Gilbert of IPTV Envangelist had an interesting discussion with Ari Paparo of VP Rich Media (DoubleClick) at the New York Video 2.0 Group Meetup. Ari stated that basically there is more video content appearing on the web than there are advertisers, and at the same time advertisers are very concerned over where they place their ads.His conclusion from this is that "few sites and content creators are going to benefit in the short term from pre-roll revenue from major advertisers". Getting your video onto the web is one thing, but being able to earn money from it is another. Gilbert mentions the use of in-context adverts, such as showing Google Maps with news stories, could be a better alternative that could be used with small time video creators with quality content. This sort of advertising provides little cost in production for the advertiser reducing financial risk. I personally think in-context text based or interactive advertisements will be much more effective than traditional video advertisements anyway.
1. Content creators are trying to figure out how to get their content in front of enough eyeballs to create a viral hit. Along side that is a thin business model for Indie, producers who even with a 50% rev share with Revver or Brightcove are not likely going to make a living by posting their content.
There is also the close-loop effect going on, a lot of the conversations about this space are between the people creating the content and not the viewers. I think we are in the nascent days of the medium and as platforms mature and become easier for direct to TV and mobile device viewing adoption rates will raise, hopefully we can all hang in there to benefit.
Posted at 1:05PM on Dec 22nd 2006 by Gilbert