Editorial: Dancing as Fast As We Can

Pity those who came to the industry early. They used to be on top of thisInternet audio/video thing -- call it "streaming media" or "broadbandcontent" or whatever you will. Okay: I count myself as an early adopter.We used to think we knew what we were talking about. For example, Iremember when I could count the number of sites offering daily video contenton one hand, and the number of sites offering regularly updated audiocontent on two hands and a couple of toes. No more. Every day I learnabout a large number of new broadband content sites, most of which didn'texist last week, much less last month or last year. Since I sat down tostart writing this editorial, as a matter of fact, I've received pressreleases from a new broadband network called World Entertainment Network ( www.wen.com) and Lycos, who are launchingseveral 24/7 channels under the brand Lycos TV. That's two in ten minutes.Before the day is over, I'll have received at least two or three dozen moresuch announcements. Do I have time to check out every one of these sites?Yes -- or at least I try -- but only because I am explicitly paid to do so.

From time to time I even learn about broadband content sites that haveexisted for a year or two, and who have huge and rabid audiences and roaringbusiness plans. They grew themselves far, far away from the little cliqueI'd been virtually "hanging" with, on mailing lists and web-boards. Forexample, yesterday was the first time I'd ever heard of Camp Chaos(www.campchaos.com) -- and they've got licensing deals in place withpop.com, a story I've been trying to cover for quite some time. Why wasn'tI all over this from the very beginning?

Ah, well.

It's embarrassing, but it's also exciting. Our business model here atstreamingmedia.com, after all, is to help our customers understand andcapitalize upon the growth of this industry. If the industry weren'tgrowing so quickly, we wouldn't be here. I'd probably still be waitingtables in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and you, dear reader, would be doing whateveryou were doing in 1994, as well. (With the exception of Troy Davis ofLoudEye, who was probably in grade school and would probably have moved onto a doctorate in Nuclear Physics by now).

This editorial is really about streamingmedia.com, of course, and thechanges that are about to be wrought upon your beloved information source.

The challenge before us here is to maintain our leadership role in anindustry that changes every five days (if not every five minutes). To thatend, we're seriously ramping up our editorial efforts particularly, and ourpublishing efforts generally. To that end, we've hired two new full-timeeditors, and I'd like to take a moment to introduce them to you:

Jose Alvear
Senior Editor
Jose isn't exactly new: he's been the editor of the Streaming MediaNewsletter for about a year. We've lured him away from his Brooklynenvirons, and his life as a freelance writer, to our offices here in SanFrancisco. Jose will be spending all of his time with us now, growing andbuilding the news content of our site. I encourage all of you to contactJose directly and let him know what your companies -- or what you asindividuals -- are doing in the streaming media space. Jose's particularcharge, at the moment, is to continue to develop our coverage of timely newsstories, with more emphasis on long-form articles and in-depth analyses ofevents, as well as to keep pace with the steady stream of short importantnews items. Jose will be managing our freelancers, too -- especially thoseinterested in covering fast-breaking news and sudden developments in theindustry:
jose@streamingmedia.com

Scott Baker
Editor
Scott joins us after a long-term association with Evoke (formerly Vstream),where he worked hands-on with streaming media technology from nearly dayone. Scott's particular role at the moment is to develop our technologycoverage, especially the tutorials section of our site, which will belaunching June 1. Scott will also be working on non-timely feature items --stories that cover long-term trends and old-time personalities in theindustry. Again, Scott is in much need of freelancers, especially those whoare interested in writing tutorials and technical reviews:

scott@streamingmedia.com

We're still looking to hire a third Editor, who can help lead our coverageof the growing business of the licensing and selling of content across theweb. We also expect to hire two junior staff writers, an ASP developer ortwo, and a graphic designer. If you're interested in such a position -- orif you just want to chat -- feel free to contact me:

Joey Manley
General Manager
joey@streamingmedia.com

In the time between now and Streaming Media East 2000, you can expect to seea wild array of new editorial features and information applications on thestreamingmedia.com website. Among them:

• a more functional jobs board (geographical browsing, etc)
• deeper, longer stories with a host of new bylines
• three Q&A's every week, instead of one
• "Streaming Site of the Day" instead of "Streaming Site of the Week" (youshould start sending your suggestions to me now)
• the tutorials and product reviews mentioned above
• more discussion lists, with tighter focus on individual subjects (thesehave launchedalready)
• um, more, more, more.

Is this enough? Probably not. More than anything, we need your input tomake this site and this service a success. Please take a minute to fill outour surveyform to help us get a handle on our audience -- and your needs anddesires. Wednesday, May 31, at noon Pacific time, we'll be drawing a nameout of the hat for a free ticket to one of our conferences. Everyone whofills out the survey is entered. How can you resist?