consumers to watch--it's been a pretty slow build,'' says Jeff Lanctot, vice president and general manager of Internet advertising agency Avenue A/Razorfish, a subsidiary of aQuantive (nasdaq: AQNT - news - people ). "The interest and demand of online advertisers has outpaced that of online consumers." It's a point of view seconded by Greg Stuart, the Interactive Advertising Bureau's outgoing chief executive. "The big stumbling block now is continued consumer adoption of video online,'' Stuart says. "If you talk to the online publishers, they say they cannot get enough video impressions to sell. There's not enough relative to marketer demand.''

Ian Blaine, co-founder and chief executive of thePlatform, a Seattle provider of digital media services says some advertisers have told his clients that they would buy far more advertising if only the clients had enough impressions to sell. It's a problem rooted in both the need to digitize more content as well as in the difficulty of drawing the critical mass of viewers necessary to make major ad deals worthwhile, he says.

"For a big campaign to work, they need 100 million unique impressions,'' he says."That's sort of a bar for it being interesting. There are plenty of people watching video. The challenge is where are they watching it. It isn't a lack of eyeballs but a lack of aggregated eyeballs." Meanwhile, the relative scarcity of online video ad inventory has caused the cost per thousand impressions to climb about 15% to 20% this year, estimates James Kiernan, vice president and associate director of digital media and innovation at MediaVest USA in New York. While a 30-second ad during a prime-time broadcast TV show typically fetches a CPM rate of about $20, a 15- or 30-second online video ad currently commands a CPM of around $20 to $50, Kiernan says. Another stumbling block for mainstream advertisers is figuring out what kind of ads a Web user can stomach. Most of the video on the Web runs for just a few minutes. That means most Web sites with video content dare not tack on more than one "pre-roll" ad, which run before the clip itself, for fear of scaring off viewers. And some advertisers won't use the ads at all.

Toyota Motor's (nyse: TM - news - people ) Scion subsidiary is an intriguing holdout, considering that its target market of 18- to 30-year-olds makes up an important chunk of the online audience. But while Scion's marketing team will sponsor concerts, film series and even video game competitions, pre-roll online video ads aren't part of the strategy, says Adrian Si, the company's interactive marketing manager.

Focus group surveys suggest that Scion customers frown on being forced to watch an ad before a movie preview or whatever video content they're trying to watch, he says. "We feel that's just way too intrusive."

But online video gives advertisers some distinct advantages. It generally offers advertisers a more precise way to reach consumers than television does. In addition, online video is what marketers dub a "lean-forward" medium, reaching viewers who are actively engaged with what's appearing on their computer screen rather than slumped on a couch. Video ads, which are usually paired with a nearby banner ad that viewers can click for more information, typically enjoy very high click-through rates, says Patrice Varni, director of Internet marketing for Levi Strauss. The company uses a combination of pre-roll video as well as animated banner ads featuring video content. "We feel we get a consumer who engages with us more deeply,'' Varni says. "It takes it one step further than TV.''

And plenty of conventional advertisers are willing to pay up as well. Chase Card Services, a subsidiary of JPMorgan Chase (nyse: JPM - news - people ), has advertised on Time Warner's (nyse: TWX - news - people ) CNN.com and Reuters.com. The company likes online video ads because it provides an appealing alternative to banner ads, which often have to vie with many other ads on the same Web page to gain the attention of Web surfers, says Manning Field, senior vice president of branding and advertising for Chase Card Services. "The fact is pre-roll is not cluttered when you compare it to other types of environments," he says. "Usually, there aren't five or six ads. It's usually as an exclusive sponsor." And sites that specialize in YouTube-style "user-generated content" have been seeking ways to accommodate marketers' concerns. For instance, video-sharing website Revver categorizes all of its content to enable, say, a skateboard maker to advertise on skateboard videos. Revver video ads don't appear as pre-rolls but rather after the conclusion of a video clip. Even then, a viewer must click to start the ad. "You can get very, very targeted advertising opportunities, really take it to a very fine granularity,'' says Revver founder and Chief Executive Steven Starr. Revver videos can be embedded in other Web sites, which allows advertisers to take advantage of popular video content that spreads virally. Starr says that "allowing content to move freely across the Internet and monetizing the content wherever it goes'' is where the future lies. "The redistribution of the file itself is where the business is heading,'' he says. Meanwhile, YouTube, the kingpin of user-generated content sites, has set up "brand channels" for advertisers. General Electric's (nyse: GE - news - people ) NBC Universal, Warner Music Group (nyse: WMG - news - people ) and News Corp.'s (nyse: NWS - news - people ) Fox Broadcasting Group have been among the first to sign up, using YouTube as an advertising vehicle without directly associating themselves with content they hadn't produced themselves. And this week Warner Music has signed a revenue sharing agreement with YouTube.

