iPlayer Update
Given Kontiki's role in digital media, and our role as the download platform for BBC's iPlayer, I'm frequently asked "how's it going?" The short answer: very well. Ashley Highfield, Director Future Media and Technology at the BBC, put up a blog post last week called "iPlayer Launch: First Indications" that provides some insight into the success of the iPlayer since it moved from beta to official launch on Christmas day. To quote Highfield:
"Demand for long-form video content over the web may be much higher than iTunes has witnessed before; It's too early to say, but I think we may be at the start of rewriting the rule book."
For more on this topic, see another good article on iPlayer by the Guardian's Mark Lawson from January 3rd.
Comments
[PJ: This blog post by the VP of Digital Content Services at VeriSign celebrates the success of the iPlayer launch, but does not mention that viewers prefer the streaming version over the Kontiki version 8 to 1.] - Jeff Richards' Blog
It's worse. RTFA. "video content over the web" - that literally means the streaming version and not the Kontiki version. (Web=websites
Posted by: Alan Jenkins | January 24, 2008 02:52 PM
Alan - Two thoughts in response: 1) hopefully you view my continued posts on iPlayer as more focused on the success of the service and video distribution over the Internet in general than promotion of Kontiki, and 2) you make a good point - streams are outnumbering downloads right now by 8 to 1. However, I think you'll see the number of downloads go up - significantly - as the BBC offers the subscription service and more prominently features the download feature. IMHO, the subscription service is one of the key elements that is truly "revolutionary" about the iPlayer. Let's revisit this topic in 6 months and see where the statistics stand. It'll be fun to watch! JR
Posted by: Jeff | January 26, 2008 11:28 AM