Placing pre-rolls on the basis of time instead of number of clips
The new MSN Video is limiting pre-roll ads to one per three minutes users spend on the site, as a way to drive more usage. Placing pre-rolls on the basis of time instead of number of clips played can be an interesting proposition.
MSN is one of the few sites that still allow 30-second pre-rolls. Its general manager explained that the industry needs to evolve, and MSN wants something less intrusive. Well, that’s better than doing nothing.
Free FOX shows coming to iTunes
FOX has decided giving away for free on iTunes some of season premiere episodes, like Prison Break, Bones, and American Dad.
FOX hopes that by allowing downloads for free, people will want to pay $0.99 for each additional show or at least watch them on TV. It is simply a way to hook you up.
Video aggregation sites becoming more popular
Just embedding player from YouTube, LiveLeak, DalyMotion and other popular video sites, some people are launching aggregation sites, a kind of Drudge Reports of video.
Take Breitbart.com , that features a bunch of news clips from TV stations and networks, mostly without any distribution agreement.
Facial recognition search tested
Reuters is testing a facial recognition search feature that scans across hundreds hours of video. For example type Angelina Jolie, and the search returns a list of clips you can clip. It is been developed by Viewdle . Pretty cool.
Packed screens as a sign of the Internet times
Television screens are getting more and more cluttered with graphics called snipes. Network executives are facing the age of channel surfing, ad skipping, and screen-based multitasking. Screens are cluttered not just with ads, but with news crawls and other stream of information, even mini-trailers. Those additions are making the experience of watching television more closely of using a computer or a videogame.
For example, ABC introduces in some of its shows a series of icons in the lower right of the screen that direct viewers to related content in other media, like books, DVDs and Websites. ABC explains that is intended “to accommodate viewer multimedia, multichannel habits and still lead them back to ABC.”
But many viewers say that those snipes and bugs are degrading their experience of watching television. Research suggests that packed screen can impede comprehension. It is very difficult to absorb at the same time information like stock quotes, weather update, and news.
This trend has reshaped news broadcast, where the sight of a lone anchor talking to a camera is rare.
This is what an expert says: “With the Internet offering an increasingly sophisticated yet chaotic visual experience, television must decide how much it want to mimic the computer. TV is having to reinvent itself.”
NYTimes wrote an article about it.