国内广电单位首家新媒体发展趋势和技术博士后工作站

作者：张懿 来源：文汇报

应对新媒体的挑战，国内广电事业单位第一家博士后科研工作站昨天在沪揭牌，三大研究方向直指最新媒体发展趋势和技术。

该科研工作站将设立在上海文广传媒集团，经国家人事部批准，首批将联合复旦大学、上海交通大学、华东政法学院三家高校，面向全球招收3-5名博士后科研人员。首批博士后的招收将在2个月内完成，预计进站时间为2年。具体招生情况可通过postdoctor.smg.cn的网站了解。

据了解，首批设立的三个课题分别是：媒体受众和广告资源开发研究、数字视音频搜索技术与应用研究、媒体版权投资与管理研究。这些课题同目前新媒体发展的态势和技术直接相关。一方面，随着宽带的普及，网络视频、IPTV日益成为重要的传播手段，传统电视媒体如何应对新收视习惯和广告投放环境；另一方面，网络时代的数字化内容易被复制、传播，如何在这一环境下，更好地对媒体版权进行经营也对传统媒体提出了挑战。而“音视频搜索”的课题，则是目前包括Google、雅虎等网络巨头竞相投资的研究方向，其进展有可能导致新的数字内容的经营方式甚至产业机会的产生。

目前关于新媒体的研究在全球范围内都属新课题，而在国内，与IT技术相关的内容研究相对较多，而与传媒产业和媒体运营相关的“实战型”研究还比较缺乏。该博士后科研工作站的设立，有助于进一步引进海内外文化传媒业优秀领军人才，为提升上海城市文化软实力发挥重要作用。

迅雷与BT达成战略合作，共推正版影视网络发行

近日，迅雷与Bitcomet达成战略合作伙伴关系，拥有1.1亿用户且保持技术领先的迅雷，此次与一定程度的竞争对手，达成合作伙伴关系，确实耐人寻味。

众所周知，迅雷不久前，取得中国首部魔幻大片《魔比斯环》互联网独家发行权，取得了不俗的业绩，成功开创了互联网影视发行的先河。据可靠消息，迅雷近期又获得了《夜宴》的网络发行权，想必迅雷在影视网络发行领域将继续深度拓展，此次将成功将BT拉入同一战壕，一定程度反映出迅雷在网络正版发行领域的胸怀与决心。

据了解，此次战略合作，共同进行影视内容的正版发行，双方利益共享，采用迅雷的DRM（数字版权保护系统），该系统可以使用户下载电影后，需得到许可号才可以正常播放。通过DRM技术内容提供者还可以保证内容的版权不受侵害，从而保护自己的版权利益。收费时采用迅雷的支付系统，

Al Gore’s Current TV Joins With Yahoo for a Video Venture

Former Vice President Al Gore, who has been an adviser to Google, now is a partner with Yahoo, producing online video segments.

By SAUL HANSELL

Yahoo said yesterday that it was creating an online video programming venture with Current TV, the media company founded by former Vice President Al Gore. The service will combine professional and user-generated video clips.

Current’s editors intend to weed out videos that are offensive or contain copyrighted materials, in an attempt to make viral videos ­ one of the hottest trends on the Internet ­ attractive to advertisers. Most clips will be preceded by a 15- or 30-second commercial ­ the first time Yahoo has included commercials with user-generated content.

The deal is notable because Mr. Gore has been an early and visible adviser to the top executives of Google, another Internet powerhouse. Indeed, Google has provided content for regular features on Current’s television network that offer peeks into people’s Internet searches.
The Google segments had been broadcast twice an hour on Current’s channel, which mainly features videos submitted by viewers. Now, Yahoo will produce a segment that will appear every hour on the hour, and the Google segments will appear every hour on the half hour.
“Why wouldn’t you want to work with both of these great companies?” Mr. Gore said in an interview Tuesday. “Yahoo is very different from Google. Yahoo for a long time has been much more in the media space.”

A Google spokesman did not return a phone call and an e-mail seeking comment on the change in its relationship with Current.

The service, which is called the Yahoo Current Network (video.yahoo.com/currenttv), was set to begin today with four channels. One section, called Current Buzz, will feature segments related to the news. It is produced by Madeleine Smithberg, a former executive producer of “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.” Three other channels will relate to specialized topics: travel, action sports, and cars. Over time the companies hope to add more channels.

Each channel will have one professionally produced segment each day and 8 to 10 segments contributed by users.

Amateur videographers whose clips are chosen for the Internet service will receive $100. If the clips are also broadcast on Current’s television network, the maker will receive between $500 and $1000. Videos that are not selected to be part of the Yahoo Current offering will be included on Yahoo’s broader site that includes user-contributed video.

MySpace欲携手中国移动进入中国

世界上最流行的社交网站MySpace.com拥有超过1亿个注册用户，它的成功令无数企业垂涎。MySpace于2005年7月已经被新闻集团以5.8亿美元收购。根据CNN今天的消息，新闻集团的主席及CEO、著名的传媒大亨鲁珀特·默多克透露了MySpace接下来将会有一系列的大动作，包括进军中国市场。

GigaOM也披露了独家的消息，即MySpace正在和中国移动进行秘密协商。MySpace的高层在上周末到北京和中国移动的高级官员会面，但双方至今仍然没有透露任何细节，也没有发表任何官方评论。不过CNN带来了更多详情，即新闻集团计划在明年或稍后在中国推出MySpace。中国移动拥有2.5亿用户，如果和MySpace展开合作，相信会对国内市场带来不小的冲击。手机交友、移动定制手机内置MySpace，或者更广泛的合作？拭目以待吧。

CBS, Comcast Shift From 99-Cent Downloads to Free Online Fare

The companies end a paid video-on-demand experiment, seeing more profit in selling Web ads than charging viewers.By Meg James, Times Staff WriterSeptember 15, 2006

用户更喜欢免费视频
Consumers to media companies: We like our free TV.

