I just wanted to add this blog post to motivate innovators to increase their contribution to my community Innovation for Creativity, which can be found here: http://www.i4cworld.org.

This is a mixed community with a very specific role: To create a dialog between the creative professions and technology innovators.

When I was in high school I was one of those kids who abhorred having to take science and math not only did I struggle to pass tests and exams, none of my teachers ever considered I could have an aptitude for their subjects. On the other hand I excelled in the Visual Arts, coming from a family where basically everyone was in a creative profession I accepted fate early on and prepared myself for Art School. However through a set of unforeseen circumstances and a passion to see the world I never did get to go to Art school, eventually I settled on a job in tourism and later on went back to university to study Sociology. I caught an entrepreneurial vibe during the late 90’ies and started my own business.

At this time a graduate in Computer Sciences came in to take care of our office computer network and created a website for me, his enthusiasm for innovation was catching, I began to see the opportunities that lay ahead using the internet to accelerate my business and absorbed everything he could teach me within a short time. Later I started creating my own websites using MS Frontpage, then I switched to Macromedia and Adobe software, I taught myself html, xml, MySql explored all the aspects of creating data connections, data distribution systems, system architectures, peer to peer networks, asp tools etc. There is very little I haven’t spent time learning to do, even the inside of my pc is assembled by yours truly.

It was when I was working at an advertising agency in Belgium a few years ago as a business development consultant that my interest in new media became more prevalent. I started on a mission to present the creative department with tools to create advertising campaigns which in my opinion would increase consumer engagement and efficiency for the advertiser.

The first campaigns introduced the simple concept of attaching an http request to make a phone call to the viewer of a viral movie. The technology provider was a company which sold CRM tools such as Click to Call mainly to large ecommerce companies. They had never thought about targeting their products to be used by advertising agencies in campaigns. However thanks to the creative vision of the sales director and the flexibility of their technology department we achieved creating a new product and to date one of the most successful viral campaigns in Europe.

But this story is not without its pitfalls along the way. The technology company enthused by its success, launched the new product commercially, sales were coming their way however sales cycles were lengthy and very complex. The dialog between creative departments in ad agencies and the sales engineers were never simple. There were always a zillion questions left to be answered, could they do it this way, that way, could the technology be tweaked to do this, that or the other.

In technology we like to think anything is possible, the excellent conceptually creative mind asks a new question: If anything is possible why won’t you do it? The answer is usually far removed from his reality, this is not his art, and where anything is possible that the human imagination sets forth, this is a business where innovators work within constraints of time and commercial priorities. Disillusion follows disenchantment and the Creative rarely infringes the frontiers of what is possible beyond his own imagination.

Innovation for Creativity was established to initiate an ongoing dialog between innovators, represented by the technology industry and representatives from the creative professions. It is important that we share a common language and technology is embraced with enthusiasm and the catalyst for great and beautiful ideas to become reality.

Today I spent some time trying to get a good take on what industry experts thought about how to run a successful business based on the various forms of internet television, be it IPTV or video casting. This being an international show I was pretty sure that I would be presented by a bunch of creative new “out of the box” ideas but alas, no such luck. Why does it seem as if broadcasters have built marketing empires around TV brands but seem to fumbling around when it comes to selling their product?

Maybe this is because Media hasn’t had to think of itself in this way before, the media business model is entrenched in their ways, the 30 second commercial being the holy cash cow. However now things have changed and we mark an era where commercial television will become a commodity like any other product you can find on the shelves of the local supermarket.

Curiously, they sit around a big panel table and start discussing all the creative ways of getting advertisers to buy from them again: overlays, pre-roll, in-roll, post roll, info blocks or product placement. You name it, but there is just one really big problem with this and that is that the consumer doesn’t want more advertising, they are demanding less of it. So even though content is king, the consumer is the prime minister and is running this economy.

Commercials were ok before, because the consumer would be willing to make concessions regarding his status versus the media companies, after all he didn’t have much of a choice. This is all about to change and if networks embrace the change of roles I believe networks can settle themselves into the new media landscape relatively smoothly, if only they would come out of their proverbial box and accept that they need to start wining and dining the viewers.

Emerging Digital TV technology already allows for much more personalization to take place most of which is not used, we all understand that broadcasters are concerned about using personal viewer data and granted this is a valid issue. However I’d like to offer analogy about consumer behavior and how people, of all generations, could be more accepting to terms of releasing at least a degree of personal information. To make my point I would like to take a closer look how people of all ages interact with their local supermarket. The supermarket loyalty card has been around for approximately 20 years now. A great system as I am sure many consumers would agree where they can go into their local supermarket chain and using their loyalty card, purchase a selection of items at discounted prices. I do not think that there are many consumers who do not see the value of this system; in fact even the skeptics who know that they are paying for it anyway accept that the store has access to a share of their purchasing behavior.

t is actually stunning that even the more “paranoid generations” do not seem to have a problem with the fact that a commercial organization has access to information on the products that they buy in the store. They know we’re about to spend money on anything from Tampax to Diet Pepsi. When it comes down to our wallet we apparently don’t have quite that much of a problem with opening up. So, I ask, why should we have that problem with what we choose to watch on TV?

