引爆草根媒体革命 免费网络视频服务方兴未艾
作者： CNET科技资讯网 翻译：李海
CNETNews.com.cn 2005-06-15 09:22 AM
CNET科技资讯网6月15日国际报道 忽然之间，互联网上的每个人，从企业巨头到非盈利性机构都想提供大容量的视频内容服务，而且是免费的。
对于独立电影制作人以及视频爱好者们来说，视频内容发布地点增多的趋势让他们比以往任何时候都更容易制作自己的视频节目了，此外，小型摄像机，低价的编辑软件以及功能更强大的电脑又为这种潮流推波助澜。
但是，免费提供视频服务的互联网公司及组织却有更加长远的价值打算－这就是抓住网络未来的控制权机会，今日的网络世界由文字以及静像构成，而未来，则是活动的画面。
Ourmedia公司的首席执行官J.D. Lasica说：“我们看见了这其中的机遇，我们将帮助引爆草根媒体的革命。我们仍然处于富多媒体网络时代的发展初期。网络的未来不会走向网络日志或者文本，而是走向人人可以发布视频，广播（podcasting）以及社区参与的时代。”
Ourmedia的最终目标不是收集大量的视频，而是建立其开放的标准，以方便网络上数量众多的多媒体图书馆以及档案馆能够通过任何的社会网络，网络日志工具，门户站点以及媒体共享网站访问这些内容。
Ourmedia使用了由Internet Archive捐赠的存储器。Ourmedia希望建立起开放标准，以便同其它非盈利性组织，或者有类似想法的公司合作，共同抵御电脑与软件厂商对多媒体权力的攫取。
Macromedia Director的开发者Marc Canter说：“我们最终将与微软以及苹果公司竞争。”Marc Canter本人自掏 5万美元，帮助Ourmedia的运行。
Ourmedia两个月前成立，目前已经收集到了5千多部视频内容。公司创始人表示，他们正在与Google，RealNetworks 以及Open Media Network谈判，争取为媒体共享建立一种通用协议。Open Media Network也是另外一家致力于视频收集的非盈利性组织，它由Netscape的开发者Mike Homer 以及Marc Andreessen创办。
Ourmedia与Open Media Network收集大众的视频几乎毫不费力。今年4月，Google开始了视频内容服务的测试，美国在线去年也发起了“会员电影”服务，以方便会员分享彼此的短片。
雅虎虽然否认自己对收集，发布用户的视频内容感兴趣，但雅虎收购Flickr照片网站却表明他们并不是对此无动于衷。
Lasica表示，他的组织和Google都欢迎更多的组织参与到免费视频市场中来。
Lasica说：“Google告诉我们，此类服务越多，乐趣也越多。我们都在这一市场，都是为了相同的一个原因：去引燃草根媒体的革命。我爱Google，我认为Google做这件事的目的，不仅是由于它是一个商业机会，而且也代表着整个互联网前进的方向。”
Google没有对此发表意见。
免费视频服务的兴起有一个背景，这就是各种各样网络内容的免费存储趋势正在兴起。雅虎和微软等互联网公司曾经试图以最高20美元一年的价格为用户提供额外的MB级电子邮件存储空间，而Google却打破陈规，率先推出了GB级别的免费电子邮件空间。
上月，雅虎发布了Media RSS 1.0开放协议。这种协议基于RSS（Really Simple Syndication 真正简易聚合），它能够让作者描述自己的作品，通过互联网实现作品的聚合。
除了描述和聚合标准以外，Ourmedia也在积极从事一种重放格式的标准推广工作，这种标准可以消除很多视频技术，比如RealNetworks的Real, Apple电脑的QuickTime以及微软的Windows Media带来的混乱，它能够方便用户将视频内容发布到网上。
Lasica说：“我们的一个目标是，为视频建立一种开放的格式，让格式战争不再发生。目前，各种各样的视频格式令人抓狂，当人们无法播放视频的时候，格式问题简直让人糊涂，非常令人感到灰心。”
Canter承认，Ourmedia对他自己的业务，Broadband Mechanics有帮助。Broadband Mechanics结合了视频，社会性网络工具以及通讯设备管理等服务。
未来几周，Ourmedia将组成理事会，并申请5013c非盈利性组织资格。Lasica表示，他们正在向CommerceNet，福特基金会以及Omidyar Network寻求资助。
除了终结视频格式之争，建立通用文件共享协议以外，Ourmedia表示，他们希望促成版权限制松动的时代来临，为此，他们将采用“创作共用许可”（Creative Commons license）。这种许可允许作者保留一些权力，而不是标准的“保留全部版权”。 （编辑：孙莹）
Video content set free on Web
Published: June 14, 2005, 12:00 PM PDT
By Paul Festa
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Suddenly it seems that everyone on the Internet, from corporate giants to nonprofits, wants to host your bulky video content--free of charge.