On Thursday, CBS Corp. and Comcast Corp. announced they were scrapping their eight-month video-on-demand experiment with 99-cent downloads of such prime-time CBS shows as "Survivor" and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation." Instead, they will immediately begin offering episodes at no charge.

ADVERTISEMENT The programs will be sponsored by advertisers, replicating the time-tested economics of broadcast television.

"Free turned out to be better," said Martin Franks, CBS' executive vice president for planning. "We can make more money on advertising-supported downloads than we could on the 99-cent downloads."

The two companies reversed course after discovering that few consumers were willing to pay for episodes of favorite shows, even when they cost less than a dollar. During the summer, they tinkered with their video-on-demand format in a few test markets by offering free downloads sponsored by automaker General Motors Corp.

Not surprisingly, the number of cable subscribers downloading CBS shows shot up.

"Viewers just didn't want to pay for it," said Josh Bernoff, media analyst with Forrester Research. "It's much easier to get money out of advertisers than out of consumers."

Bernoff predicted that the CBS-Comcast shift would be adopted by other TV companies, which also have experimented with video on demand. The lessons learned by cable provider Comcast and CBS confirmed the results of an earlier Forrester survey, which found that 67% of those questioned said they would not pay to watch an episode of a broadcast network show that had been available earlier for free.

When selling their wares piecemeal, TV companies have encountered a different consumer mind-set than have music companies or even movie studios, said Jack MacKenzie, a senior vice president at Frank N. Magid Associates, a television consulting firm.

Most people are used to buying individual songs or CDs separately, he said, or paying a set price to see a movie in the theater or on DVD. But television, he said, has always been different.
"Americans are used to the advertiser-supported model," MacKenzie said. "It's the way that we have learned to watch television. It's very much a part of our culture."

MacKenzie added that $3-a-gallon gasoline prices have crimped consumers' spending, making them less willing to order shows they could have caught for free.

What's more, he said, most consumers do not want to pay for "bundled services," particularly if it means their monthly bills fluctuate. Consumers, he said, "like seeing the same bill every month."

MacKenzie said that the Comcast video-on-demand program could help CBS maintain its bread-and-butter business of selling ad time.

Networks earlier this year sold less commercial time in their advance sales season than they had hoped. The reason: Advertisers withheld money so they could buy space on the Internet. "This could be another way for CBS to keep advertisers in the fold," MacKenzie said.

CBS will sell the ad space for the downloads on Comcast either as separate time or as part of a package for commercial spots that run in shows that air on the broadcast network, Franks said, adding that the broadcaster was just trying to meet the needs of its core constituency.

"Advertisers have been coming to us and asking, 'What are you doing on alternate platforms?' " Franks said.

The CBS executive added that the network's experiment of offering free streaming of March Madness NCAA basketball tournament games turned into a "watershed moment." CBS is no longer as worried that shows offered digitally would steal viewers from the broadcast network.

"We have found that this tends to be additive rather than cannibalize what's on the network," Franks said.

The debate over ad-supported or pay-per-view programming might not be entirely settled. Several companies are successfully selling episodes of their hit shows, such as NBC's "The Office" or ABC's "Lost" on Apple Computer Inc.'s iTunes store. Also, CBS is still offering some of its shows for $1.99 per episode through iTunes, Amazon Unbox and Google Video.

The move with CBS did not change Comcast's arrangement with NBC that makes available for 99-cent downloads of such shows as "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" and "The Office" through Comcast on Demand.

Before CBS could scrap the 99-cent system, it had to revamp deals with such profit participants as producer Jerry Bruckheimer. Franks would not divulge how the advertising revenue would be split.

YouTube's Online Video Best Practices

September 14, 2006By Brad Berens
More by this Author
Youtube的广告赢利方式

YouTube's VP of Sales Tony Nethercutt and CEO and co-founder Chad Hurley talk to our exec editor about advertising opportunities, engagement and relationship building.

Brad Berens: Recently YouTube announced that it would let advertisers create channels of content and rolled out a "Participatory Video" space on the upper-right hand corner of its home page. How -- beyond uploading :30s -- should advertisers take advantage of this new space?

Tony Nethercut: We encourage advertisers to give our users access to creative that is engaging and different than what can be seen on TV. The length of the video can be anything under 10 minutes. We suggest from experience, that somewhere in the two to five minute range is a best practice.

Berens: What new opportunities for advertising might YouTube be launching soon?

Nethercut: We continue to look for opportunities that work for both our community and our advertisers. You will see enhanced functionality in our brand channels and more video opportunities in the near future.

Berens: Right now, YouTube is avoiding pre-roll video ads and interstitials: will that always be the case?

Nethercut: We are about experiences that work for our community and our advertisers. We will continue to look at models that respect the user experience.

Berens: YouTube is rightfully and successfully protective of the user experience. Both on YouTube and elsewhere on the web, how would you articulate a set of three to fivebest practices for online video advertising?

Nethercut: Respect the user experience:
Understand that users are talking back; make sure you are listening Create video ads that are built for the audience that is viewing it; make it as unique and engaging as possible. Avoid the interruption model. Don't expect all work to go viral; have a plan to seed the experience and support the campaign. Berens: One of the big advertising buzzwords right now is "engagement." How does YouTube promote engagement? So many of the comments attached to videos -- which can number in the hundreds -- are quite terse. Do comments and ratings constitute engagement?

