YouTube announces the YouTube Nonprofit Program

Hundreds of nonprofits currently leverage YouTube to raise awareness of their causes. Today at the Clinton Global Initiative, YouTube announced the YouTube Nonprofit Program, a way to make it even easier for people to find, watch and engage with nonprofit video content on the site.

YouTube's 2007/2008 Clinton Global Initiative commitment enables nonprofit organizations (in the U.S. those with 501c3 tax filing status) that register for the program to receive a free nonprofit specific YouTube channel where they can upload footage of their work, public service announcements, calls to action and more. The channel will also allow them to collect donations with no processing costs using the newly launched Google Checkout for Non-Profits. YouTube's global platform enables nonprofits to deliver their message, showcase their impact and needs, and encourage supporters to take action.
"Video, unlike any other medium, allows nonprofits to give a tangible demonstration of their efforts, connect with people and exponentially widen their reach," said Douglas Staples, Senior Vice President, Strategic Marketing & Communications from the March of Dimes. "We are excited to be an initial participant in the program. We'll use our YouTube channel to reach out to an audience of all ages and engage them in our mission, which is to give every baby a healthy start, and we encourage other nonprofits to do the same."

YouTube Nonprofit Program participants will receive:

• A premium channel on YouTube that serves as a nonprofit's hub for their uploaded videos. Through the channel, people can connect with a nonprofit via messages, subscriptions, comments and more. Nonprofits will also receive enhanced channel branding features and increased upload capacity.
• Designation as a "Nonprofit" on YouTube that clearly identifies organizations as a nonprofit for YouTube community.
• The ability to embed a Google Checkout donation button on their channel and video watch pages, allowing people to quickly and securely make a contribution directly from YouTube. Starting today, nonprofits who offer Google Checkout for Non-Profits as a donation option -- whether through YouTube or on their own sites -- will receive 100 percent of donated funds, as Google has committed to processing all donations for free through at least the end of 2008.
• In the coming months, nonprofit channels will have a centralized area on YouTube, making them and their videos more easily discoverable.

"When YouTube was founded we dreamed that people would someday leverage the site to make the world a better place," said YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley. "It is an honor to have great organizations and individuals utilizing the YouTube to raise awareness of noble causes and we are thrilled to offer a program that helps them thrive and inspire change."

At launch there will be a thirteen organizations participating in the YouTube Nonprofit Program including:

24 Hours for Darfur * American Cancer Society * Autism Speaks * 92nd Street Y * Asia Society * Strong American Schools' ED in '08 * Friends of the Earth * International Rescue Committee * March of Dimes * YouthNoise * The ONE Campaign * The Clinton Global Initiative * World Vision Australia

Application Process

Nonprofits can apply for a nonprofit channel type by going to youtube.com/nonprofits and filling out a short application, which will be processed by our grants team. This page will also contain information on how to take advantage of this new channel type, as well as some tips for how to use YouTube effectively for advocacy and fundraising.

Credit to TVOver.net

Talking Point: IP-based Television at the crossroads

IPTV News : In about 2002-2003 the availability of high speed broadband networking via ADSL combined with optimised MPEG-2 encoding and the reduction in costs brought about by the move to the single-chip solutions for Set-Top-Boxes (STBs) as pioneered by firms such as Amino with the AmiNET103 and AmiNET110 devices made for a step-change in the history of IP-based television service delivery. The first cross-roads had been reached; it became possible to deliver the required bandwidth at good quality and an affordable cost for the first time. IPTV moved from the lab to the customer; from science project to deployable business venture.
In the years since the number of deployments and their scale has exploded as telephone companies exploited the opportunity to roll out video based services in a wide variety of forms - multicast channel zapping, video on demand, pay per view, with many competing user interfaces and methods of delivery over the basic IP channel.

