MySpace delivers video to mobile phones

MySpace users with mobile phones are about to find out if they can walk and watch TV at the same time.

On Wednesday, News Corp's online social network will make video clips from its members' pages available for viewing on mobile devices including the BlackBerry Bold, Palm Centro, Motorola Q9, LG Voyager, Nokia N95 and Samsung Instinct.

Members will be able to look at video on their own homepages as well as friends' pages. They also will be able to view professionally produced video from TMZ, the celebrity news and gossip website owned by Time Warner Inc; the National Hockey League; National Geographic magazine; satirical newspaper The Onion and others.

The free service will be supported by advertising. MySpace and many other companies are trying to exploit the small but growing mobile advertising market.

MySpace declined to comment on the cost of the project or how much money it would make them.

"These are the big guys doing it, and they're going to make some noise about it," said David Card, a media analyst at Forrester Research who called it a medium-sized deal in terms of significance. "Mobile is one of those things where people keep saying, 'Is next year going to be the year of mobile'?"

MySpace video will be sent, or "streamed," from the social network's pages rather than downloaded onto mobile phones. For this reason, the clips will not be available on Apple Inc's iPhone, which runs downloaded video.

MySpace, one of the world's largest online social networks, plans to support mobile video downloads in the future, a spokeswoman said.

MySpace's growth strategy includes developing mobile phone applications, as well as international markets and building up its music service. Acquisitions are central to this strategy, Chief Executive Chris DeWolfe told the Reuters Media Summit on Monday.

The company will work with technology from a company called RipCode to make video available on mobile handsets that have different technical specifications for how they handle video.

RipCode also will allow MySpace users to stop having to save their video clips in different formats, something that it said would save hardware, energy and storage resources.

MySpace delivers video to mobile phones

MySpace users with mobile phones are about to find out if they can walk and watch TV at the same time.

On Wednesday, News Corp's online social network will make video clips from its members' pages available for viewing on mobile devices including the BlackBerry Bold, Palm Centro, Motorola Q9, LG Voyager, Nokia N95 and Samsung Instinct.

Members will be able to look at video on their own homepages as well as friends' pages. They also will be able to view professionally produced video from TMZ, the celebrity news and gossip website owned by Time Warner Inc; the National Hockey League; National Geographic magazine; satirical newspaper The Onion and others.

The free service will be supported by advertising. MySpace and many other companies are trying to exploit the small but growing mobile advertising market.

MySpace declined to comment on the cost of the project or how much money it would make them.

"These are the big guys doing it, and they're going to make some noise about it," said David Card, a media analyst at Forrester Research who called it a medium-sized deal in terms of significance. "Mobile is one of those things where people keep saying, 'Is next year going to be the year of mobile'?"

MySpace video will be sent, or "streamed," from the social network's pages rather than downloaded onto mobile phones. For this reason, the clips will not be available on Apple Inc's iPhone, which runs downloaded video.

MySpace, one of the world's largest online social networks, plans to support mobile video downloads in the future, a spokeswoman said.

MySpace's growth strategy includes developing mobile phone applications, as well as international markets and building up its music service. Acquisitions are central to this strategy, Chief Executive Chris DeWolfe told the Reuters Media Summit on Monday.

The company will work with technology from a company called RipCode to make video available on mobile handsets that have different technical specifications for how they handle video.

RipCode also will allow MySpace users to stop having to save their video clips in different formats, something that it said would save hardware, energy and storage resources.

Mobile Video Gets Standards

The Advanced Television Systems Committee, an industry organization responsible for setting standards for digital television, said Monday it has approved proposed specifications for mobile digital television, which are eligible to become the industry standard. The ATSC's Technology and Standards Group has set a timeline aiming for fast adoption of the standard, which governs the way digital video content may be delivered to mobile devices.

Under the proposed standards for mobile digital TV, a broadcaster would be able to use part of their existing allotment of broadcast spectrum to create a mobile video channel. This mobile video channel would be embedded in the broadcaster's digital channel, but would not interfere with the broadcaster's standard or high-def services, or their digital multicasts.

