December 18, 2006
Volume 15, Issue 12
The DCIA Welcomes Oversi
Please warmly welcome First Oversi Ltd. to the Platform Group. We look forward to providing valuable services to this newest DCIA Member and supporting its contributions to commercial development of the distributed computing industry.
Broadband penetration, driven by peer-to-peer (P2P) applications and the growing popularity of Internet video (IPTV), is steadily increasing. But this growth is also introducing new network challenges.
Internet service providers (ISPs) must develop new types of core service platforms that are flexible – to support new premium revenue generating services, and scalable – to meet continuing growth in broadband applications and bandwidth demand.
Oversi has emerged as a leading supplier of service and platform solutions to meet these challenges. Its Scalable Grid Service System (SGSS) offers ISPs; telco, cable, and WiMAX operators; and content delivery networks (CDNs) a plethora of services and unmatched scalability.
The company focuses on the expanding needs and requirements of ISPs. Its aim is to enable service providers to utilize existing networks to best serve customer demand for new services. Oversi believes the key to ISP success lies not in limiting what is provided to customers, but in being tuned to their needs and providing the best services possible.
Oversi enables service providers to leverage new customer demands, present key user differentiators, maximize market presence, and turn these demands into a new flow of revenues. The company also makes it possible for ISPs to reduce operational expenses and increase revenues by providing profitable and improved services on existing infrastructure.
Oversi products offer service providers cost-effective ways of managing bandwidth expenses, delivering high-value added services, and improving user experiences. Its solutions slash operator bandwidth expenses by an order of magnitude, accelerate content delivery, and substantially improve the quality of service delivered to customers.
Oversi’s VP of Strategic and Legal Affairs, Dr. Nimrod Kozlovski, will be a featured speaker at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
VeriSign Taps P2P to Power VOD
DCIA Member VeriSign, a leading provider of intelligent infrastructure for the networked world, announced that UK television broadcaster, Channel 4, has integrated VeriSign’s P2P solution to power its new Internet video-on-demand (VOD) service, 4oD.
VeriSign’s Kontiki Broadband Delivery Service (KBDS) enables the secure delivery of content, reduces the time it takes to download video content, and produces high quality with a superior user experience.
VeriSign’s intelligent infrastructure allows content owners such as Channel 4 to offer viewers secure, reliable and on-demand access to their library of video and music content. As the global popularity of online video increases, content owners and providers are constantly searching for the most cost efficient, reliable and secure way to make their content available to a growing number of viewers hungry for on-demand content.
With a legacy inInternet security, VeriSign enables Channel 4 to legitimately distribute their copyrighted content with full digital rights management, at a lower cost and higher quality.
"We are delighted that Channel 4 has selected VeriSign’s KBDS to satisfy its network’s growing need to supply their audience with a cost effective way to access on-demand video content," said Scott Sahadi, Vice President for VeriSign Broadband Delivery Services. "We look forward to further enhancements to our broadband delivery services, making the capability even more accessible to content owners and providers everywhere."
VeriSign’s Kontiki secure P2P broadband technology enables content owners and providers to keep pace with the growth in Internet video consumption and allows them to deliver a high quality consumer experience through a cost effective, secure and proven managed service.
VeriSign’s Todd Johnson, CEO of Kontiki before its acquisition by VeriSign, will be a keynote speaker at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
Report from CEO Marty Lafferty
 There have been slogans and taglines associated with commercial development of P2P ranging from "P2P means Power to the People" (Chuck D – 2003 US Senate Hearing) to "P2P means Path to Profitability" (INTENT MediaWorks – 2006 marketing campaign).
Now, for the first time, we would like to introduce an entirely new coinage: "P2PTV."
P2PTV refers to video distribution on the Internet using P2P technologies. Many DCIA Members now offer solutions to help content rights holders, ISPs,software developers, and other participants in this emerging distribution channel accomplish this at astonishingly low costs and with astoundingly high quality of service (QoS).
