LAS VEGAS -- Most parts of the industry seem to think it will be a while before 4K, super-high-definition content is being streamed en masse. But network company Akamai says it can see consumer bandwidth increase positively toward that time. "We've started seeing growth not only in traffic on the network but growth in individual bitrates," Akamai product management and operations VP Michael Fay tells [...]

David Pogue, a Yahoo tech columnist and prolific video blogger, who is also  a host of PBS's "Nova" series, says that Yahoo will join WGBH Boston, as co-producers of a series on wearable health tech titled "Your Tech." The six month collaboration was announced at the Yahoo NewFront.  At the event, we spoke with Pogue about the new series and his expanding video [...]

While consumption in mobile video has been explosive, advertising has lagged due in large part to a lack of adequate user analytics.   That will change with the integration of Nielsen's Digital Ad Ratings (DAR), says Bruce Falck, COO of programmatic video company BrightRoll.  The integration with DAR was announced yesterday at the BrightRoll Video Summit in Manhattan. In our interview with [...]

At its NewFront presentation on Thursday, Time Inc. announced a slate of eleven new programs.   It also announced a syndication agreement with Amazon Video Shorts, along with alliances with radio, TV and local newspapers groups Cumulus, Gannett and Nextstar Broadcasting. After the presentation, we interviewed J.R. McCabe, SVP for Video at Time Inc. about the new slate of shows, the new syndication partners and [...]

While advertisers and their agencies are looking for quality programming, they want to buy audiences in a flexible scenario, powered programmatically, explains Lisa Utzschneider, SVP, Sales, Americas, Yahoo, in this interview with Beet.TV She explains how the acquisition of video programmatic platform Brightroll, provides Yahoo vast reach into 188 million video viewers. Utzschneider also talks about the impact of brand integration around programming [...]

With the introduction last year of a live daily concert series produced with Live Nation, live programming has become a major traffic driver to Yahoo and a growing opportunity for advertisers.   "Live has become a big priority for Yahoo," says Lisa Licht, SVP, Marketing Partnerships, in this interview with Beet.TV At Monday's NewFront at Lincoln Center, Yahoo announced expanded live [...]

The business model for media agencies needs to change, says David Hohman, Nielsen's agency solutions EVP in an interview with Beet.TV. Many agencies still operate according to an old-school billable hours model, but as tech companies and platform vendors bring new services to the marketing and advertising world, media agencies are going to need to evolve faster, he says. "Agencies are becoming more dependent [...]

LAS VEGAS -- Video services are becoming increasingly personalized as they veer closer to customized models, says Ted Middleton, Chief Product Officer at Verizon Digital Media Services, in an interview with Beet.TV. That trend is similar to what drove the shifts in the music industry in the last several years. Consumers don't want to subscribe to channels they pay for but don't watch, he [...]

While the breadth and quality of digital video continues to grow, as demonstrated during the Digital Content NewFronts, a big challenge remains discovery and consumption.  While that has historically been a problem, discovery is developing in good measure due to personalization of social feeds, says Adam Shlachter, Chief Investment Officer, DigitasLBi, in this interview with Beet.TV We spoke with him Monday [...]

From full-length, TV-style video produced by Yahoo to six-second Vines, the opportunities around digital video is diverse and promising. The medium has come of age and marketers need to embrace it, says Scott Donaton, Chief Content Officer of DigitasLBi, in this interview with Beet.TV We spoke with him at the Yahoo NewFront event on Monday evening at Lincoln Center. For more Beet videos of [...]

While quality content remains core to premium, digital video, it is the ability to harness data to target specific audiences which is as important. Technology needs to be a central part of the Digital Content NewFronts offering, says Robin Steinberg, EVP at MediaVest in this interview with Beet.TV We spoke with her at the Yahoo NewFront event at Lincoln Center on Monday night. Yahoo's programmatic [...]

We spoke with Michael Kassan, CEO of the powerhouse media consultancy MediaLink, at the Monday morning kick-off event for the Digital Content NewFronts, hosted by MediaLink and sponsored by Videology. Kassan says while the NewFronts has "come of age" and has taken its place in importance with the TV upfronts, the two-week duration with nearly three-dozen events, presents a "challenge" to [...]

One of the biggest challenges in selling video in a package across both TV and digital screens has been the use of different metrics, but that's poised to change with audience buying strategies, says Steve Marshall, CEO of multi-platform advertising sales software firm Invision, in an interview with Beet.TV. As the TV industry begins to integrate capabilities to buy audiences on linear [...]

At its NewFront event on Tuesday, AOL and NBCUniversal  announced a content development and distribution arrangement.  For an overview on the arrangement, we interviewed  Bob Lord, President of AOL Inc. More on the deal reported by The New York Times.

From its place on the desktop mobile, digital video is finding its place in the living room via Internet-connected devices, says Dermot McCormick, President of Video at AOL.  We spoke with the former Viacom exec bout the evolution of digital  video and the strategies at AOL around multi-screen devices. We interviewed him  tonight at the AOL Digital NewFront where where he was on [...]

Some of the new graphics software technologies coming out of Adobe sound like they will add to the palette of creative professionals in the video and imaging sector. Speaking with Beet.TV in this video interview, Adobe product management senior director Bill Roberts says the recently-announced "Project Candy" allows users to capture a color set using their smartphone camera for use in desktop video editing. "Quite [...]

The interactive video start-up co-founded by former TechCrunch editor Erick Schonfeld is getting closer to premium broadcast customers by introducing a multi-camera capability. TouchCast is a tablet video editing application that lets producers add interactive elements like photos, text, articles and web pages inside playing videos. Revealing new features, TouchCast product manager Charley Miller tells Beet.TV it now supports "running external cameras in to the iPad [...]

Broadcast online video technology supplier Saffron Digital is hoping to make life easier for content distributors, as it launches a solution to shift live linear TV. The outfit has added live capability to its MainStage platform, following a partnership with Nowtilus. Company sales and marketing SVP Malachi Bierstein says the idea is to reduce complexity in a fragmented world for broadcasters: "It is pretty [...]

The challenges of distributing virtual reality at scale is one of a  number of hurdles at the moment, but the immersive medium will come to The New York Times newsroom, predicts Rebecca Howard, General Manager of Video in this interview with Beet.TV We spoke with her at The Times NewFront event yesterday where the paper demonstrated VR.    She said the company [...]

At the Yahoo NewFront last night, the company announced a number of new programmings in live, vertical "magazines" shows and in the long-form "Yahoo Originals." At the event, we spoke with Kathy Savitt, CMO and Head of Media who gives an overview of new shows, the dramatic growth of "live" at Yahoo and the developing opportunities around video for advertisers. Beet.TV's coverage of [...]