For Video Professionals, It's the Encoding Stupid! Their Quality Content Is King

Joost's demise has deserved lots of attention of course -- and from some of the biggest names and "influencers" in technology, including Om Malik and Michael Arrington. Why? Because the Joost rise and fall holds significant lessons to anyone running a technology company -- or, most any company for that matter. Om Malik's detailed and thoughtful analysis is particularly instructive and is worthy of a read.

There are many reasons why all of Joost's advantages -- and it had remarkable ones -- did not lead them to the promised land. At the end of the day, Om Malik concludes that "in the end, however, it all boiled down to a lack of content."

Very interesting conclusion -- perhaps content IS king after all?

And, for video professionals -- where their content IS their business -- quality video trumps all.

And, where does quality come from? Certainly in the video capture itself. But, after that, quality is made -- or broken -- in the encoding process. Video professionals know this -- that "it's the encoding, stupid!" But, this is an overlooked fact -- and reality -- for virtually every video publishing platform/CMS out there in the marketplace (and for many of their customers).

THIS is where Sorenson Media comes in -- and this is perhaps the single most important differentiator of "Sorenson 360" from the "new" Joost and any CMS that is in business today.

Sorenson Squeeze has been THE gold standard in video encoding for video professionals for years. Why, because of it's encoding quality and control -- we have been the market leader for encoding for years. And, our new "Sorenson 360" re-imagines what a video publishing platform should be -- that's why we call it a "video delivery network" or VDN. It is the only solution that features the full power of Squeeze and client-side encoding -- and all of its undisputed advantages -- front and center. And, we do it in 2 ways -- (1) seamless integration of our further enhanced Squeeze 5.1 with Sorenson 360; AND (2) browser-based encoding -- drag and drop with no separate application required -- but that still uses the Squeeze engine (yes, that's right, client-side encoding directly in the browser).

THIS is why it was a natural evolution for us, as a company, to launch Sorenson 360. Quite frankly, our existing substantial base of video professional Squeeze customers asked for it. They needed an "all in one" workflow solution that puts encoding -- and, hence, quality -- front and center. No one else in the marketplace gave that to them. And, we are in the business of serving the needs of these video professionals -- that is our focus. We are not trying to be everything to everyone. (This gets back to Om Malik's essential point regarding the need to focus, with which I wholeheartedly agree.)

This is our "special sauce." And, Sorenson 360 -- and our overall product/service eco-system -- is differentiated from all others in "the space" in other critical ways as well:

(1) Our unique heritage -- we have been innovators in Internet video for 14 years (i.e., we have been around, and we will be around); we have a reputation for quality and have been best in class for years; and we have a substantial existing customer base of video professionals -- a market segment we know very well indeed; and

(2) We have been profitable for years and have a very healthy balance sheet -- this speaks for itself, especially in this day and age.

And, this last point is critical -- a profitable and healthy business is especially important now, when seemingly every week there is a new entrant in the CMS space -- now it's the "new" Joost -- that treats video encoding as an afterthought. Most of them will simply fail ...

Joost Didn't - Tried to Sell ... Couldn't - Now What?

Joost -- the Internet TV service that launched in 2006 with an air of inevitable massive success -- has officially failed and is done (as anticipated several months ago when I wrote about the company). Joost simply couldn't compete with Hulu, despite its own traditional media roots. So, it tried to sell itself earlier this year, but couldn't.

So, what's a company to do? Re-invent itself of course. Joost now has a new CEO and shifts gears to try its hand at selling white box video platform services, apparently primarily focusing on large-scale media companies and enterprises (including cable and satellite operators and telcos). Lots of players, however, already are in this crowded space and focusing on that same market segment -- including Brightcove, Move Networks (which also just recently reinvented itself in the same manner as Joost) and Ooyala. The Ooyala situation is particularly worthy of "scratching of the head", since Ooyala has been Joost's partner to provide precisely the same kind of video platform services (in other words, Joost apparently will now compete directly with its partner).

