Almost a week ago media conglomerates NewsCorp and NBC Universal announced that they were teaming up with Internet portals AOL, Yahoo and MSN to distribute new video content online. The content will include full length television shows and films as well as the clips that we have all become accustomed to when using prospective rival YouTube. Just like other video content companies such as Joost, NewsCorp and NBC Universal do not see their venture as competition for YouTube or vice versa. I disagree. Yes, YouTube focuses mostly on user-created content but the film and television clips they do have receive a decent amount of hits on the website. I believe that consumers on average do not want to search several different sites for different content. If a site says they contain video content, that should mean they have both professionally produced videos in addition to user-created content. Of course I am a proponent for marketplace competition but why cannot each of these sites be all-inclusive? Maybe because Viacom sued Google and YouTube for $1 billion dollars last month. The fear of copyright infringement has almost ruined it for us.
The question I would like to pose, and it might be provocative, but really is online video content the future? NewsCorp and NBC Universal obviously think so if they are venturing away from their traditional business (which I think needs more attention because quality television content is hard to find these days) and putting both feet in the video content realm. But as quickly as technology and consumers change, how do we know that next year online video content will still be as popular as it is today? I rarely watch YouTube or online television. Maybe I'm old-fashioned and I like watching shows on my 20" screen as opposed to my tiny laptop, but I really think that video content is going to hit a plateau, and all of the media conglomerates are going to find themselves in a relationship that has lost its passion. But maybe I am wrong. This could be a very long engagement. We just have to wait and see.
Kawamoto, Dawn and Greg Sandoval. "NBC, NewsCorp. push new Web rival to YouTube." ZDNet. 22 Mar 2007.
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