For manufacturers, the new digital mobile TV standard will serve as a baseline for end-to-end system specifications, allowing consumer electronics makers to begin developing and producing the next generation of mobile devices with digital video functions.

The proposed standard has been supported by the Open Mobile Video Coalition, which hopes to establish a uniform mobile digital TV marketplace in 2009. According to the OMVC, mobile digital video will benefit advertisers in a number of ways, mostly hinging on its interactive potential.

This opens up possibilities for location-based services, advertising and sell-through transactions, pay-per-view, digital video recording, and programming guides. The OMVC is planning interoperability testing and trials for broadcast signals and devices in the coming months.

The OMVC is composed of 20 members that own and operate over 450 commercial television stations, as well as the Association of Public Television Stations, which represents an additional 360 stations.

Mobile Video Calling Gets Boost

With Global IP Solutions' latest release, videoconferencing from a mobile handset may soon become more accessible. The company's VideoEngine Mobile for the Windows Mobile platform enables peer-to-peer video calling and multiport videoconferencing on cell phones. Handset manufacturers and vendors are the primary market for the product.

GIPS has experience in the mobile VoIP space, and the company told InformationWeek that video was a natural progression.


Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin wow the crowd at the New York City intro of T-Mobile's G1 Android Google phone. Video by InformationWeek's Alex Wolfe. Startup Aerohive talks up its distributed control WLAN architecture Jim Vogt talks through the evolution ahead in wireless infrastructure
Jim Vogt talks through the evolution ahead in wireless infrastructure
"Mobile VoIP is increasingly becoming an important service for users who seek to maximize the value received from mobile phones," said William Stofega, research manager at IDC's VoIP services program, in a statement. "With video calling, the mobile operators can now deliver the full benefits and innovations of IP communications, allowing them to offer more value-added services to customers while increasing their revenue streams."

Certain smartphones can already pull off video calling, but GIPS said the existing products utilize separate engines for the video and voice function, leading to jittering and packet-loss issues. GIPS said its VideoEngine Mobile can solve issues like lip synchronization even under adverse network conditions.

"Today's mobile phone users demand the best in quality and rich functionality, which is why there is an enormous opportunity for application developers and wireless carriers to offer real-time video calls to the masses," Emerick Woods, CEO of GIPS, said in a statement. "Our expertise in enabling IP communications will allow mobile phone users the highest-quality video calling experience possible."

The GIPS product represents the first step for increasing video calling, but handset makers and carriers need to get on board before it can get widespread adoption. In terms of the physical device, the video-calling engine needs to be implemented from the beginning for maximum efficiency. GIPS also said the product can offer wireless carriers an opportunity to increase customers' data use, and thus increase the average revenue per user.

The company said it expects the VideoEngine Mobile to be available on other popular mobile platforms like Symbian and Apple's iPhone in the near future.

Lights. Camera. Cellphone Action.

Spike Lee is teaming up with Nokia, the cellphone maker, to direct a short film comprising YouTube-style videos created by teenagers and adults using their mobile phones.

Guerrilla Mirror Phones - Rogers Video Phone Ads

Rogers, one of the key mobile phone companies in Canada, used clever “mirror phone” guerrilla ads to promote their new video phone service.

Web firm to offer TV streaming to iPhone

Two leading UK broadcasters are exploring a service that would allow live streaming of their programmes to Apple's iPhone.

London-based web TV technology specialist Best Before has developed server-based technology called Millicent that allows a broadcaster or other content producer to provide an edited video feed to be watched on the iPhone without needing to hack into the handset.

Projectors to magnify cell-phone cinema

"Pico projectors" that are small enough to carry around in a shirt pocket are expected on the market later this year. Eventually, the technology will be tiny enough to be built into phones and portable media players.

Mobile video at Davos

One of the talking points to emerge from Davos this year is the use of online video to report instantly on events, with little mediation through traditional channels.

Reuters have been trialling a mobile journalism unit, with reporters armed with adapted phones to attached microphones. Short, sharp interviews are posted quickly to a dedicated page on the Reuters website.