Life is grand

Paul Yanez’s Media Player Framework work has an important impact on internet video providers; Monetisation of internet video has to be embedded in the content itself and not simply surround it. It is bigger than Paul’s work but his is some of the best out there and highlights why the ads need to be part of the video content; Pre-roll, post-roll, overlays etc.

YouTube puts its ads in the HTML around the video. These ads don’t survive the transition to an aggregated, full-screen player like Paul’s. The initial reaction by an internet video provider like YouTube is to prevent any system that doesn’t display the surrounding ads from getting the video content. This is a short sighted reaction though as it limits distribution and reach, exactly what you want your video content to achieve. Put the ads in the content and it travels with the content.

The same really goes for all content that we want to distribute. Textual content in RSS for instance needs to survive distribution without making the provider loose their revenue stream. They either provide only partial feeds which makes it difficult to read on your television or mobile or they take down the whole feed. That isn’t good for anyone.

A lot of what we are building now on the web though is bound to desktop or laptop displays. The content requires Firefox or Internet Explorer to display the supporting HTML to generate revenue. We seem to be preaching “any device” but practicing “so long as it is a full-blown desktop browser.” Part of the promise of the web is a hyperlinked network of resources. Not a hyperlinked network of portals that have resources embedded in them. Much of the time resources are content and that content needs to travel well to achieve our dreams of “any device.”

Otherwise Hulu and YouTube and Joost are going to block Paul’s project and that would be a sad thing for everyone.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 8th, 2008 at 6:03 pm and is filed under Post. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.