To learn more about P2PTV, join us for the Next Generation P2P panel at CES in Las Vegas on January 10th or, better yet,at the P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY day-long conferenceat the Princeton Club in New York on February 6th, in conjunction with Media Summit New York (MSNY).
To catch the P2PTV wave in time for this holiday season, though, we encourage you to connect the dots between two articles published this week – Entertainment: Downloading the Video Windfall, the cover story from Business Week; and P2P: From Internet Scourge to Savior, a featured report in the prestigious MIT Technology Review. Here are SparkNotes versions.
Business Week begins by asserting that, "Broadband is making Internet video more compatible with other media. Few businesses seem poised to create instant wealth quicker than Internet video. Just ask YouTube founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, who sold their two-year-old company to Google for $1.65 billion."
"ABC alone has streamed more than 12 million episodes of shows like ‘Desperate Housewives’ and ‘Lost.’ By late 2007, more than half of all US homes will have broadband connections, according to research consultancy Diffusion Group," which counts DCIA Member RazorPop CEO Marc Freedman among its consultants. "Each day more people use those wires to hunt for videos."
"The race to get into consumers’ homes, iPods, and cell phones is cutthroat. Phone companies are taking on cable companies with Internet-based TV shows, and Google, MySpace, and others have launched video services.
One promising player is Juniper Networks, which is making inroads with telcos gearing up to launch Internet protocol TV (IPTV) – TV shows delivered over the Net. Re-arming cable players like Comcast, which offers online channels for user content and VOD programs, will likely be Netgear. NDS is working on software for a ‘hybrid’ set-top box to stream TV shows from the Net to satellite users.
News Corp. President Peter Chernin says MySpace will generate more than $500 million in online revenues and is ‘within $1 million or so of profitability now.’ By the end of `07 ‘they’ll be getting much more revenue from MySpace,’ says Merrill Lynch analyst Jessica Reif Cohen."
Wade Roush opens his MIT Technology Review report provocatively noting that, "New P2P video-downloading options should please Internet users – and stave off a network meltdown."
"The dam-breaking success of YouTube and Apple’s iTunes Video Store – neither of which existed prior to 2005 – has unleashed a huge new flow of digital video on the Internet, and many consumers now spend hours a day streaming or downloading everything from home movies to live sports and prime-time TV series.
Because video files are so large compared with the web pages and e-mail messages that used to dominate Internet traffic, backbone lines are under strain, and backbone operators such as AT&T and Verizon and ISPs such as Comcast are facing new costs they can’t easily recoup.
The Internet may be saved by the builders of P2P file-sharing networks. Researchers and entrepreneurs are arguing that P2P technology – which allows network members to retrieve content by tapping into the hard drives of other members who have already downloaded that content – is great for distributing legitimately purchased, copyright-protected music and video.
By putting new twists on the P2P concept, businesses hope to bring digital distribution of movies, TV shows, and other premium content to a market beyond iPod owners and YouTube addicts. In August 2005, for example, Wurld Media rolled out a P2P platform called Peer Impact. Once users have downloaded the free Peer Impact media player, they can buy and download movies and TV shows to a shared folder on their PC.
BitTorrent, an advanced P2P network, speeds up downloads by grabbing and reassembling file fragments from the most accessible peers on the network, rather than by transferring whole files. It is one of the best tools for locating and procuring Internet video in part because it’s free and in part because so many people use it and have built a worldwide archive of digital files.
Many other companies are jumping into the P2P video mix, including Peercast, Octoshape, Allcast, and Itiva. Dijjer, a project of Revver, reduces the load on individual users’ computers by grabbing much of the content of a requested file from other users’ computers. Tribler is a BitTorrent-like program that adds useful features such as Amazon-like recommendations and real-time maps showing who is downloading the same content. And in the United Kingdom, the BBC is developing a P2P media player called iPlayer.