Chad Hurley: The entire platform is about engagement. Our users both celebrate what they consider to be good advertisements and promotions and feel obligated to voice their views about those they do not like. We have democratized the entertainment process allowing the community to decide what rises up and to interact with the content they are viewing. It is this active engagement that many brands and advertisers seek in order to communicate and reach new consumers.

Berens: How does YouTube compare/contrast with MySpace? Does YouTube enable the sort of relationship building among users and between users and advertisers in the way that MySpace and other social networks claim to do so?

Nethercut: We are about connections around video content. YouTube ads and brand channels can be well targeted to reach a certain part of our community. The videos being viewed are engaging for a long period of or time, both users and advertisers benefit.

Changing Viewer Demands Lure Nets to Web

Mike Shields and John Consoli
SEPTEMBER 18, 2006 -
改变中的收视习惯诱惑电视网触网

Less than six months ago, ABC’s decision to stream episodes of Lost and Desperate Housewives on the Web was treated as landmark and revolutionary. But these days it would be bigger news if a network decided not to preview a new show on the Web, given last week’s slew of streaming announcements from the broadcast networks.

Network and media agency executives said the recent moves by Fox, CBS, ABC and NBC to stream significant portions of their prime-time lineups are being driven by several factors: the increasingly difficult task of getting viewers to notice a new show in a 500-channel, 50 million-MySpace user-universe; broadband users’ rapidly changing media expectations; and a growing ad market for online video.

First off, with media fragmentation near overload, networks can no longer rely on just putting their shows on TV and hoping viewers find them. Dave Poltrack, exec vp and chief research officer for CBS Corp., offered an interesting stat: in the mid-1980s, half the TV audience had already sampled a network’s shows by November [six weeks into the season]. Now that number is around 15 percent.

Thus, networks are employing the “try it you’ll like it” strategy. “It’s like the consumer packaged goods sampling market,” observed David Hallerman, analyst at eMarketer. Poltrack added that given the highly serialized nature of many network shows these days, alternative viewing options are key to reaching fans that might not want to miss an episode, or non-fans who want in on water-cooler buzz. In fact, ABC’s research found that sampling and catching up were among the top reasons users streamed its shows last spring, according to Albert Cheng, executive vp, digital media, Disney-ABC Television Group.

Beyond sampling, the nets are also simply reacting to their audience’s demand for on-demand viewing. “It’s about what people want and where people are going,” said Vivi Zigler, exec vp, NBC Digital Entertainment, New Media, of her network’s decision to stream all its new fall shows. Surely, the networks are also being motivated by the hot Web video ad market, where “interest among advertisers is outstripping inventory,” said Hallerman.

ABC said it will stick with the formula of running three national ad spots for a single advertiser within each streamed show, plus one local spot as part of a new affiliate pact. While no advertisers have been announced for this season, during last spring’s test ABC tapped both Ford and Toyota for discounted runs.
All the networks are looking to land new dollars for online video inventory, though just how they’ll charge buyers is still evolving. “ABC isn’t exactly sure of their model,” said Peggy Green, president, Broadcast & EntertainmentZenith Media Services, whose client Toyota participated in the test buy.
CBS is similarly tweaking its pricing options. “No one knows right now what the ultimate currency will be and what the industry standard will be,” he said. “The agencies are encouraging us to be as creative as possible,” Poltrack said.

NBC just began its sales process last week, so it’s possible that some shows will initially stream without ads. But according to Zigler, NBC’s sitcoms will soon carry two to three ads per stream, while its dramas will carry four to five spots. Like ABC, NBC will approach its top TV advertisers first, considering that buyers who are drawn to specific shows are likely to be interested in reaching those viewers elsewhere.
“They’re about getting those engaged users,” said Zigler. “An online user is extremely engaged.” Craig Woerz, managing partner, Media Storm, agreed that ad inventory within full-length network shows is more compelling that other broadband fare. “We’re buying as much as we can get of it and we’re willing to pay a premium.”

Steve Grubbs, CEO of PHD, said that TV advertisers who decide to buy into corresponding online inventory will want to know how streaming impacts their total audience. “As long as they can prove how much of an additional audience they are reaching, we will come to an agreement on how much more to pay for that audience,” he said.

One concern that no one seems to have is TV ratings. “I don’t believe it will eat into live TV viewership,” said. Added ABC’s Cheng: “This is purely additive,” he said. He says that research showed that even the since-cancelled Commander In Chief gained viewers during last season’s streaming experiment.
While research like encouraged ABC to expand the of shows available for viewing online this time around, Cheng said ABC won’t just put its whole fall lineup on the Web.

“We ask ourselves, ‘do we think the show benefits from additional exposure?’” For example, ABC feels that the young skewing Ugly Betty will likely benefit from being on the Web, while an older skewing drama like Brothers & Sisters might not.

Still, streaming prime-time shows is not without pitfalls. While studios are far more inclined to play ball than they were even a few months ago, rights negotiations require a “Herculean effort,” said Cheng. Plus, streaming technology can be pricey. “There is a significant cost to do this,” said Zigler.

