With all that is going on with the current broadcast industry and all of the online video initiatives that broadcasters have under way, I still can’t figure out why for the second year in a row the NAB has nothing in the way of conference sessions talking to the online video market for broadcasters. Where are the sessions talking about the new emerging business models? Where are the sessions talking about the technology and work flow issues these broadcasters are having, let alone the reporting and metrics issues that come with this new online distribution business?

Why isn’t the NAB at the forefront of wanting to educate its broadcasters in a public forum? The RTNDA@NAB conference has some sessions about online but primarily all about the radio and news industries. Nothing about video distribution channels, technology, or business models in the entertainment and broadcast industries.

Viddler, another UGC site that launched at the end of last year is now out looking for its first round of financing between $1-2 million. Viddler classifies themselves as an interactive online video platform that allows people to enhance and share video inside of the browser.

I spoke to Viddler’s president Rob Sandie yesterday who gave me an update on their technology and business model. Of course, the first thing I had to ask was how they plan on making any money and how they are any different that all the other UGC sites out there. Rob explained that they want to be the Flickr of web video allowing users to upload long form content, provide the tools for them to be able to edit the video and then allow the user to be able to buy a DVD of their video. I don’t know if there is a large enough market for that but I don’t recall any other UGC sites trying to do this. Selling DVDs is not the only business model they are focusing on but rather taking the approach of creating revenue from advertising, subscriptions to their video platform and the DVDs.

On the investment subject, I hear from a lot of companies all the time who are actively looking to raise a round of financing, but then always tell me I can’t tell anyone they are looking? Usually they say they don’t want their competitors to know. How do you expect to raise the money if you don’t get word out in the community that you are looking? And so what if your competitors know, that should have no affect on your business.

Kudos to Rob for saying he wants to get the word and out wants everyone to know that they are looking for financing. I’m happy to let any company looking for money to use my blog to get the word out. That’s the whole point of a blog, networking with your peers.

I didn’t post anything on the Joost Viacom announcement last week because quite frankly, I don’t really see it as news. While a deal was announced, Joost has not yet launched out of beta and no Viacom content is yet available to the public. While I am closely watching to see what happens, to me, no deal is real until the content is available, especially when a product is still in beta. In addition, there are plenty of other sites out there that gave their thoughts on the deal.

That being said, I came across an interesting article on itwire.com.au website this weekend. Alex Zaharov-Reutt writes in detail about how If you have restrictive bandwidth caps on your broadband connection, Joost TV is anything but free. It’s an interesting read and one that looks at the Joost content distribution from a different angle.

The article is entitled "Joost Viacom warning: expensive bandwidth means IPTV not free" and you should head over to the iTWire site to read it.

I was going to write an in-depth post about all of the lawsuits taking place surrounding major video sharing sites, but Steve Bryant over at reelpopblog.com already beat me to it with a post entitled "A Brief Guide to Online Video Lawsuits". He gives details on lawsuits and subpoenas against Veoh, Bolt, Grouper, YouTube, Google Video and MySpace. Head on over to his site to read it.

Steve will be moderating a panel at the Streaming Media East show in May about "User-Generated Content Tools".

With all that is going on in the online video news space, I am pleased to announce that Martin Nisenholtz, Sr. VP of Digital Operations for The New York Times Company will be the keynote presenter on the first day of the Streaming Media East show.

Martin’s keynote will be talking to how video factors into the historic transformation taking place at The New York Times, and what online video means for the future of journalism.

All keynote presentations are free to attend. Sign up for a free exhibit pass and your in.

For the past 3 years, StreamingMedia.com has been closely watching and covering Acacia Technologies and their Digital Media Transmission (DMT) patents and what this may mean to content owners and online video vendors. While we are not lawyers or providing legal counsel, we have been leading the charge to educate readers with the information they need to make an informed business decision regarding these patents via a dedicated section on our website at www.streamingmedia.com/patent

If you are a content owner or a vendor in the online video industry and
have never heard of Acacia Technologies, then you need to do some catch
up on your reading.

Very simply, Acacia claims they hold patents on streaming, downloading and just about every form of digital audio and video distribution out there–including pushing MP3s from peer-to-peer groups, streaming newscasts from Internet radio sites and delivering movies through cable networks.

Yesterday, Law.com published a great article by Xenia Kobylarz entitled "Extreme Makeover: From Patent Troll to the Belle of the Ball" which gives a great update on Acacia’s growing momentum. I also wrote an article with the Analysis Group for the latest edition of the Streaming Media magazine which can be found here.

If you don’t know about Acacia, educate yourself, educate your customers and help them educate their customers. This can have a ripple effect in a good way if everyone passes along the information needed to stay informed about what is going on with Acacia.

As predicted, Verizon FiOS signed it’s first content deal with content syndicator Revver. I expect this is the start of many content deals to come from Verizon, specifically for the FiOS service. While Revver’s content will initially be available only through FiOS TV, it will also be available on the Verizon FiOS Internet portal later in the year.

Speaking of the Verizon portal, I commented earlier in the week about some of the things I wanted to see Verizon do with their videos in the portal. Yesterday, I noticed they had overhauled the portal and changed the name of it to Verizon Surround. The portal, still powered by ROO, now offers videos at up to 700Kbps. Better then the 300Kbps the old portal had but I still am waiting to see some content encoded over 1MB.