The Internet is already teeming with P2P traffic. In fact, P2P downloads may account for as much as 70 percent of network traffic – and as much as 60 percent of that traffic is already video, according to DCIA Member CacheLogic, which has developed a proprietary system for accelerating P2P downloads. The system enhances P2P distribution by giving P2P networks access to dedicated, high-capacity ‘edge servers’ scattered around the Internet, in much the same way as the traditional CDNs pioneered by companies like Akamai.
So how could additional P2P traffic actually be a good thing for the Internet? Carnegie Mellon’s Hui Zhang points out that because P2P networks exploit both the downlink and uplink capacities of users’ Internet connections, they distribute content more efficiently than centralized ‘unicast’ technologies."
Stay tuned. P2PTV is already on its way to a networked device near you! Share wisely, and take care.
Online Video Market Comes into Focus
Excerpted from eMarketer Report
Who’s watching Internet video? "Increasingly," says David Hallerman, eMarketer senior analyst and the author of the new Internet Video Audience report, "the short answer is everyone."
According to eMarketer estimates, over one-third of the total US population ages 3 and older will have viewed video on the Internet at least monthly during 2006. And in only three years, more than half of all Americans will be part of the online video audience.
"At this point, nearly 60% of all Internet users watch video regularly, and that share will increase to over 80% by the end of 2010," says Mr. Hallerman.
"There will be 157 million US Internet video users in 2010," he says, "up from 107.7 million this year."
Of course, without high-speed Internet access, online video would be pitiful and painful. With it, however, video is so compelling that 86.6% of broadband users in 2006 can be counted among the Internet video audience in the US.
What does the audience that is watching online videos look like?
"It is made up of more males than females, 65% to 35%, respectively," says Mr. Hallerman. "At least that’s true among heavy viewers — those who watch at least one video each week."
But according to an Online Publishers Association (OPA) survey conducted early this year, 59% of the non-viewers who planned to start watching online videos are females, so the audience will likely move toward a gender balance.
In fact, looking at Internet users who visited video and movie Web sites in June 2006, Nielsen/NetRatings found a near-equal gender balance — and nearly 25% of those visitors had household incomes of $100,000 or more. Data from comScore Networks indicate a slight gender imbalance: 52% male vs. 48% female US online video users.
The picture is still developing, but for the sharpest overall view available, read eMarketer’s new Internet Video Audience report today.
Venice Project Hailed as Next Viral Sensation
Excerpted from Online Media Daily Report by Mark Walsh
As the much anticipated Venice Project prepares to launch, at least one major research outfit predicts that the online venture will do nothing less than create a new model for online video.
In a report released Wednesday listing predictions for 2007, market research firm In-Stat forecasts that "The Venice Project’s P2P video project will be the big viral media sensation of 2007." The project, formed by the founders of DCIA Members Kazaa and Skype , will result in "a new model for cost-effective distribution of video and a new platform and business model for content producers – both big and small – to monetize their creations," stated the report.
The In-Stat white paper adds that the two founders "have an amazing track record with building disruptive P2P platforms (Kazaa, Skype). They also understand that they have to integrate a business model that is acceptable to content creators into the platform and they have developed a targeted advertising model that may enable them to provide this."
In-Stat’s bullish outlook comes as the Venice Project this week starts to open up beta-testing of the service to a much larger group of users. The ambitious effort aims to combine TV-quality video with the interactive and community features of the Internet. The system is also designed to keep down the cost of video distribution by relying on peer-to-peer technology rather than a large group of servers.
MIT Researchers Unveil FriendSpotting
Excerpted from Digital Media Wire Report
Researchers at MIT on Thursday unveiled a new social networking system that makes it possible for anyone on the 168-acre campus to locate anyone else (who chooses to be found) through their laptop, using Wi-Fi access points.
Carlo Ratti, Director of MIT’s SENSEable City Lab, which developed the system, calls the new application FriendSpotting.
"The system is device-centric, not network-centric," said Ratti. "All the intelligence is inside the client application instead of on a central server, so nobody can track your position unless you want them to, and you decide how to exchange information with the outside world."
