The Reach - Podcasting and other Portable Media Strategies

Ignore my sarcastic view of the PR sweet-spot words in this otherwise notable press release from Adobe.  Flash has made a big comeback with it’s popularity driven by applications in YouTube and other media aggregation sites.

Some of you may say - “Comeback - have you been under a rock or something?  Hasn’t Adobe’s Flash been a critical element of web design, rich media ads, etc for years?”  and to some degree, rightly so.  Here’s the reason for my choice of words “Comeback”:  Flash grew popular in the late 90’s and early 00’s for visually stunning mulitimedia websites.  Then came search engine optimization and search engine marketing best practices, which looked down upon the use of Flash in websites, as search engine spiders could not “read” a Flash file.  So, it’s been out of vogue if you wanted your website to be search engine friendly.

With the advent of YouTube and other media aggregation sites, Flash has become the new poster child for media distribution capabilities.  Now that it has an even newer lease on life on cellphone platforms, it may be here to stay.

So, strategic question - will the use of Flash media files take the place of MP3, MP4, due to the ubiquity of the Flash Player?  Of course, you technology strategy geniuses out there are saying “Ed - I had that figured out 2 years ago - what took you so long?”. 

This would have just a LITTLE impact on the current technology that drives music, film, podcasting and iPods, etc.  If cellphone MFRs implement Flash as their media technology of choice, the ramifications are pretty large…..I’ve already said that cellphones replace the iPod and other MPx players in the end game.  Maybe this accelerates the end game.

John Battelle unearths a post here that should make us all quiver.  Originally found on the Xooglers (ex-Googlers) blog, and THEY found on Reddit.  While the core content is still unchanged - the story of how Google/YouTube got from point A to point B could be a little fuzzy.

Bottom line, apparently there is no “Free Speech” on YouTube (now owned by Google) and those that criticize a religion based on direct quotes from that religion’s main text will be deleted.  Not only the content, but your account. 

So, videos which show demonstrative violence apparently are ok, but textual fact is prohibited.  Hmmm.

Over the weekend, there was some splash about a new trend - de-portalization.  One of the best posts was from edgeio with great graphics to demonstrate the definition.  The focus is on distributed content and less demand for portal sites.  The only reason I call it a misnomer is that what this is really saying is that the LARGE portals (Yahoo, etc) are becoming less significant in our overall web experience and that there are other “portals” that have new signifcance. 

For example, one cannot tell me that YouTube is not a portal.  Or that iTunes is not a portal, in the true sense of the word.  Keep in mind content aggregation is still a hot topic, so I’m just jousting on symantics.

Until search is so sophisticated that I can type in a word and get back relevant words, images, sounds, videos, etc, then I think there will be plenty of room for content aggregation. 

The good news is that the lock the big portals has had on us is loosening and many sites that are lower on the value food chain are seeing opportunity for niche plays.  Niches have value now and I think that is a trend that will continue for a long time.

Well, no great surpise as this from Matt Richtel of the NY Times has been discussed in the blogosphere for several weeks now.  But, what I want to comment on here is that Verizon won’t have the lock on this for long (blinding glimpse of the obvious, BGO for you Barbarians at the Gates fans) and YouTube and other aggregation points will be readily accessed by cell phones soon and without too much muss or fuss.

Look for this to be the norm before long WITHOUT Verizon’s $15 surcharge….

Well, as we all know, Google pulled out the equity checkbook and bought YouTube.  There are many naysayers amongst the wise gurus (primarily due to copyright risks engaged via YouTube’s business model), but I did notice that Google and YouTube has leveraged their clout to negotiate deals with major content owners to preempt at least some level of the risk.  Who knows where this will come out?  Additionally, will YouTube be more than a passing fad?  Will quality still rule?  Only time will tell.  If you’ve read my blog previously, you’ll know what my predication would be….

Much like the Real Estate world (location, location, location), the new digital media world slogan may end up being “licensing, licensing, licensing”.  The YouTube discussion continues via Ben Werdmuller, following John C. Dvorak’s MarketWatch article from last week.  Ben mentions that YouTube has been named the “Napster of video”, which suggests illegal distribution of media.  This also pertains to Google Video as well, or for that matter, any website that is allowing uploads of video.

Similarly, this issue was addressed in an interview with Bill Gates, by a panel of journalists from WSJ Online on June 19, 2006.  Bill was busted at the end by admitting to watching pirated content on YouTube.

We just thought this related to music and the RIAA, but it appears that digital media everywhere must change their expected models of distribution and compensation, otherwise we’ll be fighting over this after I’m dead and gone…

Giovanni and I just finished a podcast discussing this - stay tuned for the publish date!