DECE vs. KEYCHEST - confirmed progress in Digital Distribution

DECE is starting make moves, at just the right time. After its creation over a year ago, DECE (standing for Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem) made up of big entertainment players like Warner Bros., Lionsgate, FOX, and Paramount to name a few, have been reviewing ways to bring content to as many platforms as possible. The link included is focused on Disney's recent KEYCHEST announcement, which is a game changer in itself, and DECE, and how Disney did not opt in w. DECE, but went out on its own (note: Disney has been working on stealth digital initiatives in Asia for years) to create one sustainable and fully baked option for consumers. The problem with this is that DECE has most of the major content player's in the industry, and Disney's KEYCHEST, is well just Disney, unless they can convince DECE to utilize some of KEYCHEST'S technology and concepts into their plans.

However, as it all plays itself out, the U.S. content providers and players start the new decade in the driver's seat as no matter what anyone thinks the future of digital content distribution and business models are being set in the U.S., including the formats for such.

While Europe and Asia have been the leaders for the last decade, the U.S. and the big content players will be the decider's and staging where content will be delivered, and how the financing will be structured for the next while. The reason. Content is king. And now that we are in 2010 and many steps have been taken to review and realign large organizations, LA and SF are at the forefront of these changes, and specifically LA, as the content creation capital of the world. With that in mind, the recent announcements from players this week and last, are huge and only make the beginning of this new decade for content creators and stakeholders even more exciting as all platforms mature, and most importantly, how content is created and financed.

Spotify - A real music model brought to you by advertising

While most people in the U.S. might not have heard of Spotify before, it is and has been hailed as a workable business model that both music companies and the music fan have been able to embrace.
Spotify recently gained attention throughout Europe and many parts of the world (where Spotify is available, which means mostly Europe) for U2 choosing them as an official partner to help release their new album. There business model for the most part has been widely accepted by the music industry in all of the countries that they are available, but for some reason not the U.S., which based on their fast growth and enthusiastic arrival might change soon. Some people feel that it is the best music app on the planet, and now with the release of the libspotify platform where developers can now make their app that much better, the sky is the limit. Right now, Spotify provides music to the listener for free by inserting a short 20 second advertisement every 30 min. of free music, which for the most part is not that much, and has been widely accepted as alright by the user. They also have a subscription if for some reason the short ad is too much, but with their very large collection of music, the easy user interface, etc... it is the opinion of the majority that it works just fine.

International Digital Content at MIP TV

The annual TV conference in Cannes usually draws people form the TV business internationally, this year, as well for the past few years digital has taken a stronger presence at one of the best TV markets in the world.
Digital's presence could be seen from the caliber of the trade show booth showcasing new technologies and innovations from Yahoo on their new widget channel, to Zillion TV, to Discovery Channel, Comcast, et al... and the list goes on. The market included great keynote's from the advertising, TV, feature, and digital technology world on the future of content and the screens that we will be watching on, and the future revenue models of the future.

Each country had a contingent of distributors and channel's selling content, with events designed to showcase new TV formats and programs, as well as digital focused projects. Being it was my first time attending MIP, and that MIP has always been an international TV market, I was very impressed and surprised to see the new and flourishing markets, especially in digital, coming out of the middle-east and Africa.

While many people stated that MIP attendance was down, the deals were still strong with lots of new revenue platforms presenting themselves for next and new platforms and markets that are becoming the key revenue generators for the years to come.

The POOL - Network of advertisers

A large group of advertisers, brands, and online distribution portals, led by Starcom MediaVest Group and Vivaki Nerve Centre are joining together to create industry standards for new advertsing models, specifically focused on digtal distribution.

Many advertisers, brands, and content portals have been complaining for years of a lack of standards for the placement/packaging of advertising for content, on-line, and any other digital platform that presents an opportunity or landscape to have content/information delivered to an audience.

The "Pool" as it is called, brings standards to a collection of media "pooled together" for media buyers & agencies to choose from for added vaclinet value.

Starcom MediaVest Group and Vivaki , both led by Curt Hecht of Vivaki, will spearhead thr group and industry standards for online/digital ad-buys.