However, IP delivery is now at a very interesting stage - a second crossroads. Ahead of it down one path is High-Definition TV, which is sweeping through the market and seeing high adoption rates where it can be delivered. The latter qualification though is important. Satellite and Cable providers are blessed with enough bandwidth, and tricks like statistical multiplexing of channels that, in combination with the advances in coding efficiency with MPEG-4 AVC, mean that they are now easily able to deliver HD quality TV to the consumer. IP networks based of Fibre (or perhaps other technologies such as VDSL where range is not a problem) can compete effectively against this, and IP STBs such as the advanced AmiNET130 are delivering MPEG-4 AVC HD content at the consumer premises. Yet there remains a substantial copper-based, ADSL broadband network community out there, for whom the data-rates demanded to put several TVs all running full quality 1920x1080i pixel High Definition TV, perhaps with PVR boxes that record one channel while streaming and displaying another, is well out of reach. Typically these networks are able to deliver 8 megabits per second. To fulfil the multi-room, PVR demands of a home with perhaps two HD TVs one can easily show that at least 25 megabits will be demanded, and perhaps more. This effectively means that operators with these networks have some issues ahead.

But, there is another path open, this lies in the direction of open-access Internet delivered content, offered up from web sites - thousands of them. The future here is foretold in the story of music downloads - iTunes, Napster and so forth - and the simple explosive growth that these exhibited. It became practical to stream or download music once modems were replaced with broadband even in its fairly early forms. 256K bits per second is enough to stream excellent quality compressed audio - four times too much for a V90 modem, but easily done with the first broadband systems. As soon as it was possible, the supernova like explosion was triggered. Video is next. Data rates for video are, now, with MPEG-4 AVC and the Microsoft competitor codecs, such that pretty decent results are possible at below 1 megabit. YouTube and its competitors are the first result, with user-generated content, although the quality of much of it is dubious. Ahead lies a world of professionally produced content published via the web directly by a range of content owners, aggregators and individual organisations with specialist interests. Niche sports, hobbies, ethnic programming and a range of things we have not even thought of yet will appear as "web channels" on the net. Initially the consumer has to access this from the PC, but this will migrate into delivery via the TV set - and this requires a very low cost unit with attractive living room quality styling, and a neat, simple user interface. Amino has anticipated this and developed the AmiNET124 and the second generation AmiNET125 products targeting this future.

Back to the crossroads. Is the future to be found along the High-road to HDTV with 25+ Megabit service delivery? Or should we look for it along the low-road....of myriad web-channels and streaming in the 1 to 2 megabit range.

Perhaps the answer is to be found in that famous Scottish ballad:

“You take the high road, and I'll take the low-road..... and I'll be in Scotland before ye!”

Credit to IPTV News

IPTV in Asia Subscriber Rates Reach 2.7 Million

Research and Markets announces the addition of IPTV in Asia: Carriers Start the Battle to their offering. With a warm up period over the past few years, Asia/Pacific IPTV subscriber numbers have increased quickly. There were 2.7 million subscribers by the end of 2006, an 87.4% growth rate from 2005.

The Asia/Pacific IPTV market's development has remained diversified. Mature markets include Japan and Hong Kong, with approximately 60% of the total subscribers in 2006. They are expected to continuously take the lead in the regional IPTV development process.

Together with the fast expanding broadband infrastructure and decreases in service price, an expanding middle class is transforming China into the future IPTV dragon. Taiwan and Singapore have a relatively higher penetration of broadband and are pioneers in technology adoptions. For South Korea, the government regulatory issues are expected to be solved soon.

Australia and New Zealand are lagging behind other developed markets, with conservative attitudes from major telecom operators and low general public interest. Other markets like India, Malaysia, and Thailand, together with China, are fueling the growth of the Asia/Pacific IPTV market. Indonesia and the Philippines are expected to provide little uptake due to their weak infrastructures. It is expected that by 2009, IPTV will be present in all of the markets in the region.

Finally, it is worth mentioning that IP-based HDTV is on its way to the Asia/Pacific, with both Hong Kong PCCW and Singapore Singtel expected to start offering IP-based HDTV in 2007.

