\Maybe it was just a business editor with a sense of humor... but in any case the layout of two media stories side by side in today's times has a 'connect the dots' feeling to it.

First - there is the headline "With Popcorn, DVD's and TiVo, Moviegoers Are Staying Home"

It begins: "LOS ANGELES, May 26 - Matthew Khalil goes to the movies about once a month, down from five or six times just a few years ago... (he instead) prefers instead to watch old movies and canceled television shows on DVD.
He also spends about 10 hours a week with friends playing the video game Halo 2. And he has to study, which means hours on the Internet and reading at least a book a week." Uh, oh... maybe he's not going to go to the movies!

Then there is this article - on the same page. As TV Moves to the Web, Marketers Follow Which begins "TELEVISION programmers are looking to make the Web a lot more like TV."

I won't spoil the surprise. But if a=b, and b=c - the... you get the idea.

And I'm not even going to linke to the notice that Tivo narrowed its loss to just a penny a share.

Tivo. Home Entertainment. Advertising Revenues. TV on the Web. A good day.

I went to see Chris Anderson from Wired interview Craig Venter.

Interesting - on a bunch of levels. First of all, I'm fascinated by the fact that I knew so little about Venter. Chris introduced him as the greatest living scientist... and a I sat up in my chair. I'd known he was the man behind the sequencing of the human genome. And I'd known he'd gotten into a wrestling match with the government over who would do it first. But that's about it.

First - a few headlines. The very first sequence was completed just 10 years ago - so this is all brand new science.

Second - Venter made the point that big science is slow... and that big leaps tend to put everyone's nose out of joint. I hadn't thought about it - but it makes sense.

and Third - that the complex questions about who owns genomics data was pushed to the fore by a government edict that NIH had to patent every discovery before it was published.

Venter is now embarking on two new projects, sequencing the seas, and sequencing the air. (he's collecting samples from a 40 story building in Manhattan - but wouldn't say which one).

this is his new non-profit research foundation

Overall - i found the complexity of his work staggering in it's importance, and equally staggering in how little coverage there has been about its potential impact. (yes, lots on his 'controversies' - they make good copy).

And then finally - back to media (the place I come from). I couldn't help but think about Anderson's Long Tail thesis, and the fact that this conversation was going on without any media capture devices recording it. If Venter will be looked back on as the father of genomics - and his musings about the challenges of getting the human genome sequenced will be of historic significance to medicine, science, energy, and the environment - then what is the long tail value of this kind of material.

I think it's significant - perhaps priceless. Since you can only suppose in the middle of a scientists career how history will treat him in retrospect. What would the value of conversations with Einstein be? Alexander Graham Bell? Louis Pasteur?

In a question and answer session after the talk, someone from the audience asked how Venter felt about the current state of High School Biology Education. He answered that his greatest concern was that recent polls suggest that 60% of American's don't believe in Evolution. He saw that as the ultimate expression of our willingness to ignore science.

Internet TV Age Is Dawning, but Who Will Watch?
By Leslie Walker
Thursday, April 28, 2005; Page E01 The Washington Post

Now that television has dumbed us down, will Internet TV weird us out?

One might get that impression based on Tuesday's launch of Open Media Network, which aims to be the online version of public television with a nonprofit Internet channel anyone can use to distribute video.

This is one weird corner of the Web, a place touting a film called "Gun Shy," about a man afraid to use public restrooms, alongside a 1960s radio broadcast by Eleanor Roosevelt. It features a Napster-like peer-to-peer system for distributing multimedia files and an electronic program guide to help users find and download shows to watch on computers.

"We wanted to reinvent public television," said OMN founder Mike Homer, who ran Netscape's Web site in the 1990s.

OMN is one example of a mini-stampede underway as entrepreneurs rush to exploit what they see as the dawning of the Internet TV age.

Trouble is, no one is sure yet what Internet TV should be, whether it will have much worth watching or what people might be willing to pay to see that isn't already on television.

Homer's network is owned by a nonprofit foundation and offers mostly free content. It is designed to eventually be self-sustaining by taking a small commission on fees that video producers charge for premium content. An audience rating system is in the works to help users discover shows that other people have liked -- and to help filter offensive content such as porn and pirated material. Homer said the system runs through central computers that will allow managers to track and take down unauthorized copyrighted material.