Starcom's advertising clients, that include Allstate, Applebee’s, Capital One and Nestle Purina, will be paired with content partners Broadband Enterprises, CBS Interactive, Discovery Communications, Hulu.com, Microsoft Advertising, Platform A and Yahoo!, to name a few, with the sole goal of streamlining and organizing the structure for digital ad-buys.

This is both strong and good news for content owners and creators who could possibly recieve a better accounting and higher ROI for their contemt, and on-line portals, who would recieve top dollar for their digita real estate.

If done right it could be win-win for all involved "POOL" parties, but if the standards are not managed effectively, it could creat more confusion and hysteria to an already, at times, confused space.

Lets hope for the win-win.

Is Mobile TV finally hit the U.S. - Let's wait to see numbers on market penetration first!

This week brought a huge announcement from a group of major TV stations at the annual CES in Las Vegas, commonly known as the Open Mobile Video Coalition. The "Coalition's" goal was to showcase and roll out some of the latest streaming TV options for consumers, and detail a snapshot of things to come. As everything in digital moves at light speed in a down market, the price point and entry into market for consumers to try and sample all of the offerings from the OMVC is hard not to try, because the price is FREE. As a way to entice and lure more people into the mobile TV space the coalition has been active in promoting great new devices from major manufacturers like LG Electronics, Kenwood (only mobile TV units in cars), The Harris Corp., Samsung and Delphi.

One of the major companies, LG, said it will offer up to five new products, all that will be capable of getting the standard Mobile DTV signals.

Currently in Asian countries where mobile TV has been active in consumers lives for awhile, the business model revolves from premium paid services to a'la carte and many offering of advertising sponsored content.

With the announcement yesterday it seems a like a solid way to introduce mobile TV, through advertising and sponsored programming, but then other issues come into play that sometimes people do not spend enough time on. The environment for mobile in U.S. cities. With geo-targeted advertising taking shape all over the country, U.S. consumers still are not as heavy users as there European and Asian counterparts, and this is where the environment issues comes into play. I many Asian and European cities transit is healthy, in the U.S., still many people are tied to their cars, which lowers the amounts of time people will spend watching, and which in-turn provides less revenue form advertising.

All n all, yesterday announcement was extremely positive, now we just need to change more of our habits, have better devices, and get ready to welcome one of the next best revenue generators in digital media, Mobile TV and all of the options of interactivity that comes with it.

Closed social networks the next fad? Maybe so...

As social networking expands, the niche aspect and sexiness of "select" & "exclusive" takes on a whole new turn as businesses get more into the social media thing through the usual suspects of Facebook, MySpace, etc... to engage their customers with "special offers'' that you need to sign up on the page for. Exclusive clubs go back a long time, and there are many on-line now like Small World http://www.asmallworld.net/login.php, and Black Card Cirlce https://www.blackcardcircle.com/, but the opportunity for companies, specifically in this hotels, takes the business model to a whole new place.

It is a way to take the LinkedIn style of networking to a whole new place that allows for more interaction, such as what the Pod hotels are doing with exclusive meet-ups for people staybing in their hotels, in some cases, planning to meet weeks in advance. This same exclusive group model can lend itself to so many ideas, such as any thing that is a chain or linked in group that provides opportunities to get together in other cities, while keeping exclusive company.

B2B Conferences take hit in down economy

Bound to happen, conferences and trade shows take hit as B2B events downscale as less companies look for other ways to get businesses talking to each other. This decision will definitely have reverberation in many ways, not just opportunities for business people to meet on their specific industry, catering, hotels, et al...

This could also be one one of the big reasons that MAC World will make next year their last, with CES definetely happy as they happen at the same time.

As companies test and samples new ways to reach their core constituency, B2B will always be around but will re-engineer itself as it looks to new ways to engage companies and clients, with the most likely avenue being web seminars ona regular basis, less glamaourus meet-ups and scaled down events, and possibly bi-yearly conferences.

Any way that it goes, conferences and events targeted towards the B2B market and in connecting business are core to... well business. They are needed, but hopefully they return and remain in a way not just focused on digital models as those sponosred parties are always a nice place to meet and discuss business.