It seems to me pretty obvious that if I need to pay for commercial TV content I wouldn’t mind getting some more value back from the network, after all every commercial I watch puts another dollar in their pocket. I guess I am just saying that I want my share of that dollar because I do have the choice of watching ad free TV. Subscription based services to TV networks are not my idea of My TV-utopia either, however I personally would be increasingly more likely to spend that money if it meant I could watch all my favorite programs commercial free. Heck, if you’d be willing to give me a discount I may even force myself to watch a couple of your sponsor messages.

A consumer is fickle by nature; you have to give to be able to take. The fact is I generally do not mind giving away a portion of my personal data if you can guaranty me some control over how that data is being used. If it makes my viewing experience better or there is added value to watching a certain compilation of content as opposed to something I need to pay more for I would be inclined to release a bit of My TV-control back to the broadcaster.

As soon as a consumer chooses to release some of the control, the marketing opportunity could eventually kick in. In fact looking at the internet gives us a pretty good idea how this can be achieved. Google or for that matter Amazon are great examples of how keeping your content relevant drives business opportunity. Loyalty and affiliate marketing schemes should also be taken into consideration. I am not saying I could be carrying an ABC network credit card around in my wallet but I am trying to make the point that consumers are sensitive to more than one approach to marketing besides on screen advertising.

Eventually it all needs thinking outside the traditional media business model box but there are certainly a range of creative marketing opportunities broadcasters can take advantage of.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the future of television is undeniably connected to the evolution of interactive video advertising. I’d like to share with you a short excerpt from the 2007 Entertainment, Media & Advertising Market Research Handbook.

“Never has the advertising industry – whose best known product remains the 30 second commercial – faced such wide ranging threats. Ad-skipping devices such as the digital video recorder continue to penetrate homes across Europe and the USA. Even sites which offer video entertainment find it increasingly difficult to catch consumers with traditional ads. Meanwhile the advertisers are becoming more demanding and ask for better proof that the billions of dollars they sink into advertising actually pay off. Here lies a significant opportunity for newcomers to the media and broadcasting industry to rethink traditional approaches and offer advertisers technology which provide alternative ways to target their consumers.”

I’d like to take an opportunity to take a look at the newcomers in this area and along the way share some interesting new video formats. Basically what these companies have on offer are various types of players which can be embedded in any type of website, using the Flash or Javascript protocol.

As this is still an emerging industry you may like to familiarize yourself with terms used for the currently available formats. Currently the most popular format is In-Stream Advertising. Typically they run before (pre-roll) or after (post-roll) a requested video online. In my opinion the most exciting evolution is the User Initiated Ad . Here you are giving viewer the power to click on, roll over objects in a video and trigger events inside or outside of the video. The level of interactivity for both formats is largely dependent on a complex mesh of Flash layers. Currently there are few providers of customizable interactive players and the standard functions are still limited or in development.

The first on my list of companies to watch is the Silicon Valley start up Ooyala.com, founded in 2007 by three Google engineers and well on their way to becoming one of the leaders in interactive and HD video serving. Ooyala already serves most of the content for the Indian Times and has contracts underway with some of the largest US movie studios. Ooyala has developed a player making it possible to serve various types of new interactive video formats including User Initiated Ads. Ooyala proprietory Backlot video management system is an impressive solution allowing for maximum control regarding syndication and tracking of video content on the web. http://www.ooyala.com

A pioneer is Plymedia.com, an Isreali/US company established in 2006. PLYmedia deployed their interactive and multi-dimensional web video platform before most of their competitors and currently offer the best developed User Initiated Ad functionalities. I was especially impressed by the non-intrusive Infoply method which uses a click in screen technique to offer more information on an object in screen. http://www.plymedia.com

Another Silicon Valley company which has been turning heads is YuMe.com. They will be serving InVideo overlay ads as part of Google’s AdSense™ for video beta advertising program. They offer a similar management system to Ooyala.com however in my opinion each company has a significantly different approach to the level of intrusion of commercial content but I think this is a matter of taste. YuME boasts a bewildering number of different formats some of which are available for mobile and IPTV platforms. http://www.YuMe.com

Update 18 april 2008

After having visited the conferences NAB in Las Vegas and Ad Tech San Francisco I feel this post should be updated to reflect a more complete overview of this market space. However I should add that some of these companies should be catagorized as adserve networks so there is more emphasis met on the adserve networking capabilities.