At its launch this week, OMN ( http://www.omn.org/ ) featured a mishmash of archived shows from several dozen public TV and radio stations; daily news video from the Associated Press; 300 independent films from the Cinequest Film Festival and nonprofit Undergroundfilm.org; plus a ton of amateur video blogs and audio shows.

One premise behind Internet TV start-ups is that the cost of distributing video over the Internet to those wanting to watch a particular program is much lower than broadcasting shows to millions of homes simultaneously, regardless of who actually sees them. The theory is that many special-interest shows might prove economical for the first time, while others already recorded might find fresh audiences.

"We are tracking about 14 different revenue streams we might get from Internet distribution, including traditional underwriting," said Dennis Haarsager, who runs Northwest Public Radio, a group of 13 radio and two TV stations based at Washington State University. His group offered 13 episodes of a TV series on the art of making flies for fishing.

Haarsager said he is particularly interested in the audience-rating tools OMN is developing and software it has planned to let video producers offer subscriptions and pay-per-viewing. Producers will be able to limit the number of times users can watch a show or copy it to portable devices, using Microsoft Corp.'s digital-rights-management software.

Haarsager said he leads a consortium of public broadcasters eager to use the Internet to extend the viewing life of their shows. "Right now broadcasting is a pretty ephemeral thing," he said. "You put it on the air and nobody ever sees it again."

OMN is not alone in trying to attract and distribute Internet videos from independent filmmakers and home hobbyists. Brightcove Inc., founded by former Macromedia Inc. executive Jeremy Allaire, is planning to launch a commercial Internet TV network this year that will invite participation from both traditional cable programmers and independent filmmakers, potentially offering a way to bypass Hollywood's big studios.

Another start-up is Denver-based ManiaTV ( http://www.maniatv.com/ ), which sees itself as the MTV of the Internet. ManiaTV has been offering live streaming video on the Web for several months and plans to launch an on-demand download service next month.

Other start-ups let people watch video downloaded from the Internet on television sets using special set-top boxes. Akimbo Systems launched an Internet TV subscription service last fall requiring purchase of a just such a setup.

A Huntington, N.Y., outfit called VCinema Inc. plans in September to offer something similar, which it calls a "downloadable home video store and digital video recording service."

Traditional broadcasters and even telephone companies are tiptoeing in, too, developing their own systems for delivering TV shows over the Internet.

MTV this week launched a channel of streaming video at its MTV.com Web site called MTV Overdrive, featuring video segments shorter than the usual half-hour MTV cable shows, from 2 to 15 minutes long.

Former vice president Al Gore chairs a new company that hopes to launch a cable channel called Current ( http://www.current.tv/ ) on Aug. 1 with a heavy Internet emphasis. Current is already inviting audience participation by letting Internet users submit videos that viewers will eventually be able to watch and rate. In addition to professionally produced videos aimed at young people, Current plans to air many user-created videos and will display data from Google about what people are searching for online.

The big challenges facing Internet TV ventures, of course, will be how to attract quality content and find the right audience. Who wants to watch a TV show about a man afraid to use public restrooms? How about a video blog of your neighbors eating breakfast? If there are audiences for such shows, how will the producers of such fare find them?

"It is a classic chicken-and-egg thing," said Josh Bernoff, a Forrester analyst. "If they get the content, people will come and use it. And if people come and use it, then folks will want to make their content available on the system."

Already, Google and Yahoo, the Web's top search engines, are trying to match Internet videos with viewers. Both recently rolled out trial video search engines that attempt to index the millions of video files published across the Web and show still images from them. This month Google went further, announcing plans to host video files on its computers, potentially laying the groundwork for its own Internet TV network.

Maybe I can become a star on Google TV and retire one day, watched by billions who share, say, my acute fear of going to work.

