US incumbent telco, Verizon, says that it is developing a pilot VOD service, dubbed "Community Studio," for its Microsoft-powered FiOS TV service
(note: FiOS TV is now available in parts of California, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Texas and Virginia), which will feature public interest and civil rights content targeted at ethnic minorities and other groups historically underserved by traditional television.
The telco says that the concept for the new service, which is scheduled to launch later this quarter, emerged in discussions with over 35 civil rights leaders. "FiOS TV's amazing capacity enables us to offer a wide variety of programming, including diverse content featuring voices from the public interest community," Kathryn C. Brown, Verizon's SVP of public policy development and corporate responsibility, said in a prepared statement. "Our viewers will benefit from additional content choices, and the organizations will gain the opportunity to reach our diverse and growing subscriber base nationwide."
Verizon's initial partners in developing programming for the new service are the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the National Hispanic Media Coalition, the American Association for People with Disabilities, the Black Leadership Forum and the Distance Learning Association. While these organizations will be able to offer programming on the service free of charge, Verizon says that it will accept that programming at its own discretion. As part of the Community Studio project, Verizon's existing VOD service provider, TVN Entertainment (provides, among other things, backend support, transport and element management tools for Verizon's VOD offering), will provide the organizations with an unspecified number of hours of encoding, asset management and distribution services.
DAVE.TV Lets Consumers Create their own Broadband TV Channels
Broadband video distribution company, DAVE.TV (the company's name is an acronym for "Distributed Audio Video Entertainment Television"), has launched a service it is calling the "Social Broadcast Network" (SBN), which allows end-users not only to upload and broadcast their own videos, but to create their own TV channels (which DAVE.TV is calling "MyChannels") featuring their own content, content from other DAVE.TV users, and ad-supported content from DAVE.TV's network of content partners. The service thus enables end-users to create playlists showcasing their own creations and their tastes in media, and share them with their family and friends.
According to the company, SBN is designed to capitalize on the success of user-generated content services, such as YouTube, and of social networking sites, such as MySpace.
Among other things, SBN allows end-users to embed a DAVE.TV MyChannels Player into their own MySpace page, blog or Web site, so that the content lives on their site rather than on a central portal site. DAVE.TV is touting this feature as changing the paradigm of media distribution from the current "one-to-many" model, where users go to a central portal to explore and acquire content, to a "many-to-many more" model, where users can explore and acquire content from their peers. As an incentive for end-users to embed the MyChannels Player, DAVE.TV plans to share advertising revenues for any ads viewed via the Player on end-users' sites. "With DAVE.TV's new Social Broadcast Network, we are empowering a whole new generation of consumers by enabling them to create, share and broadcast content," DAVE.TV CEO, Rex Wong, said in a prepared statement. "We are revolutionizing media distribution by de-centralizing distribution while leveraging viral distribution and word-of-mouth marketing."
DAVE.TV says that it is working with various studios and record labels to create applications that will allow end-users to adapt those studios' and labels' content. According to the company, the first such application will launch in the coming months, and will allow end-users to make their own music videos.
Sci Fi Channel Launches Broadband TV Service, "Sci Fi Pulse"
NBC Universal's Sci Fi Channel has launched a broadband TV service, called "Sci Fi Pulse."
The service currently features complete episodes of select Sci Fi Channel original series, full-length uncut Sci Fi Channel original movies, behind-the-scenes footage, deleted scenes and more. During the summer, it will start rolling out exclusive original content, including a weekly news show, Webisode spin-offs of Sci Fi Channel shows, and user-generated video. It will also host the return of the channel's "Exposure" online film festival. "'Sci Fi Pulse' delivers on our commitment to exploit new digital opportunities for our audience to enjoy and get involved in our programming," Sci Fi Channel general manager, Dave Howe, said in a prepared statement. "Our broadband channel is primed to be the category-killer destination for genre content on the Web, and will further strengthen our relationship with our viewers, building an even bigger online community."
The new service's Webisode offerings are part of NBC Universal's "TV 360" multiplatform content strategy (note: for more on the strategy, see [itvt]'s recent interview with NBC Universal's director of interactive TV product development, Jonathan Dakss, in Issue 6.71). The Sci Fi Channel's participation in the initiative will see it offering original Webisodes of "Battlestar Galactica," and of its forthcoming shows, "Eureka" and "Motel Man" (note: the latter is a working title). It will also see every Sci Fi Channel show currently in development offering some kind of unique broadband component.
Sci Fi Pulse will also feature a fair amount of interactivity in addition to providing content on-demand. The Sci Fi Channel plans to post several potential series pilots on the service for viewer feedback, and says that the fate of the pilots will be "determined in large part" by their reception by Sci Fi Pulse viewers. The Exposure festival, meanwhile, will present Sci Fi Pulse viewers with a series of short films and invite them to vote for their favorites. The films with the most votes will be featured in a two-hour special that will air on the Sci Fi Channel and, possibly, on other NBC Universal linear channels, and viewers will then vote for the best film from the special. The filmmakers with the most votes will have the opportunity to be involved in creating one of the Sci Fi Channel's Saturday night action movies.
