Today’s video viewers have a multiplicity of options for watching their favorite shows and movies.  Pay-TV, video on demand, blu-ray and online streaming just to name a few.  And there is proof – from viewers and content owners – that viewers are taking advantage of this explosion of video options. Just read the following: A 2010 Forrester study showed [...]

If you follow my monthly column on MediaPost’s Video Insider, you’ll notice that I seem to have hit a hot button with my digital media colleagues (some have even contacted me directly).  It’s an important issue and I’m glad to see that so many people are engaged and interested. I want to take this opportunity to [...]

I saw Iron Man 2 about a week ago and was not able to get the Black Sabbath 70’s hit “I am Iron man” out of my head until I saw a recent TV preview for Marmaduke featuring animated dogs singing and dancing to Ke$ha’s “Tik Tok”. While the “I am Iron man” song was [...]

As I pack my bags for this year’s NAB show and head to Vegas, I have a mental checklist of some of the tracks I want to check out. I would love to hear the keynote by Sony’s Hiroshi Yoshioka, about the global demand for 3D technology and timetable for mainstream adoption, and I’m sure [...]

When Steve Jobs announced that the iPad would not support Flash, he set off a stampede of vendors racing to support HTML5.  In fact, my inbox is overflowing with vendor press releases announcing their support of the iPad and HTML5.  You won’t see a press release from my company, Digitalsmiths, and here’s why. HTML5 is [...]

Look around: it’s no longer the Wild West out there. Yesterday’s TV Everywhere experiments and pilot programs are morphing into today’s company-wide business priorities for cable providers. Digital delivery of premium video content is a real business, one that is generating real money for media companies. Those same companies need to get together with cable [...]

Like everybody else, I watched the Olympics.  You gotta love the biathlon, the continued excellence of Shaun White, and Lindsey Vonn coming back from an injury to win gold in the women’s downhill skiing event. I catch Olympic fever every two years, and Vancouver 2010 was no different.  The Olympics are a stirring reminder of [...]

By now, everybody from David Carr to my Aunt Janice has weighed in on the Apple iPad and its implications for the multi-platform content space. So I’ll spare you the prognostications except to say this: The iPad is a slick new device on which users can watch premium video content like television and feature films. [...]

By now, we’ve all heard the news that YouTube will be offering digital movie rentals online. First, let me say this: a giant like YouTube jumping into the rental game is a major validation for monetized premium content distribution.  This is a great day for the business. Interesting side note for Digitalsmiths here:  Writing in [...]

If you are in the digital media business, then you probably already know that CES — the Consumer Electronics Show — happened in Las Vegas last week.  CES is the big time: a global forum for major technology companies to roll out their new offerings in an effort to dazzle both consumers and the assembled press. [...]