Veoh Player rubbing out VeohTV
Veoh’s move to a web-based browser is nearly complete, with the online video service shutting down most of its VeohTV system. Meaning viewers won’t be downloading and launching a resources-draining proprietary system.
Veoh’s users have been getting a stream of email throughout the transition period, talking up the web-based Veoh Player. “Starting next week, the ‘Download to VeohTV’ and ‘Watch on VeohTV’ options will no longer be available from Veoh.com,” the latest missive says. Before that it was the VeohTV channel guide and search that faded to black. Users still have to download a plug-in for the player to work.
Slicker competitor Joost made the move to a browser in September.
Veoh.com offers more content than the older system, the free service says, including Veoh, Hulu, CBS, ABC, Warner Brothers, Sony BMG and YouTube. Video publishing (uploading of free user content) is being done via a new stand-alone app.
Viewers can watch videos of any length in the browser (some users seem to disagree) and download movies without being online, Veoh says. The move hasn’t done much to solve the online video service’s clutter of professional and amateur video content, however.
NBC, Fox shows to Veoh, MSN
NBC and Fox videos are popping up everywhere, it seems. Veoh just embedded content from Hulu, the NBC Universal-News Corp. video site.
Microsoft also did the Hulu, building a snazzy MSN Video Guide with full episodes, not just those worthless 15-minute previews. Veoh and MSN both have CBS as well.
So Veoh urges us to “catch the shows you know from Prime Time TV” and then highlights “CSI” (CBS), “Family Guy” (Fox) and “Heroes” (NBC). Not bad. One to go.
An overlooked aspect of these services: the classic shows that are starting to add up. Pretty handy to have excellent copies of “The Alfred Hitchcock Hour” and “Hill Street Blues” close at hand, even if they are out on DVD.
The proprietary network model fell pretty quickly. People are used to finding video quickly, as they do on YouTube. Most people don’t know what show is on what network outside of their favorite shows. The holy grail is to end up being the YouTube of traditional television content, a one-stop shop.
Look for everyone in the game to start building destination TV sites, carrying all the content that’s out there to license. We may need four major networks, but only one video player.
VeohTV tunes in another copyright debate
The New York Times’ profile of Veoh Networks in Sunday’s paper includes some interesting back-and-forth on video copyright issues and the control of video that’s posted by content creators.
The VeohTV platform, now in beta, rounds up network television offerings in “channels,” which include the Big Four nets and video giant YouTube.
If you want to watch “24,” no need to go to Fox’s site (or view its banner ads). Veoh says it doesn’t need anyone’s permission to track and play already-existing internet videos. Over to the Times:
By only offering video, VeohTV omits all the other advertisements on the network sites. For example, people who watched an episode of “Heroes” on NBC.com last week also saw for 40 minutes a banner ad for McDonald’s on the same page. VeohTV users watching the same episode would not see the banner.
Rick Cotton, the executive vice president and general counsel of NBC Universal, said that streaming full-length television episodes drives traffic to other parts of NBC’s site and exposes users to the ads on it. And the right to play those shows is valuable, he said, pointing to the still-unnamed venture between NBC Universal and the News Corporation to create an online repository of their TV shows and movies. Sites like MySpace, AOL and MSN have already entered into commercial agreements to display the venture’s content.
“This material has value,” Mr. Cotton said. “The notion of taking it and generating traffic with it needs to be negotiated and needs to be done with the agreement of content owners.” That’s why NBC and the other major studios are keeping close tabs on VeohTV’s business model.
A YouTube spokesman told the Times that VeohTV pre-empts its ads while violating YouTube’s agreements with content originators such as the networks. Veoh says its TV service is just making it easier to do what can already be done on YouTube.
Veoh wants to be part of the big-boy club, so it’s chastly wooing content providers. But this issue, in general, remains a major Internet copyright debate that the courts ultimately will have to sort out. Even if it doesn’t involve Veoh. For smaller players wanting to aggregate video for niche audiences — say a site dedicated to classic jazz clips — this is a pivotal debate as well.
Viacom, of course, is suing Google for $1 billion for massive violations of its copyrights on YouTube. The media giant says YouTube has the resources to remove copyrighted material, while Google sticks to its policy of removing materials when asked to do so.
My money is on a series of Napster-like rulings in which the rich get richer. Or, looking at things the other way, the rich get paid for their work and their massive gambles on programming.
VeohTV: all over the place
The new digital goodies blog last100 took a test lap with VeohTV, the full-screen P2P aggregator that goes by the slogan “Video Lives All Over the Web.” The application is still in beta, but last100 blogger has posted a fairly detailed review of VeohTV.
Here’s a look at Veoh’s YouTube channel, where, presumably, most of the action is:
Videos played immediately but, as expected, picture quality wasn’t too good blown up to full-screen. Other channels looked much better (such as HD podcasts) but inevitably took a lot longer to load. This is the downside of VeohTV’s open approach to aggregating many video sources into one unified player. By mixing different video formats, the viewing experience varies greatly.
The blog also checked out the live TV service Zattoo, which is available only in the EU.
Last100 is written by London-based journalist Steve O’Hear. Looks like a great place to keep up with streaming/downloading schemes. It’s part of the fledgling network attached to the popular web technology blog Read/WriteWeb.