Peter Sealey Joins INTENT Board
DCIA Member INTENT MediaWorks, a leading provider of technology for the distribution of licensed digital media content and advertising via the Internet and P2P networks, announced that Peter Sealey, Ph.D. has joined the company’s Board of Advisors. Renowned for developing and leading some of the most successful corporate marketing campaigns in recent years, Sealey is also one of the industry’s foremost visionaries on the subject of emerging trends in advertising and consumer behavior, especially in relation to the impact of new technologies.
"Media is now digital, personal, and controllable. Consumers are obtaining and configuring music and video on their terms, and nothing will stop that," said Sealey. "This shift in media consumption creates challenges for marketers and advertisers. INTENT’s platform meets these challenges head-on and positions organizations to capitalize on new opportunities. INTENT will enable companies to significantly strengthen brand recognition and loyalty."
"As one of the leading authorities on corporate marketing and trends in digital media, Peter Sealey brings an enormous amount of expertise to INTENT," said Les Ottolenghi, CEO of INTENT MediaWorks. "INTENT makes it possible for companies to reach the growing audience that is moving from traditional to digital media. And, with INTENT’s unprecedented reporting and measurement capabilities, advertisers will be better able to execute campaigns that build and enhance their relationship with customers."
INTENT was the recipient of the 2006 DCIA Innovator's Award and was named Best New Digital Technology at the 2006 Digital Music Conference. CEO and Co-Founder Les Ottolenghi will be a keynote speaker at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
SPE Names Mitch Singer CTO
Excerpted from Variety Report by Gabriel Snyder
Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) has named Mitch Singer to the newly created post of Chief Technology Officer.
Singer has been head of SPE’s digital policy group since 2001 and will continue to seek digital business opportunities and formats for the studio’s products in his new position.
"Sony Pictures wants to make entertainment available wherever, whenever, and however audiences desire it," said SPE Chair Michael Lynton, "and that requires strategic investments, risk-taking, and vision."
Singer joined the company in 1990, serving in various capacities in its legal departments. In 1997 he was upped to senior veep and transferred to the intellectual property department, which in addition to dealing with copyright and trademark matters also was responsible for licensing content for new technologies.
DCINFO Editor’s Note: Mitch Singer was a Conference Luncheon Speaker at the recent P2P MEDIA SUMMIT LA.
ByteRocket Debuts MyOtherDrive
MyOtherDrive.com, the first commercial service of ByteRocket, is a free 5GB hard drive with an Explorer-style interface that provides storage anywhere Internet access is available and the ability to allow access selectively to others.
In addition to offering the same benefits as other photo-sharing sites, MyOtherDrive competes with broader file-sharing applications and social-networking sites. However, MyOtherDrive users can specify who can see the content on their site – a significant advantage.
Although MyOtherDrive handles photo-sharing especially well (pictures can be uploaded in batches and rotated after uploading), any file type can be stored on the site: office documents, PDFs, videos, music, and photos.
MyOtherDrive permits adding groups, such as family, friends, and coworkers. Users can control how to share their content: making everything public or creating multiple groups and being selective about which group sees what content. The site runs as a Java applet similar to the Microsoft Windows Explorer or ACDSee, permitting the user to create a folder "hierarchy" on the left side of the screen with a list of files on the right. Images conveniently display as thumbnails. Future enhancements to MyOtherDrive include more "social networking" features, such as blogging, photo/video tagging, and friends search.
Nareos Signs Mobile Data Group
PeerBox Mobile, a service offering of Nareos, is the world’s first P2P service for the mobile phone with a fast-growing user base serving mobile consumers in over 160 countries worldwide. PeerBox users download music, videos, and pictures directly to their mobile phones enjoying instant access to an immense collection of free content combined with paid premium content.
The licensing deal with Mobile Data Group positions PeerBox Mobile as a one-stop shop for all kinds of mobile content.
