Working with video rental stores in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, Domino’s stamped DVDs with heat-sensitive thermal ink and scented varnish. Since DVDs and Blu-Ray players tend to get hot during operation, the discs warm up throughout the movie. By the time the movies ends and you pull the disc out, you’re both seeing an image of pizza on the DVD … and smelling what you could be tasting.

And, in thermal ink, a message invites you to enjoy your next movie with a “hot and delicious” pizza from Domino’s.

Here’s the video:

That’s simply a brilliant marketing campaign. And a very savvy mixture of both high and very standard technology.

While broadband has killed the video rental store in North America and much of Europe, Brazil’s Internet is not quite so robust, according to the marketing agency that created the campaign for Domino’s. So unless you’re wealthy or in a neighborhood with good Internet, chances are, you’re still using DVDs.

photo credit: bunchofpants via photopin cc

Digital entertainment distribution startup Yekra has raised $3 million in new funding to give studios a way to distribute DRM-protected content without it being burdensome, the company announced today.

Los Angeles-based Yekra’s goal is to help distribute movies online with the full blessing of Hollywood. Movies will have copyright protections but still be available to be viewed through the web, smartphones, tablets, and connected TVs.

Yekra’s centerpiece is AffiliateConnect, a “patent-pending, first-to-market audience building technology” that helps producers and studios distribute their content. Yekra lets you set an exclusivity rights period for a movie and then set up distribution to other digital platforms like Netflix and Hulu Plus. On top of that, there’s also a marketing suite inside Yekra that helps you figure out how you should distribute based on the subject of the film and its potential audience.

One strong example Yekra touts for AffiliateConnect is Tattoo Nation (pictured), a documentary starring Danny Trejo and Travis Barker about skin art and the culture surrounding it. This movie will be available for $6.99 as a digital rental, and that can be applied toward a DVD purchase for $19.95. (On a side note, those prices seem awfully high considering a Netflix account costs just $8 a month.)

“We want to bring a new technology to market that sits at the nexus of profitable premium content and on-demand, convenient access for any connected viewer,” Yekra President Lee Waterworth said in a statement. “Today we pioneer the first system that both protects the content it distributes and makes it accessible to anyone — anywhere — with the capability to generate revenue on a cost-effective basis from day one.”

Yekra launched in an early-stage beta in late 2011 so it could test out the showing of the documentary film Thrive: What On Earth Will It Take?, which it charged $5 per view. Thrive has attracted more than 12 million online viewers during since being released.

The new funding was led by Las Vegas angel investor Maurice Gallagher, with participation by Bray Capital, Shay O’Brien, and Michael Rogers.

Screenshots via Tattoo Nation and Yekra

YouCommentate was one of the most interesting startups I ran into earlier this month at SXSW. It’s a mobile app that you use to broadcast live commentary about sports events to your friends in real time as the events are happening.

What really caught my attention is that it has potential far beyond sports commentary. While that’s an obvious and potentially lucrative market, YouCommentate also could play a role in real-time news — and even in movements for social change.

I sat down with the founder and chief executive, Steve Bealing, for a short video interview (see below).

“Sports commentary is one of the last monopolies out there,” Bealing said, explaining the market opportunity. “You pay your ESPN subscription [as part of your cable bill], and you’re forced to listen to the guys in the broadcast box. We want to democratize that platform, to let any fan get on board and share their passion.”

It’s a pretty simple app: While an event is happening, you simply tap a button and you can start streaming your own audio commentary to all your friends. They can watch the event on their own TVs and — if your commentary is good enough — turn off the sound and just listen to your play-by-play.

Some sophisticated technology enables the app’s real-time streaming with almost zero latency, Bealing says. That tech was made possible through a research grant from the Singapore government.

The app launched a little a week ago in San Francisco, but the company is based in Singapore. It has just four employees so far. The company is currently working hard to line up trials with content creators in both mainstream and alternative sports media. It’s also prepping its servers for a more full-blown rollout later — a work in progress.

“One of our commentators used the app to stream live commentary for the Hong Kong Rugby Sevens final last weekend,” Bealing told me today. “We had almost 1,000 users hit the service to listen into the live stream before the servers blew up. We didn’t anticipate that kind of heavy usage so quickly after launch — as they say, its a good problem to have.”

As for the market opportunity, “There are enormous sports markets out there,” Bealing said, referring to international markets around the world, not just in the U.S. And, he said, because of the company’s global orientation, Singapore is an ideal location.