香港电视台控告内地网站首宗成功案例

浪娱乐讯 近年香港制作的剧集、歌曲与电影，遭内地网站非法下载之情况相当严重，可惜无从追究，香港无线电视花了三年时间，近日终于成功控告内地公司侵权，成为香港电视台控告内地网站之首宗成功案例。

由2003年11月开始，无线发现世纪龙经营之网站21cn.com未获授权于网上播放无线的节目，包括剧集《上海滩》、综艺节目《2003年度劲歌金曲第三季季选》、《星光熠熠耀保良2003》及《2003年度香港小姐竞选总决赛》，无线遂透过内地律师，循民事入禀广东省法院，控告总部设在广州之世纪龙侵权。

经过审判后，原审法院判无线胜诉，但世纪龙不服上诉，近日遭广东省高级人民法院驳回，维持原判，成为终审判决，不得再上诉。世纪龙必须立即停止播放有关电视节目，在其网站上公开道歉，赔偿无线经济损失20万人民币及负责案件受理费7千多元人民币。

无线外事部助理总监曾醒明对于今次胜诉表示，这对无线来说是很大的鼓励，一直以来无线均重视知识版权，虽然经过多年诉讼，无线亦锲而不舍地追究，证明无线对维护版权之决心，亦不会姑息侵权者。曾醒明又重申虽然今次所得之赔偿并不多，但最重要是能带出警惕作用，令网站不要再侵权，更希望能对业界起到带头作用，凭这次之成功案例，日后可循法律途径追究侵权者。对于网站内仍有播放无线其他节目，曾醒明透露无线已继续循法律途径跟进事件。
　　
英皇娱乐艺人管理部总监霍汶希对于无线控告侵权者获得胜诉，认为是一个好开始，因为侵权情况愈来愈严重，令唱片市道十分差，故此是时候与其他唱片公司及电影公司商讨一下，如何连手追究侵权者。

Roundtable: Online Video Advertising

By Masha Geller
圆桌会谈:在线广告
Summit participants discuss the future and potential of online video.

During a roundtable discussion on the first day of this week's iMedia Summit in Lake Las Vegas, one thing became very clear-- online video advertising has a long way to go before brands start paying serious attention to it.

The small group of participants was led by Carole Walker, director of marketing communications and ethnic advertising at Masterfoods USA, who asked everyone to kick the discussion off by naming three things that stand in the way of wider adoption of video online advertising.

After an hour of discussion, the group had a clear winner: Measurable results, or rather, lack thereof.

Participants from PointRoll, Centro, Kaiser Permanente, Tremor Network and Nissan agreed that the biggest hurdle for online video proponents to overcome is that they can't offer an apples to apples comparison between online video advertising and television advertising.

At present, despite its many widely publicized flaws, advertisers still put their trust in Nielsen's television ratings, yet are very skeptical about nearly all metrics associated with online video. All agreed that despite online video being just as measurable, if not more so, than television, the two sides are speaking different languages and marketers are having a tough time deciphering the interactive video dialect, and thus continuing to live in the fear of the unknown in many cases.

This is not to say that online video is doomed to spend eternity on the back burner.

Several research studies, namely a recent one from PointRoll, have shown the effectiveness of online video advertising and advertisers are definitely paying attention. Many have successfully employed the myriad online video technologies currently available and the sector is quickly moving out of the "just hype" category and into the "viable digital marketing technique" sphere.

The key is pre-planning, the group agreed. Repurposing television creative online is okay, but it doesn't take advantage of the interactivity offerings of the medium, which almost never fail to deliver better results for marketers.

Chip Russo of Pointroll, said, "If you're going to make video really effective online, get engaged really early so you have an opportunity to customize. Repurposing [TV ads online] is still ok, but custom video for the web is where we see the best results."

Another benefit of sitting at the planning table from the beginning is that it allows for bringing in people with specific online video experience, who can negotiate the landscape of TV vs. web, such as difference monitor ratios and different monitor color schemes. "If you can pre-plan, it's something you should definitely do," Russo said.

Another pitfall of online video is the dearth of pre-roll inventory, largely caused by the still relatively small amount of available online video contenat. One way to combat that, panelists agreed, is to extend online video messaging to the rest of your online video buy, such as ay of the popular in-banner video formats.

Finally, there is the issue of educating both clients and agencies about online video advertising. While everyone tends to think of online video ads as the spots appearing before content rolls (pre-roll) that's only a small portion of the plethora of opportunities currently available.

A monumental task, but not an impossible one.

CBS shies away from social networking

By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson and Emiko Terazono in London
CBS购买大型视频社区网站欲留还去

Les Moonves, chief executive of CBS, ruled out buying a large social networking or user generated video site on Wednesday, a week after his opposite number at sister company Viacom was fired for missing out on digital acquisition opportunities.

Mr Moonves said social networking was an important phenomenon and CBS had looked at Facebook and YouTube, "but we're not going to buy them".

CBS would continue to strike digital partnerships, however, because "we're all searching for what's going to work."
He questioned the valuations that have been mooted for the two young companies, asking: "Is YouTube worth $1bn today? Maybe, but it's a lot of money. Is Facebook worth hundreds of millions of dollars? We're looking at all these things."

In reference to Tom Freston's removal as chief executive of Viacom, which was blamed in part on his failure to buy a social networking site to rival News Corporation's MySpace, Mr Moonves added: "Do I wish I owned [MySpace?] Sure. Fortunately, it wasn't something I was negotiating for at the time."

His relationship with Sumner Redstone, the Viacom and CBS chairman who fired Mr Freston, was "terrific," Mr Moonves said. "I keep my head down, I do my job."

