Blasts From the Past: A Decade (Almost) of StreamingMedia.com Headlines

Oct. 12
iBEAM Files for Bankruptcy; Williams Purchases iBEAM Assets for $25 Million
On Thursday, iBEAM (www.ibeam.com) announced that it has voluntarily filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in a Delaware court. Williams Communications, already a 49% owner of iBEAM, signed a deal yesterday to purchase the assets of iBEAM for $25 million in cash. Williams also said it was giving iBEAM a loan of up to $18 million to continue operations until the asset sale is finalized. At the time of the sale, the loan will be repaid from the proceeds of the asset sale. In June 2001, Williams invested $20 million in cash and $10 million in services in iBEAM, which had been struggling to stay afloat. —JA

Nov. 14
Streaming Media Europe 2001
Against all odds, the streaming media technology market continues to grow. This was underlined at Streaming Media 2001 last month, where the leading streaming companies faced over 4,500 visitors to London’s ExCeL centre in docklands for 3 days of hard selling, debate, and the presentation of new products and services. —Jon Silk

2002
Feb. 4
Proposed MPEG-4 Licensing Draws Fire
In a long-anticipated release, MPEG LA has published a summary of the proposed initial licensing terms for the MPEG-4 Visual technology. Industry reaction is mixed at best, with internet streaming media interests allegedly getting the short end of the stick and moving fast to have their concerns addressed. The terms include the following: the cost of distributing a decoder (player) will be 25 cents with a cap of $1 million per year, the cost of distributing an encoder will be identical to that for a decoder, and a serving fee of two cents per hour for all content (whether streamed, downloaded, or packaged on DVD, CD, etc.) is uncapped. —Bill Bernat

April 29
Streaming Media West Recap
Streaming Media conferences have long been about the latest in new technologies for the streaming industry. This year’s West conference, held last week in Los Angeles, proved no different—with newly announced RealVideo 9, video-on-demand provider Intertainer’s call for 1-MB/s to the home, and MPEG-4 showcased in a keynote speech and lively panel on visual licensing issues. Jonathan Taplin, CEO with Intertainer.tv, kicked off the conference with a bold promise to guarantee all at-home broadband users 1mb-per-second in bandwidth in the next 2 years. As part of the campaign, Taplin urged the audience to email the commissioner of the FCC demanding high-speed bandwidth. Certainly, this guarantee would go a long way in helping Intertainer develop a sustainable business model for VOD, who currently have 100,000 registered users. Taplin also outlined a new online film marketplace targeting budding filmmakers around the world. —Derek Top

2003
April 30
Making Wireless Content Pay
There’s a lot to dislike about wireless media—not the least of which are crummy green-screen graphics, plain text, and slow download times. But there’s a key difference between web and wireless that gets content providers excited: While web users expect free content, wireless phone users know the meter is always on. That’s why many top media companies are looking to wireless for the revenue boost they never got from the web.

Sept. 17
Microsoft Opens Windows Media 9 Codec to SMPTE
Small things come in big packages, 365 pages, to be exact. That’s the size of the massive tome that landed on Peter Symes’ desk recently. Symes is vice president of engineering for the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE). The document contains detailed specifications for the Windows Media 9 compression technology, which Microsoft has submitted to SMPTE for consideration as an official standard. —Larry Bouthillier

Oct. 30
Streaming Media West 2003 Wrap-Up
Mature offerings for software and services for presentation delivery were varied and innovative. The conference was characterized by a collaborative, cooperative atmosphere among the various vendors exhibiting. "It’s great to see more exhibitors, and more customers here with a problem to solve and a ready budget, "said VitalStream’s Jim Bryce. That thought was echoed among many of the exhibitors. The 3-day event also boasted over 100 speakers and presenters covering a wide range of business and technical topics showcasing successful implementations of streaming and digital media technologies. —Larry Bouthillier, Kinley Levack, Christine Perey

2004
Jan. 20
Patently Absurd? Streaming Users Face Acacia Patent Fight
California-based holding company Acacia Research claims it holds patents on streaming, downloading and just about every form of digital audio and video distribution out there—including pushing MP3s from peer-to-peer groups, streaming newscasts from internet radio sites, and delivering movies through cable networks. The company, which currently owns five patents in the U.S. (the oldest dating from 1991), was also granted patents for use in 14 European countries in January 2004. Last year, Acacia sent letters to numerous adult internet sites and radio webcasters demanding a license fee for the utilization of this technology. Not wanting to limit their reach, Acacia is now also going after universities, streaming media service providers, content portals, and Fortune 1000 corporations. Even if your corporation does not stream audio and video from its website and simply links to websites that do, Acacia claims that also violates their patent … In court documents, Acacia said they have sent out over 10,000 letters informing companies they are infringing on their patents. —Dan Rayburn

April 19
Commentary: MPEG-4 Is Dead
I’ve been down on MPEG-4 for a while now, despite my respect for many of the folks associated with the standard. Given the adoption of Microsoft’s Windows Media Video 9 by the DVD Forum, there’s increasing reason to believe, to paraphrase an old Southern expression, that the MPEG-4 dog just won’t hunt. It hasn’t yet and probably never will, at least in any serious commercial way. —Jan Ozer

Aug. 17
Macromedia Introduces Flash Video Kit
In an attempt to bridge the gap between web developers and rich media content producers, Macromedia this week introduced the Flash Video Kit. Bundled with Studio MX 2004 with Flash Professional, the kit features an extension for Dreamweaver that’s aimed squarely at a segment of Macromedia’s market that had yet to make the leap to streaming media. "We realized that a large portion of our user base is made up of HTML experts who don’t know Flash Video and don’t have time to learn it," says Chris Hock, Macromedia’s director of product marketing. "But people who use Dreamweaver want to integrate video into their HTML pages." —Eric Schumacher-RasmussenOct. 13
NASCAR Hops on the Streaming Bandwagon With Kangaroo.TV
Kangaroo and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series to offer attendees handheld "spectator devices" that allow them to follow live content such as in-truck video feeds, team audio communication, timing data, and scoring information as well as a digital version of the media guide. —Kinley Levack

2005
Jan. 5
H.264 Begins Its Ascent
To quote Mark Twain, reports of the codec’s demise are premature. If anything, H.264 is just beginning to gain traction. The signs are everywhere. Starting with IBC2004 in Amsterdam in early September, where Apple showed off an H.264 c