My company, Sorenson Media, offers our own significantly differentiated video publishing and hosting service under the name "Sorenson 360."

Sorenson 360 is differentiated in several critical ways (we like to say we have re-imagined what such a service should be, and that is why we call it a "Video Distribution Network" or "VDN"): (1) we have a laser focus on what we call the "video professional" and the SMB space, a market segment we know extremely well because we already have massive numbers of customers in that segment via our "Squeeze" encoding products; (2) we are the only service that features client-side encoding which has a host of critical advantages over all the other guys (read more about that here); (3) we offer a full portfolio of services (Sorenson Spark, Sorenson Squeeze, Sorenson Squish, and Sorenson 360); and (4) our company has been a pioneer in Internet video for 14 years and has long been profitable with a rock solid balance sheet -- that means that we will be around in the future.

Malcolm Gladwell to Chris Anderson -- Information Can't Want to be "Free"

Chris Anderson, Editor of Wired and author of "The Long Tail", is renown for his conclusion that "information wants to be free"; and that the Internet inevitably leads to the free availability and access to all kinds of "information" -- text (newspapers), music, and videos. This conclusion is expanded in Anderson's new book, "Free: The Future of Radical Price."

"Not so fast," says Malcolm Gladwell, one of my favorite writers and author of "Outliers," "Blink," and "The Tipping Point" among others. Gladwell critiques Anderson's primary point in his his new review from The New Yorker. This is a "must read" -- click on this link.

I agree with Gladwell wholeheartedly here. I frequently have written that information DOES want to be free -- but, I clarify this by saying that "free", in this context, means that information ultimately cannot be confined in the Internet world and wants to be "freely available." But "freely available" is not the same as "free" (i.e., no cost). I firmly believe that content providers ultimately will/can charge for information of all kinds via a combination of ads, downloads and subscriptions. And, ultimately, I believe that content providers will do significantly better in the brave new world precisely because it is "freely available" in any form that consumers want -- and anywhere, anytime they want it.

Yahoo -- "Quoth the Maven, Nevermore ..."

Maven Networks -- killed by Yahoo! after 17 months and $160 million.

We saw this coming ...

... and Yahoo!'s video ambitions remain murky. On the one hand, CEO Carol Bartz recently underscored the fact that Internet video is still in its infancy -- and that Yahoo! needs to invest in video technology because Internet video presents a massive opportunity. And, on the other hand, Maven is no more.

Maven customers -- come to us -- we will take care of you with our new "Sorenson 360" service and the transition will be painless. You are in good hands. We at Sorenson Media have been leaders in Internet video for 14 years -- and we have a strong balance sheet. We have been here innovating ... and we will continue to be here innovating. You need not worry that we will be shut down. And, that is critical when you are entrusting your prized video assets. It also is a substantial differentiator between Sorenson Media and virtually all others in our video publishing space.

Cable's "TV Everywhere" Initiative is Not TV Everywhere -- But, Internet TV Will Be

I recently blogged about Comcast's and Time Warner's recently officially announced "TV Everywhere" initiative -- which is cable's understandable (yet ultimately unrealistic) attempt to reign in the genie of TV over the Internet. "TV Everywhere" is anything but -- since the cable and satellite operators (and, for the most part, the major TV content providers) have interests of self-preservation to keep TV programming "walled in" and not freely available. This is the IPTV view of the world, as opposed to "Internet TV" -- the latter which is, for the time being, represented best by Hulu.

As I have written several times before, the IPTV view of the world -- i.e., TV Everywhere -- will most certainly rule the day for the near term (meaning, the next few years). But, ultimately, Internet TV will win the day, because consumers ultimately will demand it. Put simply, content wants to be freely available over the Internet (which does not mean, however, that consumers will not pay for it in some manner).

