Mobile Video Tipping Points

Geschrieben am 31.10.2008 von markra

Do you watch mobile video on your phone? If you’re like most mobile phone users, the fast answer is “Probably not.” While there are more than 3 billion active mobile phones in the world today, 2007 found only 4% of mobile users subscribing to mobile video services. It’s not for lack of content — there are 15 billion Web videos on the Internet. So why aren’t people watching mobile videos? To date, users haven’t found the mobile video experience compelling enough. The list of adoption barriers include: - Price - Image quality - Rich content - Long download times - Device support - The user experience (search and discovery) - Consumers’ lack of awareness of the feature And frankly, it hasn’t been easy for content owners and carriers to deploy mobile video. Typically, publishing video has required very manual formatting and delivery processes that require costly administration steps and storage. The Pandora’s Box for mobile video first cracked open in 2008. Key milestone events inspired the evolution of the mobile video market - events like the release of the iPhone, NBC’s broadcast of the Beijing Olympics, the 2008 Presidential election, and the increasing availability of innovative, video-enabled devices. Innovation of Devices and Networks Since the release of the iPhone, many handset manufacturers have launched so called “iPhone-killers” that aspire to match the sexiness and usability of the iPhone. This new generation of smartphones have large screens, video-streaming capabilities, and high speed 3G and WiFi connectivity. They are, essentially, powerful multimedia devices. Many currently popular smartphones like BlackBerry and Windows Mobile have crippled multimedia capabilities. In many cases, these devices do not support video streaming, have file download limitations, or have small screens, not appropriate for video viewing. RIM has deployed video streaming capability in its latest generation of smartphones, but there are still millions of older smartphones out in the market a whole generation behind. Examples of next-generation, media-centric devices include the Sprint Instinct, the T-Mobile Android G1, and the impending BlackBerry Storm. These devices all include WiFi, video streaming codecs (like RTSP video streaming), and large touch screens that don’t display a keyboard while streaming a video in full-screen mode. Certainly, the increasing influx of large screen, highly connected, multimedia friendly devices will help drive adoption of video streaming features. Dave Sloan http://mashable.com/2008/10/30/mobile-video-tipping-points/