Esther’s argument at one of these conferences struck me as profound. There *was* no “Multimedia industry”. Blasphemy - but brilliant. Esther’s point was that with SO many new companies, SO many new products, and the clamor to multimedia-enable every single piece of software and all the new PC’s, multimedia wasn’t a product, wasn’t a business, and certainly wasn’t an industry. It was merely a feature. In her vision, every system and every software product was going to have multimedia features in the not too distant future. And she was right. Within two years the nascent “industry” collapsed, yet multimedia features were a success, and drove new system and application sales.

I contend that with the mad rush to spawn new YouTube clones, we’re witnessing the same mis-step played out again. If you accept that the market even needs more than a couple of these, you quickly come to the same conclusion - that uploading and sharing videos isn’t a business model unto itself, advertising or no advertising. It’s just something that should be available at all the relevant sites we visit or use. Now, that’s not to say that there isn’t value in providing an index, or intelligent guides to the video that is out there… but that very different from the mechanics of sharing.
Don’t get me started on this same issue with regard to “social networking”…

Deepest apologies there folks for the extended absence. What with it being August and all, and the girlfriend was out here for the summer, traffic was a bitch, the sun was in my eyes, and the dog ate my homework.

Nonetheless… we’re back in the saddle again, and will try to catch up over the next few days with all the latest & greatest news and goings on. Plus a few fresh prespectives gained from significant beach time.

• YouTube
• GoogleVideo
• AtomFilms
• 45 channels of content from
• Viacom
• Turner Broadcasting
• MTV Networks

As much as I think AOL lost their shine long ago, I have to admit that’s a pretty compelling lineup of content for what’s left of their middle-america audience. It will take more than a flashy interface though to add value beyond what YouTube and Google Video each offer independently. Why will the average YouTube fan (and we know there’s lots of them) choose to use AOL instead?

Also, if I choose to remove my content from AOL’s site - will I have to go through Customer Service hell?

Just as important I believe is the fact that YouTube metrics are inherently “honest” traffic. If you have a MySpace account, you know how much “spam” you’re getting in bogus friend requests from various advertisers. The problem with the recent rise in MySpace stats is that it doesn’t filter out the marketing crap. So, all those ‘bot’ accounts, marketing accounts, advertising-based friend requests, et cetera are still being counted admist the traffic numbers for MySpace.

Now, just going on personal experience and that of my real flesh-and-bone friends on MySpace, we’re getting hit by an (unscientific) average of 2 per day; some higher, some lower. By my math - which is suspect to begin with - that tells me that MySpace’s recent traffic numbers could be inflated by as much as 100% or more over real traffic by actual humans.

Contrast that to YouTube, where a video watched is a video watched. No spoofing those numbers.

There’s no question that the mobile video market needs a better  solution than traditional MPEG codecs, particularly when you consider the constraints of processing capacity and power consumption on mobile devices.  The question does remain however, whether the market has the appetite for yet-another-codec.

Mobiclip is supported by Sony Pictures Digital, but heck, there’s little loyalty amongst Hollywood media giants to any one technology, so who knows how many others Sony Pictures Digital supports, or how exlusive their support for Mobiclip is - if at all.   Likewise, Actimagine’s hardware partner is Sharp, which while a solid CE company, is a second, or third-tier brand in most consumer’s eyes.

Reports are surfacing

If true, it’s a shame that it is taking Apple so long to develop what some Asian manufacturers have been able to get into the market over a year ago. Yeah, yeah - I know… Apple wants to get it “right” and all that, but still (keep those flamethrowers turned off folks - remember, I’m a big fan of Apple). Then again, given all the manufacturing problems Apple’s been having with the MacBooks (heat, fan whine, discoloration), maybe they need to avoid another fiasco, and get all the issues worked out first.

Basic VC questions arise - what’s to keep the audience from using any of the myriad of clones out there? Chad and the boys best strike while the iron is hot, but a $1B valuation runs the risk of burning us all.

Update: John Batelle’s got an excellent take on this as well, over at his blog.

Don’t know where exactly they rank in the list of 170+ YouTube clones, but at first blush around their site, it’s extremely difficult for me to figure out where their differentiation or advantage is. They haven’t yet matched the list of YouTube features, their categorization model is simplistic at best (and no, I don’t mean “simple”). The only somewhat distinctive feature that I noticed is their “Request” menu choice, which offers a way for audience members to post requests for specific footage. There’s Calls for Entries for various contests, folks looking for any footage someone might have taken of a specific event like a protest march, et cetera.

While I’ve only seen this type of effort on a couple of sites, it’s interesting that Dabble hasn’t made a bigger deal out of this, and showcased it on their home page. Instead, being tucked away on a menu choice means that either they still have something up their sleeve, or just don’t get it. Not sure which.