Adjustables.com
Originally a Dutch company which opened a branch in Silicon Valley this year. Adjustables distinguishes itself by offering advertisements (logos, banners, etc.) that float inside online videos, during the play out of the video content. Adjustables provides publishers of online video with advanced technology (patent pending) for integrating ads inside streaming video, less annoying other than just offering pre-rolls.Podtrac.com
A service that connects podcasters and podcast listeners and viewers with advertisers. They match audience demographics and interests with the appropriate advertising for those listeners and viewers and are more of a video adserver with large network capabilities.

AdoTube.com
A low brow video inventory server focusing on ad presentation. Creative functionality includes in-video lead generation campaigns, in-video credit card processing for video monetizing, and a Supervised Contexutalization® approach for contextualizing video libraries. They offer publishing networks but you will need to demo to have a better idea of their reach.

Aditall.com
AditAll is a video advertising community where users can quickly, simply and inexpensively create, produce and distribute video ads. Producers upload video and music clips to the AditAll inventory and set the price for their work. Advertisers can browse this inventory to find, customize and purchase the clip they like best for their needs. As with Adotube it’s early days yet and I can’t tell you much about the market reach.

Mediflo.com
MediaFLO USA, a division of Qualcomm Incorporated, aggregates and delivers premium, TV-quality entertainment and information services to mobile devices over its dedicated nationwide wireless network across the US. Its basically end to end. This is a distribution system which incorporates DRM and offers a product which could appeal to network broadcasters willing to distribute video content over a vast range of 3G capable devices.

Limelight.com
Limelight Networks offers an end to end video content delivery sytem which is used by thousands of entertainment, technology, enterprise, and government entities around the world. They enable any object in their digital media library to be instantly delivered and monetized with DRM. It offers its service over a dedicated fiber-optic network and essentially they target larger broadcast networks.

Videoclix.com has pioneered the clickable video space since 1998. All objects in VideoClix content are clickable, providing a next generation interactive video platform with a robust monetization solution for content providers, and an effective non-intrusive media vehicle for advertisers. The company caters to top producers and advertisers with its end-to-end hypervideo solution that includes: authoring, content delivery network, HD quality player, metrics, syndication, social media and standard IAB display ads. VideoClix helps monetize content through the VideoClix Ad Delivery Network while enabling content providers to bring their own advertisers, sponsors and brand integration deals to the table.

I am sure there are players I have left out, this was more of a reveiw of the companies I have been able to look at recently. However should you come across interesting additions to this list please do not hesitate to post your views.

Two days ago I launched a new Personal Service called Holiday Home Hunters. Its basically a 72 hour manual search for vacation home rentals executed by a real person.

If you have been out on Google searching for your family holiday home you may have stumbled across over the overwhelming results of over 44 million links to holiday home companies, vacation rentals and individuals offering their homes. It isn’t the only downside because many of the same homes are advertised on many different websites Vacation Rental Management companies can have hundreds of affiliate websites where they advertise their inventory.

A few years ago you could go down the local high street travel agent for a catalogue of rentals but only a very few good companies actually print them these days. The web should have pretty much captured the market for vacation homes but instead it looks saturated and ends up not being time saving in any way, in fact it can easily slurp up hours and even days of your time.

So, more choice isn’t necessarily good for the consumer who is time stricken and quality conscious. There are actually a limited number of holiday home management companies and owners who can offer any kind of guaranty your vacation rental is up to the standards you would expect. Getting reviews on individual holiday homes is very good if you trust their opinion and have the time to go through them. Getting someone else to do the search for you who has been in the vacation home rental business for years is probably going to be able to shed the wheat from the chaf.

I was in the holiday business for years and I’ve never sold anything to anybody without having a pretty thorough idea of what I was selling them, therefore getting very few complaints and many returning customers.

I have always been an advocate that there is a growing market for personal services oddly I’d never have thought a manual personal search on the internet would become one of them until very recently. However considering the raving reviews on the launch that does seem to prove the case.

Check it out at http://www.dolcevia.com/hhh/holidayhomehunter.html

or in Dutch at http://www.dolcevia.com/vakantiehuisjager/vakantiehuisjager.html

As soon as I tried to post this article I noticed that Zoho had taken the reference to the new Zoho Mobile Application off their homepage but if you sign up you should be able to find it from one of the other applications.
I haven’t really had the chance to try the Zoho Mobile Application creator yet however I have been using the Zoho Web Application Creator for a few months and I’d recommend to take this for a spin.
Unfortunately I’ve already come across a few technical quirks that need ironing out in the regular Zoho Web Creator but I must add that if something does really go haywire on you the support team are usually quite quick to respond.

Zoho has a short learning curve and will have you creating your applications within a few hours even if you haven’t had any programming experience at all. It opens up a great scope of possibilities for professionals like me who are naturally impatient. Creating really professional looking web forms has never really become so easy. Zoho still seems to be able to keep ahead of Google in the race for providing Desktop Software as a Service and the range of applications manages to fulfill the niche quite well.