A recent compelling perspective on this state of the TV business -- provocatively titled "The TV Business is Toast" -- is offered by Henry Blodget of the Huffington Post. Definitely worth a read.

The iPhone 3G S -- Doing to Mobile Video What the iPod Did to Mobile Music

It can't be denied that the iPod revolutionized the music industry by popularizing mobile/portable music on a massive scale. Apple's introduction of the iPod in the early years of this decade -- during my years a Musicmatch (remember Musicmatch?) -- marked a watershed for consumers. Apple made portable music drop dead easy, elegant ... and fun. Yes, fun.

Apple is now doing it again with its recent launch of the iPhone 3G S and mobile video capture. Just like the digital portable music world prior to the iPod (Creative and others were well in the game before the iPod saw the light of day), mobile video capture is nothing new. Many have been doing it for years. But, once again, Apple has made mobile video capture drop dead easy, elegant and -- yes -- fun. See a pattern here?

So much so that in the few days that Apple launched its new iPhone 3G S, uploads from mobile phones to YouTube leaped 400% on a daily basis! Think of that number -- unbelievable. But, when you think about it, it is not all that unbelievable, because Apple has done this before -- revolutionizing a market, in other words.

Apple's 3G S -- which TechCrunch recently pronounced should have been called the Apple 3G V ("V" for video) -- marks the mass popularization of mobile video ... which, in turn, will further accelerate the break-neck pace of Internet video in general.

Cable's Internet "TV Everywhere" Officially Introduced ... Anything But TV Everywhere Over the Internet

I have written extensively about the long-anticipated epic battle between Internet TV (which consumers want) and IPTV (which the major cable companies and telcos want).

Internet TV's poster child is Hulu, the joint venture between News Corp., NBC Universal and Disney which offers television shows over the Internet for "free" to consumers ("free" does not really mean free, because the programming is ad-driven precisely the same way as conventional broadcast TV is not really "free"). IPTV, on the other hand, is a controlled "walled garden" approach to providing television programming over the Internet -- consumers can't choose what they want; rather, the cable companies and telcos choose to make such programming available only to consumers who also pay monthly for traditional cable TV. This IPTV approach to providing video programming over the Internet is the cable companies/telcos' attempt to preserve the status quo of the economics in their business during a period of massive disruption that is inevitable with the onset of faster and faster broadband.

Well, that epic battle begins today, as the two cable industry behemoths -- Comcast and Time Warner -- officially introduce their IPTV initiative which they call "TV Everywhere." But, as reported by the Los Angeles Times today, technology has been a hurdle to the efforts of these giants to keep their content "walled" from the outside world. If we have learned nothing else from the past several years, we have learned that content "wants to be free" -- as in freely available over the Internet (that does not mean that consumers won't pay for it via pay-per-download, subscriptions or ads). I am firmly in the camp, therefore, who believe that Internet TV ultimately will win the war in this epic battle, even if IPTV wins the initial battles (which it most assuredly will given the clout of these giants with the major TV content providers).

Netflix CEO Predicts Demise of Core Business

In a must-read article and interview in today's Wall Street Journal, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings predicts the ultimate devise of the company's DVD rental business beginning in 4-9 years.

The culprit? The online video business of course. And, from the company's beginnings years ago, Hastings smartly has been preparing for that day. The company already streams movies to customers as part of their subscriptions, and Internet video, of course, has been growing at a ever-accelerating pace.

For the consumer, Internet video distribution and access eventually will lead to unlimited choice and unlimited flexibility -- what you want, when you want it, and where you want it (including in the living room and on mobile devices).

And, for Netflix, Internet video distribution -- which many predicted to be Netflix's ultimate Achilles Heel -- very possibly could lead to even more explosive growth for the company in the future. The company is positioned uniquely in the marketplace to capitalize on the ultimate massive Internet video opportunity (whereas Blockbuster has faltered terribly), and Netflix's operating costs will dramatically decline since the company will not need to pay expensive snail mailing charges.