PeerBox Mobile users will be able to search and download Mobile Data Group’s licensed mobile games, ring-tones, video content, and more, either through open P2P file-sharing networks or from Nareos’ online store.Copyrighted material will be available as paid mobile downloads.
"The agreement with Mobile Data Group marks a leap forward in our consumer offering of non-music related mobile content. We’re always looking for innovative, colorful, and fun content for our PeerBox customers – and Mobile Data Group provides a perfect match," said Nareos CEO Alexander Lazovsky.
SafeNet Launches DRM Fusion Toolkit4TV
DCIA Member SafeNet, setting the standard for information security, announced the launch of DRM Fusion Toolkit4TV, the first product available for mobile TV licensing and protection that supports all major, open broadcast digital rights management (DRM) standards.
DRM Fusion Toolkit4TV protects broadcast mobile content and services from unauthorized use and distribution. By using a standardized solution for mobile TV protection, operators do not have to be irrevocably tied to a particular vendor. Additionally, operators can offer service to users with standard, off-the-shelf handsets since no proprietary client software is required. Standards supported include DVB-18Crypt and the first implementation of the OMA BCAST smartcard profile standard.
Broadcast mobile TV is among the industry’s fastest growing new mobile services and when secured, can provide operators with a significant increase in Average Revenue Per User (ARPU). As forecasted recently by the market analyst firm In-Stat, the number of mobile TV broadcast subscribers worldwide is predicted to grow from 3.4 million in 2006 to 102 million in 2010. In addition, business research and consulting firm Frost & Sullivan predicts that in the U.S. alone, the number of subscribers for broadcast, mobile video will reach approximately 6 million by 2010.
SafeNet VP of MediaSentry Services, John Desmond, will be a featured speaker at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
Seamless P2P to Premier Phenom 3.0
DCIA Member Seamless P2P will roll-out Phenom Version 3.0 at CES in January, where the DCIA will be conducting the Next Generation P2P panel.
Seamless P2P has completed beta testing Phenom Version 3.0 Virtual Internet Extranet software and will officially launch at CES.
The company will be exhibiting Phenom in a live communications environment designed to show the strength and robustness of Phenom’s high-encryption SOX- and HIPAA-compliant secure peer mail, chat, file transfer, remote PC access, secure VoIP, video conferencing, and white-boarding functions.
PlayFirst Releases Pirate Poppers
Excerpted from MacNN Report
DCIA Member PlayFirst has released "Pirate Poppers," a strategy game challenging players to aim cannonballs to clear away menacing chains and unlock trinkets as well as jewels that rain down from above.
Pirate Poppers features adventure, puzzle, and arcade game modes – each with 77 levels – along with special Chameleon, Explosive, and Super cannonballs.
Six different power-ups include Prisoner’s Pace, Stern Wind, Drop Anchor, Chain Breaker, Color Bomb, and Spyglass to aid players. Collectible treasures include goblets, coins, amulets, and more. Pirate Poppers is available for $20 and requires Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later.
Ramones Reinvented for Kids
Excerpted from Soul Shine Report
Not one, but two separate albums can appeal to a new and much younger generation of Ramones fans.
According to DCIA Member Go-Kart Records, on "Brats On The Beat: Ramones For Kids," the Gabba Gabba Hey Singers have "kidified" 12 classics. All the songs feature kids singing background as well as various punk vocalists on lead. A portion of the proceeds will go to St. Jude Children’s Hospital.
And if parents are looking to soothe their babies and the traditional lullabies just aren’t cutting it, there is another Ramones option out there.
"Rockabye Baby! Lullaby Renditions of The Ramones" is a more soothing option of Ramones hits. Put out by Baby Rock Records, the label notes, "The Ramones sang about brats, babysitters, and believing in miracles. Is there any doubt the band didn’t want to grow up?"
New Copyright Clearing Service
Excerpted from KillerApp.com Report
A new content rights clearing service, MediaHedge, will make it easier for the entertainment industry to protect its copyrights on digital content. Today, most Internet video sites remove copyrighted materials manually based on content owners’ explicit requests. MediaHedge, an automated rights clearance system provided by Philips Electronics, can replace that manual process.