Leslie Walker's e-mail address is walkerl@washpost.com.

a cool heads-up from my friend Andrew Blau at GBN -->

Within a day of the launch, users had discovered combining PSP Video 9 (a free PSP video conversion and management program) with Videora (a $22.95 automatic video downloader utilizing BitTorrent and RSS (define ) allows them to cobble together a system that automatically downloads video feeds directly into their PSPs. Just like Adam Curry's initial iPodder script, it isn't the most elegant solution. But also like iPodder, it works.

more

There's a terrific new post up from Chris Anderson (of Long Tail fame) about television and it's particular appropriateness to long tail economics.

He's right on many points, including the disposable nature of current offerings and the huge amount of TV that is missed and gone forever.

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From The Long Tail "Thus the ratio of produced content to available content is the highest of any industry I've looked at. Other industries may produce more content--print, for instance--but it's far more available (see Google). Only television treats its premium content as disposable. True, a lot of it actually is. But not all, and not as much as is effectively thrown away after a brief moment in the sun."
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What he doesn't say - but i suspect he an many other literate folks know - is that most of what is now distributed via TV deserves to be missed.

Content that is created under the current system conforms to it's shape and limitations.

That means that all content is biased in favor of scale (large audience sell TV ads).

But the power of the promise of the Long Tail isn't that we want to have all 500+ channel content on a server in an on demand world - what a pile of junk. Rather it is that evolutionary economics could actually create an entirely NEW kind of media.

Think of current 'television' as mass market entertainment, and the future of 'motion media' as having a whole series of other species. File content under:

a. Knowledge b. Debate and Discussion c. Exploration and Ideas d. Art

Overall, far more detailed - valuable, and necessary. Not a pastime, but the evolving center of a marketplace of ideas and information - created with new media tools.

So, I would suggest that TV shouldn't be saved. It shouldn't be Exploded. It should Evolve.

This is the tricky part. A number of years ago I was at conf. with lots of smart people. It was one of those 'everyone participates' think tanks. And when it came to me - the question was "didn't I agree that TV was the source of much evil in the world, in education, in our lives." Rather than answer - I asked everyone in the audience who watches TV to raise their hands. Out of 100 people - 8 did.

My point is - there is a cycle we have to break. TV programs to lowest common denominator audiences. Intelligent viewers don't use video for knowledge, or understanding. And the people who make programs for smaller, but more discerning viewers find they can't reach their intended recipients.

Companies like Brightcove (as Chris rightly points out) are key to the puzzle. But then we need to go the next step, and challenge great thinkers to attempt to translate their ideas into moving media. Not 'Sundance' films. Something entirely new.

Because we'll need an entire generation of new media ideas before we can ask people to evolve from passive consumers of junk media into thoughtful creators and remixers of participatory television.

The pipe debate is interesting - but it's not the driver.

3.2 Billion Dollars with of adds on Google is the real clue. Contextual, coherent, measurable advertising is going to drive a whole new economic system for content of all types. Blogs, Video, Text, etc.

So with content now empowered by a way to turn users into revenue - the face of motion media (video) content is going to change far faster than anyone could imagine. Proctor and Gamble just too 20% of their media spend out of the network TV upfront. This isn't a negotiating ploy to get lower cpm's - it's a demand to their media agencies to find new ways to bring their brands to their audiences.

So while VOD is a great long term model, the short term dollars are already in play.

And the whole question of non-linear, VOD, and consumer habits seems to always come back to how many new ways there are to slice and dice old content. CBS News, MTV, the Today show 'when you want it.'

The idea that video content in the post 'walled-garden' universe will look very much the same as in the current world is wishful thinking on the part of the incumbents.

What kind of content will people make? What kind of content will audiences
be drawn to? That's for the market to sort out - which it will - but a few things are pretty certain. Niches will for the first time have the potential to be economic. And a new generation of content creators won't be locked out by the prohibitive cost of tools and pipe.

We're a little close to all this.

But flash back to 1997 - and think about how you used the internet as part of your business and personal life? Ebay? Expedia? Banking? Google? We've become quickly used to having a staggering amount of information at our fingertips. And video is the only piece of the info-sphere that's lagged (simply because of bandwidth and the single largest limiting factor).