Credit to tvover.net

IPTV Revenue $26 Billion by 2011

Telcos increasingly are looking to IPTV offerings to augment their declining voice communications revenue, causing the market for IPTV video services to rise by a factor of nearly 34 from 2006 to 2011, iSuppli predicts. The market for IPTV video services will rise to $26.3 billion in 2011, up from $779.2 million in 2006. This figure does not include advertising and value-added TV services.

Telcos view IPTV as an opportunity to recapture the revenue generated by many of the Internet-based services that have bypassed them by traveling through their broadband pipes. However, IPTV will deliver significantly more than just video services, offering access to digital music, on-demand gaming, data services, home security, and other items. These value-added offerings will boost the global IPTV video revenue stream by more than $1 billion by 2010.

While this represents huge growth, IPTV still will have significant room for expansion in the years following 2011.

iSuppli also found that:

• Many IPTV deployment strategies are focused on next-generation video services. Because of this, competition for services is likely to focus on features and benefits, rather than price. Features such as high-definition programming, digital video recording service, and remote access are the main features that telcos are focusing on to gain a competitive advantage. Pay-per-view and video on demand service will combine to generate nearly $300 million in revenue in 2007.
• Advertising promises to be another significant revenue source to augment IPTV video. iSuppli believes IPTV operators have an opportunity to deliver unique value to advertisers through behavioral targeting and interactivity. This will drive IPTV-based advertising revenue to surpass $1 billion annually in 2010.
• In 2011, China will lead the world in IPTV subscribers. The massive size of the population, combined with the government's technology emphasis for the 2008 Olympics, are the principal reasons for the growth. Revenue, however, will be driven by the United States. North America will account for more than $10 billion in IPTV subscription revenue by 2011.

iSuppli's report, "IPTV Content & Services 2007: Telecom Companies Turn up the Heat," provides an analysis of IPTV and reviews the various tiers of service. The report then takes a look at the telco-delivered IPTV market from a value chain perspective including content providers, service providers, broadband portals and aggregators, Internet VoD, Internet TV and "over-the-top" offerings, platforms, BSS and OSS, and CE equipment and technology. The customer premise equipment implications of IPTV are examined in terms of set-top boxes, modems, gateways, home networking, digital rights management and conditional access, middleware, and client software. Finally, the IPTV content and services market is forecasted by geographic region for the IPTV video services market (including VoD, DVR, and HD), advertising models in IPTV, value-added services, community and personalization, and by region.

Credit to tvover.net

Motorola Introduces Open Software Platform for IPTV STB's

Motorola introduces a set-top software solution using an open Internet Protocol platform on its VIP 1200 series set-top boxes. The KreaTV application platform uses the Linux Operating system to help support multiple entertainment and video service applications on Motorola's VIP set-top series, allowing service providers and other third parties to easily customize and deploy revenue-generating applications via development kits and custom training on the toolsets. Interactive features such as programming guides, viewer voting tools, and advanced gaming can be seamlessly integrated by the service provider using the open-platform system in conjunction with third-party middleware and software providers.

Operators in North America can leverage the flexibility of KreaTV software to help introduce features like multi-room DVR, video on-demand and interactive teleconferencing. The open KreaTV software solution is designed to meet carriers' needs and to help satisfy consumer IPTV demand in any market.

Motorola's 2006 acquisition of Kreatel Communications led to the addition of the open software platform on Motorola's popular VIP set-top series.

The Motorola VIP 1200 series with KreaTV is a compact, interactive IP set-top that supports high-definition and standard-definition high-quality digital video. The KreaTV open software platform is integrated with leading North American middleware and conditional access applications to help provide IPTV users with a rich and secure viewing experience.

Motorola is demonstrating the VIP 1200 with KreaTV software at this week's NXTcomm exhibition in Chicago. To date, Motorola has shipped more than one million IPTV set tops.

Credit to tvover.net

Motorola Introduces Open Software Platform for Its IPTV Set Tops in North America

Unleashing the potential of IPTV, Motorola today introduced a set-top software solution using an open Internet Protocol (IP) platform on its VIP 1200 series set-top boxes.