MSN in Broadband Programming Deals with Reveille, Be Jane
--Deals are Part of a Microsoft Initiative, Called "MSN Originals"
Microsoft's MSN service has launched an initiative, called "MSN Originals," which it says will allow "top brands [to] tell their stories beyond standard media through in-content integration." As part of the initiative, MSN has signed content partnerships with independent Hollywood production and distribution company, Reveille (note: programs produced by the latter include NBC's "The Office" and "The Biggest Loser," FX's "30 Days," and MTV's "Date My Mom"), and with Be Jane, Inc., a company that produces multimedia content and operates a Web community focused on encouraging women to involve themselves in the traditionally male sphere of home improvement. MSN says that MSN originals will draw on content and services provided by these and other partners to provide consumers with video, interactive community features and multimedia-rich editorial.
MSN's deal with Reveille will see the latter creating and producing original online programming for its service: MSN is creating a production fund that Reveille will use to recruit writing, producing and performing talent, in order to produce pilots and other entertainment programming designed specifically for the Internet.
According to the New York Times, the deal with Reveille has a one-year term and will see the production company creating 10 pilots for MSN; to date, the newspaper reports, four shows have been greenlit, including 1) a comedy about an airline pilot that will likely star Tom Arnold and that will be divided into two-and-a-half minute episodes; 2) a show called "Under the Influence," which will pair musicians with one of the people who inspired them; 3) "Face Off," which the Times describes as "an interactive 'Crossfire' with a pop-culture slant"; and a show with the working title, "Chef to the Rescue," in which chefs will provide advice to people preparing meals. Microsoft and Reveille say that programming created under their partnership will be offered in both linear and non-linear formats and will feature audience participation. Shows that prove successful on MSN may subsequently be launched on traditional television, mobile and other platforms, the companies say.
"The digital future has arrived, and in collaboration with MSN we will be creating new forms of content without boundaries," Reveille CEO, Ben Silverman, said in a prepared statement.
"We believe in a multiplatform world where the best elements of an idea can be tailored to the attributes of the specific media, enabling the audience to have more enriched experiences and advertisers to contextualize themselves in a more profound way."
MSN's deal with Be Jane, meanwhile, will see the latter creating an original online series on home improvement, targeted at women. The series, which will be hosted by Heidi Baker and Eden Jarrin, will provide project suggestions and tips, and will feature the stories of women across the country who have undertaken major home-improvement projects. According to MSN, the series will be "deeply integrated" into the MSN portal's MSN Lifestyle, MSN Spaces and MSN Video areas.
MSN says that it will offer multiple advertising and sponsorship opportunities in conjunction with the new MSN Originals broadband video content: in addition to traditional display and streaming video advertising, it will offer advertisers product-placement opportunities in the content, as well as the opportunity to "be deeply involved in the early stages of content creation and production": Reveille is noted for having funded the NBC reality TV series, "The Restaurant," entirely via product placements.
Narrowstep Powering Golf, Martial Arts Broadband TV Channels
Broadband TV infrastructure company, Narrowstep
(note: the company--whose flagship TelVOS platform powers a number of high-profile broadband TV services, including the ITV Local service of UK commercial terrestrial broadcaster, the Independent Television Network--has reported a significant increase in revenue for its recently concluded fiscal fourth quarter--see article in this issue), has teamed with Brand Live TV to launch a broadband TV channel called GolfBug.tv.
The channel, as its name suggests, is devoted to golf, and provides a daily schedule of programming targeted at players of all levels. "The channel combines news from the pro tours, expert tuition, information on the world's best courses and resorts, interviews with leading golf figures, as well as reviews of the latest equipment," GolfBug.tv's managing director, Andrew Cooke, said in a prepared statement. "There are also live and on-demand broadcasts of great action from events, old and new, and GolfBug.tv will look to carry on the fun and humor that golfers share at the weekend. Using telvOS, Narrowstep's dynamic server technology, we have found that television over Internet Protocol combines the best of traditional broadcasting with the user-control and interaction expected from a Web site. Therefore, our viewers will be able to watch a daily schedule of programming, but also view video content, live as well as on-demand, when and where they wish: at home, at work or while traveling."
In other Narrowstep news: the company's telvOS platform is also powering a new broadband TV channel devoted to martial arts. Dubbed Martial Arts TV and available free of charge to consumers in the UK, the channel features a line-up of content at launch that includes coverage of Thai kickboxing, independent movies, original animation, music videos, and exercise and training videos. According to Narrowstep, the channel--whose management team includes a number of former executives of Paramount, Universal, MTV, EMI, HMV, PolyGram, and UPC--has several large-scale programming deals in the works. The channel also provides various interactive features, including forums, blogs and event and club listings. Like other telvOS channels, it provides consumers with the option of watching scheduled live and recorded programming and VOD, and supports viewing speeds of between 56Kb and 1800Kb (telvOS automatically detects each viewer's Internet speed on log-in). According to Narrowstep, Martial Arts TV plans to expand its broadband service internationally and eventually to launch on digital TV platforms.
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