Speaking to journalists at the Broadcasting Press Guild in London, Mr Moonves said that bankers had approached CBS about bids for both ITV, the UK's largest commercial broadcaster, and Endemol, the Dutch production company behind the Big Brother reality TV series.

Investment bankers "did bring round the Endemol book [but] it's not something we're interested in," he said. His comments come as Telefónica, Endemol's controlling shareholder, is planning to sell the group and a management team has begun informal preparations for a buyout.

CBS had examined ITV more than a year ago, Mr Moonves said, but "we haven't looked at it that closely."

Google aims to take over your TV screen

Threat to traditional broadcasters By Tony Glover

Google注册了一系列非常有趣的域名，即GoogleAdSenseTVsite.com/net/org。虽然Google最后并不一定就使用这个域名，但根据经验，这些域名会透露Google将要推出的新服务。Google AdSense TV Site，听起来有点像是
AdSense for TV的域名。早在今年5月份，Google CEO就已经主动透露了Google正在开发电视搜索引擎，在随后的6月，Google已经在开发一种实时环境声音辨认技术，利用普通家用电脑的内置麦克风收录周围环境的声音，然后根据这些声音判断当前正在观看的电视节目的内容，然后向电脑提供与电视节目相关的信息

GOOGLE is planning a new -version of its search engine – designed for TV screens – that the company’s co-founder and its chief executive believe will rival traditional broadcasting.

Chief executive Eric Schmidt told The Business: “At the most people currently have access to only around 500 television channels,” said Schmidt. “They should have access to everything – that is where we are heading.”

As they prepare to make the move from the PC to the television, internet service providers and broadcasters are trying to develop electronic programme guides (EPGs) that will enable viewers with a broadband internet connection to choose from a far wider range of video and film entertainment than is currently available. And Google believes it can offer a world--beating EPG.

“You have to look at what an electronic programme guide is. It is just a search engine and that is what Google does best,” said Schmidt.

Some internet service providers such as BT intend to limit viewing choice to content suppliers they have selected. But IT giants such as Microsoft and Intel are determined to harness the full power of the internet with its virtually unlimited choice into every living room.

Attaching a Microsoft Media Center player or an Xbox console will enable consumers to use a digital television to browse the internet for whatever video content they wish. This will enable viewers to use Google to realise Schmidt’s vision of allowing viewers to use a television-enabled Google search engine to watch any film or programme they want via the internet.

There has been industry scepticism as to whether the internet will be able to sustain the volume of data needed to allow television audiences to stream live video into their living rooms en masse. But Page, currently president of Google products, told The Business: “People are inventive and the history of the internet proves that it can be adapted to carry whatever level of data is required.”

Page is involved in a project being carried out in Google’s US research and development labs that will revolutionise television advertising. Paid search, the paid ad links that appear to the right of all Google searches, is the revenue generator that made Google the fastest growing company on Nadsaq.

Google’s co-founder Page believes that if the company is to continue to be successful in the era of internet television, it must develop a new form of paid search. Schmidt admitted to The Business that the company has yet to develop the right format but added that Page is trialling new prototypes on an almost weekly basis.

Microsoft is this weekend denying a story that appeared in the New York Post that is has been in discussions to buy online auctioneer eBay. A Microsoft spokeswoman told The Business: “There is no foundation to this story.” Last month Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer denied rumours that Microsoft was teaming up with eBay to take on search giant Google.

Keep these guidelines in mind

Today's consumers demand more than great programming-- they demand an engaging experience. How they access, search for and consume video is as important as the programming itself. So keep these guidelines in mind, regardless of how the net neutrality game plays out.

-Quality content is job number one. Taking existing content and making it available online is only a small portion of what needs to be considered. Focus your innovative talent on generating web-centric content that reaches out to today's active television viewer.

-Experience matters to your audience. While you can't and shouldn't become a technology company, you should partner with companies who understand the dynamics of video distribution so you can focus on great content creation. Build online trust now. Protecting privacy while delivering value to your audience is critical.

-Give advertisers what they want-- quality interaction with their audience. Consumers have accepted advertising-driven models, but they respond most to relevant advertising that is content driven and respectful of their time. Help your advertisers understand this new world by embracing new advertising formats and judiciously using ad slots for effective results.

-Embrace your audience across platforms and devices. Making your content available online is important, but teaming with someone who understands the nuances of how to present that material across many available devices is equally essential.

CBS Television & TiVo Make History With First-Ever Exclusive Debut of New Fall Show on TiVo Before Its Network Premiere

Tivo 的用户将首先享用CBS首映的秋季独播电视节目

ALVISO, Calif. and NEW YORK, Sept. 5 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CBS Television today announced plans to make TV history by partnering with TiVo Inc. , the creator of and the leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVR), to launch a new Fall show in an entirely original way -- not via a network premiere, a DVD or the Internet, but on the TiVo(R) service, which continues to revolutionize how America watches television. Through this pioneering partnership, TiVo subscribers will be the first in the nation to see the hot comedy CBS show "The Class" as early as a full week before its premiere on live TV.

