Startups Rush to Pave Way for Web Video
NEW YORK - Video on the Internet has gone from being the next big thing to the current big thing. But murky YouTube videos are just the start there's a lot of room for improvement.
A raft of startups are rushing to supply the tools to make better and more profitable video available. Nearly a dozen video-related startups will be presenting at the DEMO 08 technology conference, starting Monday in Palm Desert, Calif.
The biannual conference, which gives startups and more established companies six minutes on stage to pitch their new products to investors and media, has been the launching pad for several successful ventures over the years, including the Java programming language, TiVo Inc. and Half.com.
Several of the 77 companies presenting this time have been tackling the problem of taking video quality to the next level. It's quite possible to send high-definition video over the Internet, but the cost of doing it at scale is daunting, because it requires about 40 times the bandwidth of a YouTube-quality video.
"If you run any infrastructure that lets people share video, it's really, really expensive," said Dan Putterman, chief executive of San Francisco-based Squidcast Inc.
The company is launching a service that allows users to send video they've shot with their high-definition camcorders to friends and relatives at full resolution, for free.
To do this, users will take help from other users, in a manner similar to peer-to-peer file sharing programs like BitTorrent and KaZaa. Each file that is uploaded gets distributed in small chunks among the computers of many users (who won't notice the chunks or be able to look at them). The intended recipient gets an e-mail with a link. Clicking it starts the download, which pulls the chunks together from the network of user computers like a squid pulling in its tentacles.
In other words, Squidcast itself doesn't need to devote computers or buy bandwidth to transfer user's files. It will finance the service by showing short video ads to the recipients while they download.
"If someone attempted to do this as a hosted platform they would simply go out of business," Putterman said. "It can't be done and that's why it hasn't been done."
Atlanta-based Asankya Inc. is trying to solve the same problem, but for Hollywood rather than home movies. CEO Scott Ryan puts the current cost of distributing an HD movie online at about $3. Considering movies rent for $4 to $5 and the creators have to be paid, there's no real money in it for distributors.
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