Trends in 2007: Traditional Media Conquering Online Video

In 2006, many businesses observed YouTube and were impressed by its capacity to attract an increasing number of Internet users every day. A certain number of businesses spent the year trying to understand and develop models to attract Internet users to the social network of online video which reaches always a market share of almost 50%.

Businesses belonging to traditional media such as television broadcasters are definitely first in line. They have arrived at the stage where their viewers have been continually decreasing month after month and, they too, want their part of the market share of online advertising.

Unfortunately, not all television broadcasters, cable distributors, and other suppliers of video via traditional means will not have the winning ticket to enter in this world where, more than ever before, Internet users have control. We expect to see the creation of many YouTube copycats that will never be profitable and will soon shut down. In fact, operating a website like YouTube is not free…you have to think of the millions of gigaoctets of band width broadcasted daily that is necessary to post the videos.

Let’s not be too pessimistic…we will not only see flops! There are certainly many possibilities. Businesses that will probably succeed are those which will surmise how the creation of a website like YouTube can respond to their business objectives. These businesses will have to be conscious of the assets that they will need to dedicate to it in order to offer something of value to Internet users.

Personally, I cannot wait to see the Venice Project from the Skype producers as well as the use of the BitTorrent network to offer high quality content while using less band width.