web-to-tv.com

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A MediaPostPublications.com article sent to you by: editorial@mediapost.com

Does Netflix’s Success Spell Hope for Hulu?
Steve Smith

Well, at least I know that I am not alone. Netflix reported this week that it had a net increase of 1.7 million subscribers this year in the first quarter of the year. I was one of the 1.7 million. Netflix got me from all angles this quarter. The streaming Watch Instantly service was on my Xbox 360 and then on the PS3. But it was the iPad that sold it to me. As I wrote here last week, seamlessly synching my movie experience across screens so that I could take my movie to bed with me, is revelatory. I admit it. I am in the tank for them now. And I am not alone.

Read the whole story on the MediaPostPublications.com website.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=acFyZd94Rchw

http://kylo.tv/features/

Watch the web with PC-2-TV software.

Almost every day a new device hits the market, enabling more Internet content to be viewed on a TV. BluRay players (LG-BD370/390, Sony BDP-N460) that also stream Netflix, YouTube, Amazon Videos. Netflix-only solution Roku now supports MLB.TV. Media PC/Set-top box/DVD players continue to evolve and overlap. The Myka ION HD player supports Hulu and Boxee with BluRay as an add-on option. And the ultimate convergence Internet@TV from Samsung.

What all of these solutions still lack is a solution to Surf and Search.
When you are looking for a video – either something specific or something in a category, or just serendipitously browsing, you need a keyboard and a private screen. Private because no one wants to watch your surfing – and you may find something you want a glimpse of that you don’t really want to share with the room.
I would bet that many folks with Internet-connected TVs still use laptops or “app phones” to find content privately, then share it on the big screen with family and friends. The New York Times reported that streaming Netflix users complain about having to use their laptops to manage the queue they watch on TV.

There are solutions that move in this direction. Gmote for Android for. MythTV for Linux. These solutions use VNC to direct the screen output of an Internet-enabled component to the display of a laptop/app-phone. This is the technology behind remote display control for IT Tech support and web conferencing such as GoToMYPC. But VNC isn’t optimized for controlling for an Internet-enabled video component, especially in a home WiFi environment where bandwidth is critical. Perhaps Clicker Media will have the solution we seek.

Internet TV,Web-to-TV,Google Search,

How do companies make a connection with people who need their products in the web-to-tv age?

TV commercials are broadcast to everyone. Right now, there is a hamburger commercial playing on my TV, but I haven’t eaten a hamburger in thirty years. The broadcaster doesn’t know that – and they’re wasting they’re money to pay for my eyeballs, whether I DVR-skip it or mentally skip it.

The TV viewing experience can be compelling if the product matches your needs. At some level TV is absorbed subconsciously better than repetitive dancing stick figures on a Flash banner ad.

Internet video does offer behavioral targeting with cookies or user-defined preferences that feed advertising delivery options.

How about TV embedded advertising that is tailored to the viewer. Cable can deliver neighborhood localized advertising, but having neighbors that love hamburgers won’t change my dietary bias. Web-to-TV has the potential to match the highest impact ads with the right potential customer.

ZenithOptimedia’s June 2008 Forecast for the world adspend shows television advertising dominant but flat, maintaining a 37% share of the ~$600B market in 2010. Internet advertising grows from 10% to 13%, mostly at the expense of slight declines in Newspapers, Magazines and Radio.

Today, Internet advertising is dominating by “search”, which is dominating by Google. The battle for online video advertising is just beginning. The WSJ reported on July 9, 2008 that Google’s YouTube only generates revenue from 4% of the content with a total revenue of $200M. Plans to re-architect the business are underway.

Video advertising will take several formats: pre/mid/post roll runs of varying lengths, embedded product placement, sidebar display ads, etc.

What happens when the distinction between online and TV blurs. When, for example, I’m watching “web content” on my big screen TV using a Web-to-TV device connected to my ISP. I’m watching branded messages in a lean-back setting with my friends and family. Do I care whether the content comes in as MPEG2 from the Satellite receiver or as Flash/Silverlight/H.264 through my cable modem? I don’t think so.

The question branded advertisers should be asking is not “how to move my ad content from TV to online” but “how but to exploit online technology to blur the distinction between Online and TV.

Here’s a good article.

Your PC as Seen as Your Big Screen TV

In 15 years, broadcast television will only be useful for high-profile live events like the Super Bowl, awards shows and programs like “American Idol, Ben Silverman, co-chairman of NBC Entertainment, said during a keynote interview at the TelevisionWeek Upfront Summit in New York.

I think he’s too pessimistic. Web-to-TV will happen in 10 years, and American Idol certainly won’t last that long (one can only pray). The web will subsume regular TV broadcasting for 95% of what people watch. Of course the “pipes” must get bigger – and they will; the consumer electronic industry must integrate internet access and embedded browser-player functionality into television sets – and they will; and users will need new techniques for finding content in an infinite span of long-tail channels – and they will.

WebTV, founded in 1995 and later acquired by Microsoft, was the first attempt at bringing web media to the television. As described in PC World “getting the Web to display on a typical TV in 1995 was like watching an elephant tap-dance–you were amazed not that it could do it well but that it could do it at all. With the WebTV, Web pages looked horsey, some media formats didn’t work at all, and using the remote control to hop from link to link was excruciating.”

Today’s Web-To-TV solutions are more robust though limitations in control persist. Do people want to stream the PC to their TV – or do you just want to turn on the TV and easily search, select and share web media with your family and friends? How do you type in a URL with a one button remote? Which hardware solution / media restriction do you want to live with? Is YouTube really worth watching on your 54″ 1080p display?

A byline in the Financial Times today offered an interesting definition – Web 2.0 is a world dominated by user-generated content, while Web 3.0 will be a world where professional content dominates. The Web-To-TV evolution is poised to make the same transition – from today’s YouTube cats-on-a-treadmill to professional actors, lights, camera and action – all on your big screen TV in full HD. Now where did I put I put the remote?