Sony Bravia Tries Bringing AOL Video Into the Living Room
January 8, 2007, 8:53 PM
Scott Fulton, BetaNews: Over a decade ago, there was a big skirmish over whether Microsoft or PC vendors had the right to decide whether the AOL logo could be featured prominently on new users' default desktops. The issue became about bundling, and the idea that a service can't prove itself to the consumer without a feature built-in.
Today, Sony is premiering the latest in its Bravia line of high-definition digital TV components (the word "Bravia" is presented in all-caps, but it's not an acronym, so I won't follow suit). One of its key features is something called an "Internet Video Link," which is essentially the capability for the TV tuner component to dial up Internet videos from a major service, just as easily as it dials up channels from the TV service provider or antenna. Perhaps there's a hint of irony in the fact that Sony's provider of choice is AOL Video, which AOL has recently been making over as one of its principal services, perhaps as important or more so than e-mail and instant messaging.
But with Internet video such a mercurial business these days, how long can Sony's new high-class components be expected to continue to tune in AOL Video, giving them high-definition access people's amateur, low-definition backyard animal videos? We asked our Sharon Fisher to investigate.
Sharon Fisher, BetaNews Senior CES Analyst: What AOL announced was a partnership with Sony to make content from AOL Video available through Sony's Bravia Internet Video Link. What that means is, if you buy a Sony television, you can gain access to video content from the Internet via an optional module without requiring a PC. That's going to be available this summer.
Now, Sony is the #1 television manufacturer, according to DisplaySearch. And AOL Video has the advantage of all sorts of legitimate content because it's owned by Time Warner. However, it hasn't been terribly successful; according to Hitwise, as of December 2006 it had only a 2.95% market share among video services, placing it sixth behind Yahoo video. That's a decline from 4.28% market share last May, and that's compared to a 45.92% share for YouTube - up three points since May.
Because of this, AOL Video retooled itself in August to support user-uploadable videos, like YouTube does. And they did indeed take a big jump in August; HitWise said they went from 10,000 hits to 1.23 million hits. In comparison, however, YouTube gets more than 100 million hits per day. And that was before YouTube's acquisition by Google.
So we've got several factors at work here.
First, now that YouTube has been legitimized by the Google purchase, they're cracking down on the bootlegged official video. So what you might end up with is a two-tiered system, where you go to AOL Video for the official stuff and YouTube for the user-contributed, fun stuff.
Second, the two companies have very different business models. Because AOL Video is part of Time Warner, it doesn't necessarily have to make money on its own. It can be used as a marketing arm for Time Warner. Google, on the other hand, makes its money with content-based ads, and I would expect that YouTube to be leveraging that before long.
Scott, you made a joke about, "Here's some videos I downloaded for you of possums chasing squirrels," so just as a test I sent some Google e-mail with that text, and I had all sorts of ads pop up about pest removal, possum planters for the garden, and so on.
Scott Fulton: Which was much appreciated. Now I have a source for getting rid of my possum problem.
Sharon Fisher: Third, Sony is very definitely not being exclusive with AOL -- in fact, they announced that they're also supporting Yahoo Video and Grouper and are in discussions with "other companies." I asked the Sony rep, "Like Google?" and he said, "Maybe." Nothing is stopping Google from making a similar agreement with Sony for YouTube content.
Scott Fulton: My possum can whup your squirrel, Sharon. Bring it on. Thanks for the research.
Post a Comment