Month: April 2012

Unlike news on teleivison which fully occupies its own screen, video for the Web must share real estate with text which is generally adequate to report the news. To win mindshare on the Web, video has to be visual and unique, says Charlie Tillinghast, President and Publisher of MSNBC.com in this interview with Beet.TV

SAN FRANCISCO – Web video production and the financing of it has shifted dramatically in the last five years. Now, the industry has entered a second wave of content creation that brings Web publishers closer to the funding process, says Erick Hachenburg, CEO of Metacafe.

Online video ads may have a halo effect on the display business. That's because sites like MSNBC.com only serve video ads when they're in the "viewable" section of a page, explains Charlie Tillinghast, President and Publisher of MSNBC.com in this interview with Beet.TV.

The Metropolitan Opera, which has been streaming performances on demand on the Web since 2008, recently released an iPad App featuring the institution's nearly 400 full-length operas and hundreds of audio recordings.

LONDON (via SkypeVideo) Bambuser, the fast growing Swedish start-up that allows users to stream live video over mobile devices, has entered into an agreement with the Associated Press.  The pact provides the Bambuser platform to AP staffers and provides "citizen" journalists to provide unique live video to the wire service.

Online video attribution models are becoming more sophisticated and qualitative, says Eli Goodman, comScore Media Evangelist, in this session from the Beet.TV Executive Retreat in Vieques, Puerto Rico.

Online video is flourishing and more advertisers are embracing the nacent media.  However, in this video session from the Beet.TV Executive Retreat, Adam Singolda, CEO of Taboola, points out that “there’s a supply and demand issue” when it comes to online video.

Paul Slavin, the veteran news producer and executive at ABC News who left the network last year, joined the big health destination site Everyday Health where he is creating an ambitious slate of video for the Web and television.

Hiro Media, the Tel Aviv-based online video advertising company has raised $5 million in funding the company announced today.  

Wibbitz, an early stage startup from Tel Aviv, is making waves in the online video industry with a text-to-video software that analyzes and understands written content and automatically turns it into video inventory for publishers. 

Digital video traffic is steadily shifting from PC-only to include mobile and other devices, says Sorosh Tavakoli, CEO of ad management platform Videoplaza, in this session from the Beet.TV Executive Retreat in Vieques, Puerto Rico.

Look for a host of dedicated second-screen experiences to come down the pike from TV programmers in the next two years, said Vivian Schiller, Chief Digital Officer for NBC News, in this session from the Beet.TV Executive Retreat.

YouTube is selling channel sponsorships to brands for $4-6 million, according to a report in Adweek.

Online video superstar Felicia Day launched a new YouTube channel today called “Geek and Sundry” billed as the “very best of indie geek culture” that rolls out with several new original series. Beet.TV first caught up with Day in January at CES where she gave us the early details on the new project.

Online video buying opportunities for brands are becoming more TV-like, but yet the payment models are shifting to more targeted methods, said Paul Kontonis, VP/Group Director at Digitas in this session from the Beet.TV Executive Retreat.

An early stage Tel Aviv-based start-up called Wibbitz, says that it can take the RSS feed of a text publisher and create a distinct video segment incorporating voice, images, photos and video.