Notes from Streaming East
By BroadCasting & Cable Staff -- Broadcasting & Cable, 6/18/2000 8:00:00 PM
- NBC is among new investors in a second round of financing arranged by SeeItFirst.com, a video streamer whose specialty is the technology to allow users to see individual, high-resolution frames of a streaming video, even at lowest connection rates.
During the Streaming Media East 2000 conference in New York last week, SeeItFirst founder and CEO Narayanan Ran announced that the company has lined up $14 million in financing from NBC, Wit Soundview Corp., Swiss Finanz and Deutsch Investments.
He explained that the frame-by-frame capability allows streaming video to be viewed much the way a VCR, TiVo or Replay user can stop motion, and he demonstrated how a stock analyst's video-streamed report could be augmented with data allowing a user to click and buy (or sell) the stock mentioned.
- MP3.com CEO and Chairman Michael Robertson said Tuesday that despite recent settlements with BMG and Warner Music Group, the site will continue to offer free music for downloading. In a speech, he said MP3.com's strength comes from the size of its audience.
The business can flourish, he said, if the focus is moved away from security issues-"If you want to stop piracy, stop selling CDs," he joked-and toward service by allowing users more access to free music. Robertson insisted that artists will profit from MP3.com: Each time an artist's song is played, that use is recorded, and the artist is compensated by the site.
- Yack (www.yack.com), the Internet Program Guide, will acquire Channelseek (www.channelseek.com), the Convergence Guide, in a multimillion-dollar stock deal, the companies announced. No purchase price was disclosed. Channelseek founder and CEO Tom Britt will join Yack as vice president of business development under President and CEO Jeff Morris.
Yack's acquisition of Channelseek will create a combined entity with nearly 250 event producers. Channelseek publishes the first printed guide to streaming media, which is stuffed into mailers that DSL and broadband providers send to customers. Both Yack and Channelseek.com have Web sites that are databases for video content on the Web.
-StreamSearch.com, a Web site that also serves as a portal for streaming-media sites, announced a deal to deliver search capabilities to GTE.net's DSL broadband unit, which is on track to garner in excess of 200,000 subscribers by year-end.
The company also announced an affiliate marketing co-op program in which StreamSearch will pay up to $50,000 to certain clients, including broadband distributors, ISPs, broadcasters and content providers, to help pay for advertising streaming products.
No related content found.
-
No Top Articles
VIEW ALL GALLERIES