“It’s a fantastic place to start a business, it’s one of the thriving parts of the world, and we literally set up our company within a day and we were off and running,” Bealing said. “The govt makes every effort to remove the red tape, so entrepreneurs don’t have to worry about that.”

Sports is just the first step, for Bealing, and it’s a logical one, because it’s such a big market. But down the line, he envisions people using YouCommentate to offer real-time audio commentary on all kinds of events, from TV shows to street protests.

Imagine if informed people could have offered real-time commentary on the video streams coming out of the Tahrir Square protests in Egypt a couple years ago. Activists could offer commentary, pro and con, on the Supreme Court arguments on gay marriage. Political pundits could comment on sessions of Congress or Parliament.

The possibilities are intriguing, and I’m looking forward to seeing where Bealing takes this company next.

Check out the video we shot with Bealing at SXSW, below.

Popular streaming music service Spotify has launched its first real advertising campaign, with a one-minute ad that will run across TV and social media and several web-only ads.

Spotify recently announced that it has 6 million paid users, but the company needs to continue to get more members so it can eventually make a profit. Launching a large ad campaign could help with awareness among average consumers.

The ads were developed by Droga5 New York, and the one-minute slot will debut tonight on the premiere of the NBC show The Voice. Droga5 also worked on two stand-alone digital ads Spotify will be running across the web and social media.

The three ads all show people enjoying music and contain voice-over narration describing music and the emotions of people listening to it. I personally don’t find the video ads that compelling. First, it would be nice if the videos actually contained some fun music. Second, it’s unclear how Spotify actually works and how it enables these experiences. Third, the one-minute ad indirectly references “I am the Walrus” by The Beatles, but that song isn’t even on Spotify. The stand-alone digital ads aren’t much better.

On top of the new ad campaign, a new report from Business Insider says Spotify is looking to add a streaming video component to its music service. Anonymous sources “briefed on the company’s plans” told Business Insider that streaming video content was in the works and it could compete with the likes of Netflix and HBO.

The report seems a little fishy to us because Spotify is already spending so much of its cash on music licensing that the pursuit of high-end video content seems out of reach. We could see Spotify expanding into the realm of streaming live concerts and maybe even music videos, but that would be on a much smaller scale and not aim to compete with big-name streaming video providers.

In response to the report, Spotify said that it does not comment on rumors.

Check out Spotify’s video and stand-alone ads below.

That might be changing sooner than you think.

Today Netflix chief product officer Neil Hunt told The Verge that Netflix expects to be streaming video at the massive 3,840-by-2,160 pixel 4K resolution in the fairly near future: this year or next. If you thought Netflix was a data hog before, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Now we know why Netflix recently unveiled its speed list of the 17 fastest Internet service providers in America.

“We have work to do with the compression and decode capability,” Hunt admitted, but he noted that Netflix’ own House of Cards was shot in 4K.

Assuming a massive amount of compression would need to take place in order to be able to stream 4K video reliably and quickly, the question becomes: What kind of hardware will be necessary to run full-res Netflix in the near future? Smart TVs, and appliances like Xboxes, Wiis, and Apple TVs might need very significant upgrades to have the kind of onboard power to run real-time decompression for that much video. Not to mention much more on-board storage, even if just for buffering.

One other thing Hunt wants to see from video producers? A higher frame rate.

Hunt says we’ve now pretty much maxed out the resolution of our eyes but that 60 frames/second would make for a much better video experience than the current 24 or 30.

photo credit: pkingDesign via photopin cc

Streaming music service Spotify has added another million paying subscribers in the past few months, bringing its total number of paying users to 6 million — far more than any competitor.

Spotify announced that it had 5 million paid users back at an event in December, so it’s a bit of a surprise to have added another million paying users so quickly. It’s a good sign for a company that has a serious sustainability problem — Spotify hasn’t yet become profitable because it pays too much to music royalties (reportedly 35 cents paid per 100 songs streamed). It also doesn’t make up the cash it loses for offering free streaming to more than 15 million people, a move designed to introduce people Spotify and get them to subscribe.

While other unlimited streaming services are out there, such as Rdio and Rhapsody, neither have come close to collecting Spotify’s numbers. Rhapsody has more than a million paid users in the United States, while Rdio has never released its number of free or paid users.

Rumors point to Apple and Beats launching streaming services soon, but it is unclear when they will launch and what each service will offer. Apple is apparently leaning toward a Pandora-like streaming radio approach, while Beats’ “Daisy” service will likely be more like Spotify’s all-you-can-listen-for-one-fee service.