In this innovative launch developed jointly by TiVo and CBS, TiVo subscribers will have an unparalleled opportunity to experience CBS fall line-up exclusives. In addition to the opportunity to watch The Class up to 1 week before its network premiere on September 18th, TiVo subscribers will be able to view sneak preview clips and receive exclusive footage and information on three more of CBS's most eagerly anticipated new shows: Jericho starring Skeet Ulrich and Gerald McRaney, Smith starring Ray Liotta and Virginia Madsen, and Shark starring James Woods and Jeri Ryan. With just one click of the remote, TiVo subscribers will be able to record the premieres of all four shows. This will mark the first time that any group of network shows have ever been bundled together and offered jointly for the ultimate in viewer convenience. Following the premieres, subscribers can utilize the popular Season Pass(TM) recordings feature which once set, automatically records all shows viewers choose for an entire season without them ever having to give a second thought to when they air.

Tom Rogers, TiVo's CEO said, "We're thrilled to be able to introduce this ground-breaking innovation to the industry while at the same time providing our subscribers with exclusives that no else can match. At the core of this fresh and forward-thinking campaign is the television industry's recognition of the tremendous influence that our 4.4 million TiVo subscribers can generate as some of the smartest and savviest TV viewers around."

"CBS's partnership with TiVo is a creative new way to use DVR technology to help drive television network viewing," said George Schweitzer, President of CBS Marketing Group. "Our goal is to introduce our fresh new comedy The Class about a group of 20-somethings who met in the 3rd grade and whose lives become bound together to a broad, diversified, receptive audience that has the ability to start trends and generate buzz, which is exactly what TiVo offers."

This dynamic new partnership between TiVo and CBS was developed in conjunction with Initiative Media as part of a broad agency-wide relationship with the InterPublic Group of Companies launched in April 2006.

Double D of Video: Distribution and DRM

网络视频的分销和数字版权
September 05, 2006By Stephen Condon

So what is the Double-D?

Double-D stands for Distribution and DRM. That is, the online distribution of video advertising and content in a way that ensures one's video assets are protected before they are distributed. Unfortunately, many advertisers and content providers see the two Ds as separate endeavors. But that can be a costly mistake.

Today's market forces have created a situation in which both distribution and DRM are of paramount importance and should be viewed hand-in-hand. Here's why:

Major brands are using online video advertising in order to extend their brand message and reach a younger audience. The market is booming so much so that there is a shortage of video advertising inventory;

As more of these national brand advertisers conduct online ad buys, their ads employ increasing amounts of SAG talent and copyrighted music, thereby driving up the value of the creative assets. Content providers must therefore be more aware of the legal implications with video content distribution than ever before; and More and more video (both advertising and content) is being downloaded and exchanged illegally over the internet.

As with any high growth market, the solutions can often appear confusing to advertisers and content providers. But the fact is that while the 'Double-D' is multifaceted and technologically complex on the backend, the front-end of the equation should be transparent and risk-free. Following are the three most important aspects of distribution and DRM that advertisers and content providers should be aware of:

1. RIGHTS

Geography: In what markets (domestically and internationally) do you have the right to deliver this content? Is your online solution equipped to prevent video distribution to unauthorized and/or undesirable locations?

Media: Across what media do you have rights to talent, music and imagery? In traditional Television, these rights were easy to enforce and control -- less so with the advent of cable -- and incredibly challenging with the millions of distribution points across the internet.

Frequency: Do the rights you own limit the number of times your commercial or content can be shown? What about the number of months it can remain accessible? Are you able to track where and when your video goes up and comes down online with the same precision as you can in other media?

The Double-D Solution: A platform of products that gives content providers the flexibility to apply any number of business rules to every piece of video content to organize, manage and track that content locally, nationally or globally. What is watched and delivered in Germany for one price, may have a totally different set of rules than what is watched and delivered in France. The result is an incredibly easy way to organize, play and track all the important elements of a piece of video content.

2. PROTECTION
How securely are your video assets protected? Are you familiar with the process? Do you know that if your video is being shown using Flash video or within a Flash ad, it is completely, 100 percent at risk for pirating, misuse and duplication? Is your team staffed to monitor the backend technology of every site you run on? The barrage of these questions may seem ridiculous, but the wrong answer to any one of these questions means your video is not well protected.

The Double-D Solution:

A platform that utilizes Digital Rights Management (DRM) to encrypt and secure, ensuring that video is played when it is supposed to be played, who it is supposed to be played to and only the number of times it is authorized to be played. Unfortunately, security is something that most online advertising providers have not even thought of, not to mention actually provide. This is not trivial and should be thoroughly investigated if promoted by a company that has only been in the video space for just a year or two. Also DRM alone is not enough. DRM can lock the content but many simple implementations are the equivalent of locking a safe and leaving the key on top. The keys that unlock the content must themselves be protected and not handed over unless the user or viewer is properly authorized.

3. CONSEQUENCE
The financial consequences of distributing files that can be altered, distributed across non-negotiated channels and/or to non-negotiated markets can be a multi-million dollar (not to mention PR) mistake協ar more expensive than the cost of due diligence and prevention.

The Double-D Solution:
A platform where advertisers don't have to worry about breaching contracts, stolen video content or even worse, altered video content being sent around the internet. Look for vendors that ensure the content is delivered to whom it is intended, when it is intended, the number of times it is intended and that it is never stolen and altered or sent around without permission of the advertisers

So maybe a better question instead of What's the upside of the "Double-D?," is "What's the downside of anything less?" We've been at this for over 20 years and have seen a lot of products and providers come and go as the industry has evolved. What has stayed constant amidst the market change is that this is an all-or-nothing game. You either understand your rights or you don't. You are either protected or at risk. You will either keep the lawyers out of your office or install a revolving door.