So let's have a bit of faith. And a bit of imagination. It could be that in 20 years we'll look at 2005 as the first chapter in a golden age of motion media content. Content produced by passionate individuals, inspired professionals, and legacy network systems. Content that rises or falls based on direct consumer feedback (either performance based advertising or VOD revenues). Content that - if meaningful - has a life in the long tail world of future revenues.

We're at the beginning. And that can only be good.

I spent two really interesting hours with Andrew Blau, the author of the GBN report "The Future of Independent Media." LINK

I've read ton's of research, and lots of futurist predictions about 'what will happen to media.' This great piece of work is refreshing because it's full of examples that will ring true to anyone making media today.

Andrew says the feedback has been very positive (lots of calls like mine saying "Wow, you nailed it") as well as a few saying "ok, so what is the future?"

The answer is - we all collectively have to work to figure that out and make it happen. It's worth remembering that the people that build technology don't often have a clear picture of what they're enabling. So as the marketplace thrashes about - with VOD, DVD, IPTV, WiMax, 3g, all elbowing their way into the content delivery universe... creators will have real impact in what technologies gain a foothold.

Anyway - download and read Andrew's work. It's fun to see that we're all in this together, and that the changes in distribution may open some doors you didn't consider possible.

Andrew Blau
September 2004

About This Issue of Deeper News

The technologies that enable us to make and consume motion media are becoming better, cheaper, and more widely available—and with blistering speed. As a consequence, patterns of media production and consumption are changing just as rapidly. The Internet continues to create new opportunities to connect with audiences. Video games are becoming a platform for critique and education. A new generation of media makers and viewers is emerging, which only increases the likelihood of profound change. Images, ideas, news, and points of view are traveling along countless new routes to an ever-growing number of places where they can be seen and absorbed. It is no understatement to say that the way we make and experience motion media will be transformed as thoroughly in the next decade as the world of print was reshaped in the last.

MORE .

I've been thinking a lot about CES and NATPE and the extraordinary disconnect between what is happening on the technology side, and what is happening on the programming/advertising side.

Really it can be argued that from the moment Tivo arrived on the planet, our business had a running start at understanding/evolving it's relationship with viewers and advertisers.

But the truth is - it hasn't happened.

Tv is pretty much the same as it was 5 years ago. And all the denials aside, the projection of Tivo like devices in the home suggests that we continue to ignore this evolution at our peril.

First of all - consumers want the freedom to watch what they want when they want it.

Second - broadband is a fat pipe. It's being laid into virtually every living room in American.

Third. People don't hate all advertising - just the stuff that clearly has no need to reach them (I don't like ads for Women's makeup, call me crazy!).

It seems to me that our customers have been promised new services for a very long time... And we've continued to say that this media evolution is right around the corner. Well now the Consumer Electronics folks aren't going to wait any longer - they're going to build a new highway into America's living rooms (and cars, and handheld devices, and phones, and wrist watches... You get the idea).

And once it's built - there's no telling what will travel on that highway. It may be network TV shows, it maybe Hollywood movies, but it won't discriminate... So competition is very much on the horizon.

The one thing I found in comparing CES to NATPE is that advertisers had pulled their head out of the sand, and were actively thinking about new ways to have relationships with their customers.

There are plenty of brands that I'd enjoy watching on my TV. I'd watch Sharper Image. I'd watch BMW (I already do). I'd watch a whole bunch of fashion info if it were tied to catalogs I like (lands end, LL Bean, Brooks Brothers, Banana Republic).

Maybe I'm rambling, but it seems to me that folks are using Bittorrnet and such, not because they want to - but because they're forced to. And advertisers will figure that our long before TV networks do. If advertiser find a way to do business directly with viewers - then the model is really exploded.

Once the smoke clears - there will be something entirely new in it's place. And that's worth thinking about.

More from this great Business Week article:
Next: TV Meets IP
Internet technologies promise to soon take couch potatoes to worlds far beyond TiVo. Even phone companies could benefit big-time

Just a few years ago, the fine art of watching TV seemed unlikely to change much. You watched programs when the networks told you to watch them. Maybe you taped them on a videocassette recorder. Either way, your choices were limited. Then along came the TiVo (TIVO ) digital video recorder, which as its 2 million loyal customers will tell you, added more than a little convenience to the coach potato's world.

