[Philip Lelyveld Comment: this is a key part of the ETC's Hyper-Personalized Entertainment Offer project. I have met with Watchwith and Digital Smiths.]
Who’s going to be the next startup to succeed in online video?
That’s the big question -- and I won’t promise to have any answers, but I can share with you a video report from Beet.TV commentator Ashley Swartz that has me now keeping an eye on two companies in the metadata arena -- Veenome and Watchwith. As metadata practitioners, they do the work of brand safety, which means they could easily fit in the ranks of firms that offer tools and technology to police ads for content or verify placement, for instance.
Former Digitas emerging media expert Ashley Swartz said in her report that as video proliferates on the Web, it won’t have as much value to marketers until more data and information is attached to it. Metadata is needed for the video advertising revolution to actually flourish, she said.
See the full story here: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/181640/good-metadata-is-a-brand-safety-tool.html
In an age where Kinect and PlayStation Eye/Move are encouraging less traditional interaction with video game consoles and cameras are a mainstay in virtual everything, let alone most mobile devices, one man at Disney Interactive sees video game systems moving even further from the path of the familiar and letting the console games make their own decisions based on — you guessed it — physical appearance.
Both ‘System and method for number of players determined using facial recognition’ (US Patent Application 20120214585) and ‘Gender and age based gameplay through face perception’ (US Patent Application 20120214584) list Phillippe Paquet as the sole inventor and offer to leverage existing technology in interesting ways.
While a fascinating prospect, this would encourage locking players into stereotypical gender roles which could be a problem — assuming the gender of the player is 100% accurate. Even the example of using age to determine difficulty is questionable since skillsets — particularly when it comes to video games — are very much subjective to the individual rather than the number of growth rings inside their bodies.
See the full story here: http://www.stitchkingdom.com/disney-video-game-face-recognition-21890/
The Moving Picture Experts Group issued a draft international standard of a new video-compression format, H.265, said to be twice as efficient as the current H.264/AVC standard.
The multi-industry body met last month to draft a standard for High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) that would enable faster delivery of current quality video using less bandwidth or greater video quality using the same bandwidth as H.264 today.
Another area where the MPEG Visual Technology team is working on was said to be “a new kind of 3D video compression format, which would enable a new standard for 3D video systems that would do away with 3D glasses.”
Read the full story here: http://www.tvtechnology.com/news/0086/mpeg-h-draft-standard-disclosed-/214981
Revenues from multi-screen content platforms are estimated to top $21 billion in 2014*
It's clear that the “battle of the screens" is accelerating and continues to disrupt traditional media and content models. The MultiScreen Summit™ will bring content providers alongside senior brand, agency and entertainment executives to examine the new screen economy being driven by a fundamental shift in the way consumers search, access and share content.
Read more about it here: http://www.thescreensummit.com
One of the major social TV players, WWE has recently launched their new app. iOS and Androiddevices will be able to use this second screen TV app that “activates during Monday Night Raw with live polls and content,” according to their release.
The app will incorporate many different features that include social conversations, the ability to purchase merchandise and order tickets to WWE events.
Since WWE has such consistent year-long programming that’s built around real-time buzz, we might see this app slowly start to outperform their actual website. As second screen startups continue to launch, pivot and go after users, one might wonder if the white-labeled, show or network-specific apps will end up being the eventual replacement of the old-school TV guide grid.
See the full story here: http://www.lostremote.com/2012/08/22/wwe-launches-first-app-jumps-into-top-10-on-itunes/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LostRemote+%28Lost+Remote%29&utm_source=2nd+Screen+Authority&utm_campaign=78f9c74d2d-my_google_analytics_key&utm_medium=email
CLOUD LANDSCAPE
First, let’s look at the cloud landscape. Fig. 1 outlines one worldview of the cloud.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has defined three chief cloud topologies. Their definitions are well accepted by the industry.
IaaS: Infrastructure-as-a-Service—Resources of processing, storage, networks and other fundamental computing means where the consumer is able to deploy and run arbitrary software, which can include operating systems and applications (app or apps).
PaaS: Platform-as-a-Service—This model is used by developers to create applications or services. Software tools are provided to enable the programming and deployment of the end product. The software stack differentiates this from an IaaS model.
SaaS: Software-as-a-Service—A service that runs applications on a cloud infrastructure. The applications are accessible from various client devices through a thin client interface, such as a Web browser or other “app player” such as Adobe Flash.
These models offer services charged by usage; they are utilities for hire. ...
Read the full story here: http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/the-cloud-what’s-it-all-about/215050
[Philip Lelyveld comment: Unless they are going full-on universal product offerings, why would a grocery store want to compete with digital downloaders? Physical versus virtual goods!]
Sainsbury’s is contracting video tech firm Rovi to power video on demand and for download in a service due to launch later this year under its new Sainsbury’s Entertainment brand.
Rovi promised paidContent “a transactional-based model that supports the sale and rental of premium titles versus a subscription-based service”. The service will launch initially on web and Sainsbury’s says it wants to take it later to internet TVs, Blu-ray disc players, smartphones and game consoles.
Sainsbury’s movie and TV offering will go head-to-head with Blinkbox, which Tesco acquired a majority of last year. Expect to see each supermarket competing with Netflix, Amazon’s Lovefilm, BSkyB and other dedicated VOD brands on internet TVs next year.
See the full story here: http://paidcontent.org/2012/08/22/grocers-digital-dreams-sainsburys-launching-vod-tesco-ending-mp3/?utm_source=General+Users&utm_campaign=e23558e47f-c%3Amed+d%3A08-23&utm_medium=email
Twenty-four percent of viewers use a second device screen whilst watching TV, according to Deloitte’s UK survey of 2,000 people.
What are they doing with those devices?
Whilst nearly half of 16-to-24-year-olds use communication tools like email and social networks, only one in 10 of second-screeners browse the internet for information about the shows they are watching, Deloitte found.
This could suggest there is greater opportunity in second screens’ social dimension that in commerce and adjunct information.
See the full story here: http://paidcontent.org/2012/08/20/research-tvs-second-screen-is-for-talking-not-browsing/?utm_source=General+Users&utm_campaign=ecf8b2c7d2-c%3Amed+d%3A08-22&utm_medium=email
With in-built wi-fi, a 3D television and its own weather station, it's clear this beach hut is no ordinary seaside shed.
Infact, the makers of the futuristic wooden white dwelling claim it is Britain's most high-tech beach hut, thanks to a raft of devices which make it more technologically advanced than the average family home.
The 10ft by 8ft hut in Shoreham, West Sussex, has been kitted out with 15 top-of-the-range gadgets.
See the full story with more pictures here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2191403/Is-Britains-high-tech-beach-hut-Seaside-shed-comes-weather-station-wind-powered-lighting.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
