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Posts Tagged ‘Media Publishers’

Brightcove Comes To Yahoo Connected TVs, But Web Video Is Still Stuck In Widget Hell

If you own an Internet-connected TV that is compatible with Yahoo’s TV widgets (AKA, a Yahoo Connected TV), you may soon start seeing video produced for the Web on your TV. Brightcove announced today that media publishers using its online video platform can now distribute their videos through Yahoo’s Widget Engine, which powers the widgets on Yahoo-Connected TVs. These TVs are made by Sony, Samsung, Vizio, and LG, which show widgets along the bottom displaying data and content from the Web. These include your Facebook and Twitter streams, stock quotes, the weather, Amazon on-demand videos, and now Web videos powered by Brightcove.

A lot of print publications use Brightcove to power video on their Websites, and some of these already have Yahoo Connecetd TV widgets. These include MyRecipes, Cooking Light, Real Simple, Southern Living, Sunset, AllYou and ThisOldHouse. There are a lot of Time Inc. titles in there. TheStreet.com, Wine Spectator, Slate, and The Hollywood Reporter now also have TV widgets through Brightcove.

Yahoo also announced a partnership with MIPS Technologies today, which makes processors for Internet-connected TVs and set-top boxes. The idea that you need a special TV to watch video content from the Web seems strange. As long as it’s a flat-panel TV, why should it matter, right? But these integrations are more about bringing data to TVs from the Web in a friendly format. I’m glad Yahoo is pushing this along, but at some point hopefully open standards will develop so that any widget, data, or content from the Web can be viewed on any TV. Why should it go through a Yahoo widget? I get widgets from Verizon FIOS TV on all my TVs, even my old CRT. I don’t believe those are Yahoo Widgets.

The other issue is just getting people to use these widgets. I have yet to even set up my Twitter or Facebook widgets on my TV. I think I looked up the weather once. But if I really want to do all that Web stuff, I have my iPhone or my laptop. There is a reason WebTV failed. Widgets are not going to fare any better. However, if they can be used to put Web video on your TV, I could see that gaining traction. Except that you have to remember to click on the widget button, which is still an unnatural act, instead of just surfing through the regular channels. Once these additional Web channels can be incorporated into the digital guide through which people surf TV, then Web video can be treated just like anything else on TV. It shouldn’t matter where it’s coming from.

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Peerset Rolls Out Psychographic Data Tool For Advertisers And Brands

Startup Peerset is launching an advertising data tool that generates “psychographic” recommendations and ad placement advice, based on content analysis. Peerset’s proprietary technology organically links interests, values, lifestyles and attitudes to brands, letting advertisers see the constellations of these links.

Sound confusing? That’s because Peerset’s technology is fairly complicated. The startup basically examines interactions on social media sites and then interprets these connections and provides recommendations to brands and advertisers based on the results. For example, if the ad subject is “Fashion,” Peerset may determine that the ideal audience is also communicating about “Sex and the City,” “sushi,” and “Madonna.” Peerset says that this data can help advertisers and brands figure out what audiences are likely to engage and connect strongly with a product or service.

Peerset goes beyond just giving advertisers data on target audiences; the startup actually integrates with existing ad serving systems and will place contextual adds next to connecting “subjects.” Peerset will actually execute media buys either through social media publishers or through ad networks which let you target by keyword. For example, the “Fashion” ad would be placed next to content about Sex and the City or sushi.

And Peerset’s technology lets advertisers create campaigns that target and connect with audiences who share similar values, interests or lifestyles. It should be interesting to see if Peerset’s technology proves to be profitable for advertisers and brands.

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Offerpal says game sites will make more money with its new survey engine

Offerpal Media announced a new way to monetize video games by allowing users to earn virtual currency in games in exchange for filling out online surveys.

The Offerpal SURVEYS platform is available for game developers and social media publishers to implement in their games. In these games, users can earn virtual currency by filling out surveys. Those surveys are sponsored by advertisers or market researchers who want to reach certain kinds of users.

Normally, users have to pay for virtual goods, such as more powerful weapons, with real money in games. The SURVEYS platform represents an alternative payment system. It means that gamers who don’t have the money to pay for virtual goods can still do something valuable — filling out surveys — that allows them to earn goods.

Offerpal is making the announcement at the New York Games Conference today. At its launch, developers will be able to monetize using more than 1,000 different surveys available in over 50 countries from top market researchers such as Nielsen NetRatings, comScore, OTX Research, Synovate and others.

Offerpal has done surveys before and they are among the most popular offers, said Anu Shukla, chief executive of Offerpal. The new platform is a stand-alone product that developers can use if they want to focus exclusively on surveys and start making money through them in a matter of minutes. Offerpal’s direct sales staff is constantly adding new survey offers. To date, more than 5 million surveys have been completed through Offerpal and about $12 million has been paid out to publishers as a result of revenue from the offers, Shukla said.

Offerpal was founded in 2007 and has 65 employees. To date, it has issue more than 30 billion virtual points to more than 115 million consumers, who have used the apps or games of 1,200 publishers. Offerpal has raised more than $20 million to date.

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Dotopen Opens For Business – It’s Like FriendFeed For Companies

Barcelona-based dotopen has launched its B2B communication platform in public beta today in another attempt to create a successful matchmaking service for businesses where decision makers could come to collaborate and connect with each other.

We’ve heard that a million times before, but I got an early peak of the platform when I was in Spain for the Mobile 2.0 Europe conference last month and there is one thing that I think differentiates dotopen from the likes of LinkedIn, XING, etc.: it’s not so much focused on connecting people in companies than it is to provide an up-to-date, stream of information on the company itself and start from there.

When I got the demo, I immediately thought of it like some sort of ‘FriendFeed for companies’, and the startup’s founders Rudy De Waele and Carles Ferreiro said there are effectively some comparisons to be made in that regard. The idea is for companies to set up a public profile on the service and dynamically and manually populate it with streams of information, creating a virtual ecosystem of businesses that decision makers could use to find new partners and clients.

I registered a startup I’m involved with myself, Oxynade, to see what kind of data can be added to the public profile (which you can find here). Apart from basic company information, you can add streams and social networking profiles for key management, indicate what you’re looking for as a company (e.g. ‘new partnerships with media publishers’) and insert a stream of feeds from blogs, Twitter accounts, etc. You can also detail your financials and which companies you’ve partnered, affiliated and/or competing with.

You could deem dotopen to be a potential competitor for our own CrunchBase, but the difference is that dotopen focuses more on wrapping an open community feel to the service targeted at company management only, while CrunchBase is a free wiki-based database accessible to everyone.

It’s an interesting concept, but time will tell if it will be able to attract enough companies to register a profile and effectively use the platform to expand their business. As usual, there’s the chicken or egg problem: dotopen can only be really useful when there are lots of companies sharing data, so the goal would be to try and get as much traction from day one (that would be today) and make the experience good enough for them to share and recommend the service to others.

What’s your take?

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