Any company distributing video in any way, shape or form must understand how to securely implement Digital Rights Management (DRM) services either in place prior to or packaged with their distribution plan. The promise to "transform the distribution and consumption of media" is great marketing. The act of transforming the distribution and consumption of media is great engineering and product development. If you've got content you want to distribute, the odds are you're already a great marketer. How's your development team?

Warner Bros. Creates Short-Form Digital Ad Content Division

By T.L. Stanley
华纳兄弟创建专门的制作宽带和移动视频短片部门

LOS ANGELES (AdAge.com) -- Warner Bros., the powerhouse behind "E.R." and "Friends," is launching a landmark division designed to create short-form broadband and mobile content for marketers. Warner Bros.' creation of Studio 2.0 is the most aggressive move yet by a Hollywood studio to push into the digital ad-making business.

Marketers' content
Today everyone wants to be in the content-creation and -ownership business -- agencies are making movies, marketers are setting up production facilities and we all know about consumers and their YouTube specials -- but this is the most aggressive move yet by one of the longtime kings of content, the Hollywood studios, to get into digital content and partner with advertisers.

Aimed at satisfying advertisers' growing thirst for original content and digital platforms, the division, dubbed Studio 2.0, will integrate brands and develop programming specifically for ad sponsorship.

Rich Rosenthal
Warner Bros. has hired award-winning ad-industry veteran Rich Rosenthal, who has spent the past decade at Young & Rubicam, to head the venture. An Emmy-nominated commercial producer, Mr. Rosenthal has worked with marketers such as Sony, United Airlines, Procter & Gamble and General Mills.

"We view this as a natural extension of what we do every day as content creators, and we're adapting to the digital environment," said Bruce Rosenblum, president of Warner Bros. Television Group. "Since advertisers were intimately involved in the early days of television, it makes sense for them to be involved in this arena, too."

There's no deal in place, but logic suggests programming could be distributed on sibling AOL, and licensed to websites and wireless providers. There's no blueprint for how the partnerships will work, Mr. Rosenblum said, nor is there a business model for financing the programming, though it's expected marketers will help foot the bill through sponsorships, integration fees or co-financing.

Advertising and entertainment
"We've been hearing from advertisers that they want to closely align their messages with entertainment content," said Craig Hunegs, exec VP-Warner Bros. TV Group. "The goal is to create stand-alone content that speaks to the audience. It's not about creating something that looks like a commercial."

The content could provide a springboard to TV series or other entertainment, executives said. Studio 2.0 will draw from Warner Bros. resources, including on-air and behind-the-camera talent, and Mr. Rosenthal will act as a sort of talent scout.

"There's a greater chance of getting an audience invested in entertaining stories and characters," Mr. Rosenthal said. "Advertisers want to collaborate on ideas outside the traditional avenues."

Fox's move
News Corp.'s Fox TV Studios also intends to create original content with marketers in mind, aligning with branding guru Peter Arnell in a nonexclusive pact to create content across platforms. The studio also made a first-look deal with ad hotshop Crispin Porter & Bogusky. No projects have come out of either deal.
WPP Group's MindShare Entertainment has worked with Walt Disney Co.'s ABC to produce ad-backed, brand-embedded programming, and with CBS on original movies.

Ad agencies are increasingly creating their own content for clients, and marketers such as Anheuser-Busch are showing they want to own and even produce their own entertainment content. Commercial production houses are creating more of their own content as well.

重庆卫视牵手视频网站

8月24日由重庆电视台主办，重视文华承办的“第一次心动”巨星招募与TVIX.CN视频分享网共同在北京召开合作新闻发布会，正式宣布TVIX.CN成为“第一次心动”巨星招募计划视频互动合作伙伴。

“第一次心动”巨星招募计划总导演、总策划人及总制片人杨梓含在会上介绍：“第一次心动”巨星招募计划是2006年下半年国内唯一的大型娱乐选秀活动，也是重庆电视台2006年重点项目。其提出的 “百姓故事百姓演，百姓明星百姓选”的思路，全面的倡导和丰富健康的群众文化生活，“第一次心动”所提倡的“平民娱乐”理念与TVIX.CN所提倡的“视频共享”理念成为本次活动的良好契机，娱乐的平民化将在本次活动中为中国娱乐开创一番新的天地。
对于电视台来说，与网站合作不仅克服了电视节目的收视时间限制，也扩大了节目的影响力和受众范围，增强了互动性，也是一个新的节目营销途径，但是对现阶段提高电视节目的收视率有多大作用却需要时间来证明；对于互联网视频网站而言，借助电视节目不仅填充和丰富了视频内容，网聚人气，而且能够借助传统媒体的强大影响力迅速提升知名度者这倒是不容质疑的。

不去管重庆卫视办的这档选秀节目的收视率如何，至少他开创了与专业视频网站合作的先河，积极探索新的节目传播渠道和节目互动方式，TVIX.CN也在探索与国内主要内容供应者的合作方法，期待一个共赢的局面。探索和开拓的先行者总是令人仰慕，因为他们要么成为该领域的先驱，要么成为先烈。既然心已经第一次动了，那么祝福他们能走的更远。