Originally uploaded by bankythehack3000
The ubiquity of the Web grew tremendously within the last few years due to bandwidth, low cost of hardware, democratization, and the emergence of standards. All of this converged in 2005 with the launch of YouTube and the Web was never the same. Video, finally, became a compelling channel on the Web and today a search for video returns 77 Million generated by about 2.8 Million users.
Enter stage left, one Michael Eisner. The once proud king of the Mouse descended on Austin Texas to talk about the idea that now is the right time for compelling “story driven monetized content” on the Internet. His company Vuguru has produced a modest success in Prom Queen via a key partnership with Myspace and this Spring will produce a prequel to Robin Cook’s upcoming book Foreign Body which will consist of 50 episodes of 90 seconds each. On the 51st day the new book will appear in stores.
Eisner acknowledges that no one really has it right, just yet, and interviewer Mark Cuban acknowledges, and rightly so, integrating digital content on the PC with your Hi-Definition television really hard to do. Lost in the discussion though is that IP based television is mainstream. AppleTV 2.0 and XBOX Live currently allow users to download hi-def content from the Internet to be played right on the television. In the future, and even today, our televisions will be just another screen in which we interact. It will be devices like our phone, both wireless and wireline, computer, and set-top boxes that will be the conduit for video on-demand.
Eisner predicts that within five years, IP based content will be just as compelling as what we’ll find on television. YouTube is already experimenting with various advertising models.
Another paradigm shift is coming. The infrastructure has capacity and when the number of eyeballs can support the revenue the content creation will generate, we’ll just need to be able to relax comfortably in our living rooms with devices that enable all the magic to happen.
Convergence is coming. And that is what Eisner is betting on.