For independent filmmakers and video moms, the trend promises to provide venues for distributing the videos that have made easier than ever to produce by a new wave of tiny cameras, inexpensive editing software and more powerful computers.
But the dot-coms and dot-orgs offering to host these works for free are in it for something potentially far more valuable--the chance to control a Web of the not-so-distant future, one that's overflowing with moving pictures the way that the online world of today teems with text and still images.
"We see an opportunity to help kick-start the grassroots media revolution," said J.D. Lasica, CEO of recently launched Ourmedia, which hosts video for free. "We're still at an early stage of the multimedia-rich Web. The Web is not going to be Web logs and text; it's going to be people posting video and podcasting and taking part in the citizens' media that's just starting to explode."
Ourmedia's ultimate goal is not to amass a huge collection of video, but to establish open standards that will make vast multimedia libraries and archives across the Internet accessible through any number of social networks, blog tools, portals and media-sharing sites.
Ourmedia, which uses storage capacity donated by the Internet Archive, hopes to establish open standards in concert with other nonprofits and like-minded companies in order to ward off a multimedia power grab by computer and software vendors.
"We're ultimately competing with Microsoft and Apple," said high-tech veteran Marc Canter, one of the original developers of Macromedia Director, who spent somewhere south of $50,000 of his own money to get Ourmedia going.
Since its launch two months ago, the site has collected more than 5,000 videos. Founders say they're in negotiations with Google, RealNetworks and Open Media Network, another video-collecting nonprofit started by Netscape pioneers Mike Homer and Marc Andreessen that aims to establish common protocols for sharing media.
Ourmedia and Open Media Network are hardly alone in soliciting video from the masses. Google since April has been taking submissions for videos it will archive. America Online last year launched Member Movies for sharing short movies.
Yahoo disavows interest in amassing and distributing content produced by consumers, but its Flickr photo site acquisition suggests otherwise. Among start-ups, Brightcove is a video distribution site gearing up for launch.
Lasica said that both his group and Google welcomed the multiple entries into the free video market.
"Google told us that they see a lot of these sorts of services springing up, and the more the merrier," Lasica said. "We're all in it, in a sense, for the same reason: to help enable the grassroots media revolution. I love Google and think they are doing this because it's not just a business opportunity but where the entire Internet is headed."
Google declined to comment for this story.
The free video bonanza comes as part of a broader shift toward free online storage of various content types. Where Internet companies like Yahoo and Microsoft once tried to get people to pony up $20 yearly subscription fees for a few extra megabytes of e-mail storage, for example, Google changed the paradigm and crafted an advertising-based business model by offering a gigabyte, and then more, free of charge.
Yahoo last month published Media RSS 1.0, an open protocol
based on Really Simple Syndication that lets content authors describe their work and syndicate it over the Internet.
Beyond a description and syndication standard, Ourmedia is pushing for a standardized playback format that would cut through the confusing array of technologies--such as RealNetworks' Real, Apple Computer's QuickTime and Microsoft's Windows Media--that confront people trying to play videos posted to the Web.
"One of our goals is to create an open format for video so that there are no more format wars," Lasica said. "It's crazy right now. It's confusing to people when they can't play video, and it's very frustrating."
Canter acknowledges that Ourmedia could help his own business, Broadband Mechanics--just as the Open Media Network serves in part to promote Homer's Kontiki peer-to-peer service. Broadband Mechanics designs what it calls digital lifestyle aggregators, which combine video, social networking tools, and communications device management.
In the coming weeks, Ourmedia will form a board of trustees and apply for 5013c nonprofit status. Lasica said the group was seeking funding from CommerceNet, the Ford Foundation, and the Omidyar Network.
In addition to bringing an end to the video format wars and establishing common protocols for sharing files, Ourmedia says it wants to help bring back an era of looser copyright restrictions by accepting content under the Creative Commons license. That license allows producers to retain and yield a range of rights rather than the standard "all rights reserved."
"The Internet Archive is playing a role for those who would like to give things to the public," said Internet Archive Chairman Brewster Kahle. "We're interested in supporting broad use of materials, and Creative Commons licenses have helped return to the copyright system we had when we were growing up."