MediaHedge identifies copyrighted material during upload by matching the content’s "video fingerprint" to files provided by content owners. Content owners maintain ownership and control over the fingerprint database and can set rules for the use of their content. Based on the content provider’s instructions, the host can then allow, restrict or prohibit the use of the content on a video-sharing site or P2P network.
Philips’ fingerprinting technology can identify video material that is currently in circulation, unlike watermarking, which requires information to be embedded into the video content prior to release. The fingerprint matching system can identify video even when it is severely degraded, and can recognize very short video clips from anywhere in the original video material, even if the audio has been changed.
iTunes Sales Still Weak
Excerpted from Business 2.0 Blog
Is iTunes in trouble or not? Earlier this week, Forrester Research estimated that song sales for Apple’s Music Store had fallen 65% in the first half of the year. Apple later denied those reports, citing strong global sales growth, though it didn’t offer comparison data.
Later, the Forrester analyst who wrote the report reneged, saying the sample size was too small. Yesterday, both comScore Media Metrix and Nielsen NetRatings released data. The former saying sales were up 84% and the later claiming an 85% rise in visitors last month, versus a year ago.
However, comScore also said that the average amount per iPod sold was up just 10% – that means 22 songs per iPod instead of 20, or about two albums. Clearly, iTunes sales aren’t crushing the music market.
Apple may be touting its 6% share of the music market, but that’s not all that great, especially since iPod has revolutionized the way people consume music.
As Bill Gates said yesterday, people should just buy CDs and then rip ‘em – and they are, though a much greater number still download music from file-sharing programs. Nobody likes DRM, and that’s reflected in iTunes’ relatively tepid sales. Please click here for more.
DCINFO Editor’s Note: Please check back next week for a related proposal from DCIA Member Clickshare.
Media Companies Must Innovate in 2007
Excerpted from The Hollywood Reporter
There’s a prevailing but misguided notion out there among big media firms that the status quo is best. This is dangerous thinking in the digital age, where innovation is the key to survival. The adoption of this conservative strategy has led to the departure of several high-ranking media executives, most notably Yahoo COO Dan Rosenweig, and Ross Levinsohn, President of Fox Interactive Media. "In the Internet, more than any other media business, it’s all about risk-taking," Levinsohn said. "And when you kill that spirit, you lose your strategic focus, and that can lead to product degradation and the inability to attract the best minds." FIM is expected to generate its first profit of $100 million in fiscal year 2007 on revenue of $600 million, $250 million of which will come from News Corp.’s new search relationship with Google.
Yahoo is the best example that big-media bigwigs don’t necessarily know how to run online companies. Several traditional media hires have proven to be busts for the Web giant. Yahoo is now forced to play catch-up as it revises its focus, which is expected to shift more heavily to the bottom line, which could stifle innovation.
Coming Events of Interest
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2007 International CES – January 8th–11th in Las Vegas, NV. With four decades of history, the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) reaches across global markets, connects the industry and enables CE innovations to grow and thrive. The DCIA will moderate the "Next Generation P2P" panel on Wednesday January 10th, featuring DCIA Member executive Les Ottolenghi, Co-Founder & CEO, INTENT MediaWorks.
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P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY – February 6th–8th in New York, NY. The Winter DCIA Conference & Exposition will cover policy, marketing, and technology issues affecting commercial development of this emerging high-growth industry. Exhibits and demonstrations will feature industry-leading products and services. For sponsor packages and speaker information, please contact Karen Kaplowitz at 888-890-4240 or karen@dcia.info. Plan now to attend.
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Media Summit New York (MSNY) – February 7th–8th in New York, NY. Digital Hollywood’s premier international conference on motion pictures, television, cable & satellite, broadband, wireless, publishing, radio, magazines, news & print media, advertising and marketing. Your registration for the full P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY Conference & Exposition includes this event as well.
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