Turns out, TiVo was just the start. A new wave of TV-related innovation called IP-TV is just starting to reach consumers. Just as the service known as voice over Internet protocol is poised to revolutionize the phone business by offering a low-cost Internet alternative to traditional phone service, IP-TV could bring Internet-style interactivity and flexibility to your TV set.

It won't happen overnight, of course. But over the next decade, the long-hyped notion of "video-on-demand" could become commonplace, allowing consumers to watch what they want, when they want to. They'll be able to control their IP-TV service remotely through a PC or a cell phone. And they'll be able to personalize their content, whether they want to watch the local high school football game or home movies.

THE ARTICLE CONTINUES: LINK

->From business week:

Digital technologies mean more than just sharper pictures. Here's a look at three major trends they'll make possible

The 1977 fight between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier was more than a colossal battle between two legendary heavyweights. "The Thrilla in Manila," shown on HBO, was the first live satellite broadcast over cable TV. It heralded the beginning of cable as a new standard that could one day replace the broadcast model.

Twenty-seven years later, analog cable will finally make way for a new champ -- digital TV. Though only 13% of homes will have digital TV by the end of 2004, according to the Consumer Electronics Assn., which expects that number to reach 65% by 2008. Three major tech trends will fuel this adoption: broadband Internet, wireless home networking, and high-definition broadcasting -- all of which will pave the way for entirely new possibilities in TV

Article continues: LINK

I've been avoiding this post. First I thought, we're just busy (I've been traveling). Then I thought, it'll happen. but it hasn't. Which isn't to say I don't love having it in my rack of cool gizmo's.

But this is going to be the challenge of all Future TV devices and services. If a tree falls in the forest (or a new show is available for download) how do I know.

My son - who's got his own ideas about media to be sure - says Akimbo "sucks". I'm not nearly that harsh. My wife and younger son have abandoned it... 'nothing on'.

And I think it's pretty early to write it off. The technology works - and content will follow.

But Akimbo's navigation makes it hard - almost impossible in fact - to enjoy browsing, exploring, looking for new things. There's no search. No web enabled portal that can program my box, no email each week alerting me to new things I might like...

In sort - no attempt to welcome me to the service, make me feel I'm part of a grand new thing. BTW - Tivo was able to do that. Capitalize on that - no, but at least get the juices flowing.

It may be that I'm just way too early. I'm clearly an alpha customer (are there 12,000 boxes out yet, I don't think so).

But when I find my self wondering if I'll keep it 'because it looks cool' or send it back - the bottom line is, I've given up using it. And that's just sad.

So IPTV entrepreneurs, Exploding TV fans, and Citizen Journalists alike - worth taking not. Getting your content to the box in someone's home isn't worth a damn if you can't get them to click on the link that downloads it.

I've been avoiding this post. First I thought, we're just busy (I've been traveling). Then I thought, it'll happen. but it hasn't. Which isn't to say I don't love having it in my rack of cool gizmo's.

But this is going to be the challenge of all Future TV devices and services. If a tree falls in the forest (or a new show is available for download) how do I know.

My son - who's got his own ideas about media to be sure - says Akimbo "sucks". I'm not nearly that harsh. My wife and younger son have abandoned it... 'nothing on'.

And I think it's pretty early to write it off. The technology works - and content will follow.

But Akimbo's navigation makes it hard - almost impossible in fact - to enjoy browsing, exploring, looking for new things. There's no search. No web enabled portal that can program my box, no email each week alerting me to new things I might like...

In sort - no attempt to welcome me to the service, make me feel I'm part of a grand new thing. BTW - Tivo was able to do that. Capitalize on that - no, but at least get the juices flowing.

It may be that I'm just way too early. I'm clearly an alpha customer (are there 12,000 boxes out yet, I don't think so).

But when I find my self wondering if I'll keep it 'because it looks cool' or send it back - the bottom line is, I've given up using it. And that's just sad.

So IPTV entrepreneurs, Exploding TV fans, and Citizen Journalists alike - worth taking not. Getting your content to the box in someone's home isn't worth a damn if you can't get them to click on the link that downloads it.