The KreaTV(TM) application platform uses the Linux Operating system to help support multiple entertainment and video service applications on Motorola's VIP set-top series, allowing service providers and other third parties to easily customize and deploy revenue-generating applications via development kits and custom training on the toolsets. Interactive features such as programming guides, viewer voting tools, and advanced gaming can be seamlessly integrated by the service provider using the open-platform system in conjunction with third-party middleware and software providers.

Operators in North America can leverage the flexibility of KreaTV(TM) software to help introduce features like multi-room DVR, video on-demand (VOD) and interactive teleconferencing. The open KreaTV(TM) software solution is designed to meet carriers' needs and to help satisfy consumer IPTV demand in any market.

Motorola's 2006 acquisition of Kreatel Communications led to the addition of the open software platform on Motorola's popular VIP set-top series.

"Motorola is building on our global IPTV leadership by extending the level of high-quality, on-demand and interactive services for consumers in North America on a proven hardware platform," said Doug Means, Motorola corporate vice president and general manager. "The KreaTV(TM) open-platform software gives service providers a choice in working with the best IPTV allies and application developers."

"As demand for IPTV services and set-tops continues to grow, service providers will be able to leverage an open system to bring together best-of-breed technologies and applications to deliver a truly next-generation experience to consumers," states Michelle Abraham, principal analyst, In-Stat.

The Motorola VIP 1200 series with KreaTV(TM) is a compact, interactive IP set-top that supports high-definition (HD) and standard-definition (SD) high-quality digital video. The KreaTV(TM) open software platform is integrated with leading North American middleware and conditional access applications to help provide IPTV users with a rich and secure viewing experience.

Motorola is demonstrating the VIP 1200 with KreaTV(TM) software at this week's NXTcomm exhibition in Chicago. To date, Motorola has shipped more than one million IPTV set tops.

About Motorola
Motorola (NYSE:MOT) is known around the world for innovation and leadership in wireless and broadband communications. Inspired by our vision of Seamless Mobility, the people of Motorola are committed to helping you get and stay connected simply and seamlessly to the people, information, and entertainment that you want and need. We do this by designing and delivering "must have" products, "must do" experiences and powerful networks -- along with a full complement of support services. A Fortune 100 company with global presence and impact, Motorola had sales of US $42.9 billion in 2006. For more information about our company, our people and our innovations, please visit http://www.motorola.com/.

MOTOROLA and the Stylized M Logo are registered in the US Patent and Trademark Office. Linux is the registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in the U.S. and other countries. All other product or service names are the property of their respective owners.

Credit to thomasnet.com

Mobile Phones As Mass Media: The Upcoming Technonlogical Revolution - Part 1

An evolving historic technological revolution is under way, which is creating new industries, new products, new services and, unmercifully redefining or even destroying others. It is more powerful, with greater reach and is growing faster than any other media-ecology.

It is the grass roots of the mobile mass media.

It is not as clear and coherent, with established well known global brands, as the older Internet is today, with its Google’s, Yahoo’s, YouTube’s and Second Life’s. But the foundations are now being laid for the future corporate giants for the 7th mass media to emerge.

Differing from the internet, mobile as the 7th mass media channel is similar to the five legacy mass media, economically viable with a stable business model from day one. Yet, differing from the legacy mass media, all of which are witnessing a decline in their audiences and revenues, mobile like the internet, is an interactive media enabling it to fully capitalize on social networking and digital communities.

But more importantly from a media audience point-of-view, there already are over twice as many mobile phones worldwide as there are personal computers, nearly twice as many mobiles as TV sets. The only mass media that is carried upon the owner at all times, mobile is also the first mass media where near 100% accuracy is feasible on measuring the audience.

In the following report originally published by Alan Moore, CEO of SMLXL, you will be able to read about the evolution mass media and the trends they established within our culture and our communication habits. Today I republish for you the first part of the white paper, which introduces the topic by rolling out the history of mass media and their characteristics.

Here more details: Read More
Credit to masternewmedia.org