We're only three weeks away from the Content Delivery Summit, taking place May 9th in conjunction with the Streaming Media East show, and I'm pleased to announce that Barry Tishgart, VP of Comcast Cable will be the second keynote speaker at the event. As everyone knows, Comcast plays a major role in video distribution and Barry's presentation will take a look at the market from varying perspectives – as an ISP, content provider and CDN operator.

The economics of moving video over the Internet are complex and Barry will discuss the pertinent issues as the volume of video traffic increases and its impact on Comcast's core and access network. Barry will also discuss how innovations in online video have positive or negative effects on the overall economics of video.

In addition to keynotes by Comcast and Cisco, we have a great lineup of speakers already confirmed for the CDN Summit including executives from:

Additional speakers are being placed and you can check out the full conference agenda here. We'll have round table sessions, demo presentations on transparent caching and application acceleration, and presentations from end-user customers and content owners. I'll also be personally doing one-on-one networking between attendees and speakers and there are multiple networking receptions and dinners taking place after the summit.

Readers of my blog can take advantage of special pricing by registering using the promo code of DAN to attend the CDN Summit for only $395. Taking a look at the pre-register attendee list we have carriers, telcos, ISPs, MSOs, content owners and vendors coming from all over the world. This is the event to be at if you are in the content delivery business.

Sorry for all the calls and emails I have yet to return over the past five days, but I've been dealing with a sick family member and am away from home. A lot of news has taken place in the last few days and I have a quite a few voice mails and emails asking me about the impact of Level 3 buying Global Crossing, KIT Digital acquiring ioko and all of the other news that's come out of NAB. I promise I will return all calls and emails by this weekend and have some blogs posts up next week with my thoughts.

On Tuesday, April 12 at 9:30 p.m. ET/6:30 p.m. PT, Streaming Media editor Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen will be moderating a session at NAB sponsored by NewTek called "Broadcast Minds 2011." Panelists will include Adam Carolla, whose "Adam Carolla Show" is one of the most downloaded podcasts of all-time; Leo Laporte, the "Tech Guy" who started TWiT.TV, whose podcasts were downloaded 50 million times in 2010; Steve Hellmuth from the NBA; and Mark Fratto from St. John's University.

The event will be streamed live on the home page of StreamingMedia.com (read "Adam Carolla, Leo Laporte Among the 'Broadcast Minds' at NAB" for more information) Each of the speakers is using NewTek's TriCaster to deliver live video directly to their audiences more cost-effectively than they could via traditional broadcast technologies. It should be an informative and entertaining hour.

Here's a video from NewTek previewing the event:

Today at 2pm I'll be moderating another StreamingMedia.com webinar, this time with RealNetworks on the topic of "Creating a YouTube-like Experience Within Your Organization". If you have used popular video sites on the web, such as YouTube, creating your organization's media library will be a simple and familiar experience. Viewers can access and play videos from their desktop, iPad, iPhone, tablets and mobile devices. Learn how to:

• Upload and convert existing media files like MPEG, AVI, MP3, Windows Media or QuickTime files
• Embed video and audio content created by your media library in your existing training or learning environment
• Stream video and audio to desktops, mobile devices and tablets
• Secure your organization's media assets utilizing existing authentication structures
• Customize your organization's media library

Register here and bring your questions for the presenters for the live Q&A portion of the event.

Today at 2pm I'll be moderating another StreamingMedia.com webinar, this time with Microsoft presenting the workflow for delivery of live video with Expression Encoder and IIS Media Services, using Microsoft's adaptive streaming technology, Smooth Streaming. Microsoft will walk you through the steps to understand the capabilities of your machine, select and configure hardware and software, and customize your video so that you deliver a compelling experience to your target audience.

We'll have a live Q&A session so register for the webinar and bring your questions about your live workflow setup.

Kontiki confirmed for me this morning that the rumors I have been hearing about a change at the top are true. Eric Armstong, who had been at Kontiki for eight years and was most recently their President and CEO has left the company. Kontiki’s board of directors has been interviewing potential replacements for the past few weeks and hopes to announce a new CEO shortly. Kontiki said Eric’s departure has no impact on the company’s recent B round of funding in the ammount of $10.7M.

Updated 1:13pm: Eric is now the VP of Sales in North America for Harmonic.

Updated 4/1: I’ve also learned that Kontiki’s VP of Worldwide Sales, Jacco van der Kooij, has left the company and taken a new job with Qumu.

We are very excited to announce that Eric Kessler, Co-President of HBO will kick off the Streaming Media East conference and exhibition on Tuesday, May 10th as our keynote speaker. Eric's focus of late has been on the launch of HBO GO, HBO’s new authenticated streaming service and during his keynote presentation, Eric will demo the latest version of HBO GO and sit down with me for a Q&A discussion after his presentation.

You can get access to Eric's keynote with a free exhibits pass, so go online and register today. You can also get $200 off the conference ticket price using the promo code DAN and if you register for a gold pass before April 8th, we'll even throw in a free Roku HD.