Top photo via Sean Ludwig/VentureBeat

We are working with UK Trade & Investment to showcase the United Kingdom's thriving start-up and investment scene through a series of posts and video interviews at SXSW. Check out all of the coverage here. As always, VentureBeat is adamant about maintaining editorial objectivity.

Popular video-sharing service Vimeo has opened up its previously announced “Vimeo on Demand” paywall to all of its Vimeo Pro subscribers, a move that makes it easy for anyone to charge people to watch or download a movie online.

Vimeo has already made a lot of moves in 2013 to continue setting itself apart from YouTube and other web video services. It recently acquired iOS GIF-making app Echograph to help counter the buzz of hot video-sharing apps like Vine. Vimeo also partnered with GenArts’ Vivoom app to make it possible to add filters and “Looks” to Vimeo videos. The paywall availability (which is being made in conjunction with the company’s presence at SXSW in Austin) will likely help with Vimeo’s reputation of enabling creative professionals.

Vimeo tested the paywall service this past winter by offering it for six different films this past winter to get it ready for widespread usage. Video creators are able to set the price, country-by-country availability, and the duration of streaming availability. Creators also have the option to offer the film as a high-quality MP4 download on top of streaming.

“This service is set apart from others because it is attached to Vimeo and all the technology it’s known for,” Vimeo CEO Kerry Trainor told VentureBeat. “We’re excited about the interest people have expressed about using Vimeo a distribution platform.”

What’s so good about the Vimeo paywall is that it’s applicable to all kinds of content, including feature films, short films, TV episodes, and education videos. I mentioned to Trainor during our conversation that I thought the most innovative video distribution was happening from comedians such as Louis C.K. and Aziz Ansari. Both comedians made a lot of cash by offering DRM-free copies of their latest stand-up specials without the hassles. Trainor agreed that comedians generally have been good at online distribution and that Vimeo could be an attractive place for more content like, particularly because it would take care of the hassle of creating a stable distribution platform.

“We’re not ruling out Hollywood deals, but this is open for all kinds of genres and types of content,” Trainor said. “We’re encouraged by the quality of submissions we’ve seen so far.”

Ideally, if the paywall service is a hit, it could help Vimeo generate more revenue. After fees to PayPal or credit card companies, Vimeo takes a 10 percent cut of the transaction and the creator gets 90 percent.

Trainor said Vimeo makes the majority of its revenue from subscriptions, but it also takes in cash from advertising deals and payment transactions. The paywall service falls under the transactions business.

One of the first projects out of the gate for Vimeo on Demand is a re-mastered and expanded version of It’s Such a Beautiful Day, a film by Academy Award-nominated animator Don Hertzfeldt. Vimeo will be showing the film today at SXSW. The movie will be available exclusively on Vimeo on Demand for a $2 rental or you can buy it for $6.

IAC-owned Vimeo was founded in 2004 and claims have to 15 million registered users and more than 93 million unique visitors each month.

Top photo via Vimeo

After all, the online TV and movie distributor has, on occasion, used up to a third of all bandwidth in North America singlehandedly. And Netflix’s 33 million customers currently stream more than a billion hours of TV and movies every single month.

The streaming media company has put out a “Netflix ISP Index,” giving you insight into which Internet service providers are the fastest.

In the U.S., that list starts with Google, which is running a high-speed fiber experiment in Kansas and boasts an average download speed of 3.35 megabits per second. Cox comes in fourth, followed closely by Verizon FIOS. But long-time incumbents AT&T, Time Warner, and ClearWire languish well in the rear:

1. Google Fiber – 3.35 Mbps
2. Cablevision – Optimum - 2.35 Mbps
3. SuddenLink - 2.19 Mbps
4. Cox - 2.12 Mbps
5. Verizon-FIOS - 2.10 Mbps
6. Charter - 2.08 Mbps
7. Comcast - 2.06 Mbps
8. Mediacom - 2.04 Mbps
9. Time Warner Cable - 2.04 Mbps
10. Bright House - 2.02 Mbps
11. AT&T U-Verse - 1.91 Mbps
12. Centurylink - 1.68 Mbps
13. Windstream - 1.61 Mbps
14. Frontier - 1.54 Mbps
15. AT&T DSL - 1.43 Mbps
16. Verizon DSL - 1.37 Mbps
17. Clearwire - 1.25 Mbps

The results are average velocity, so peak velocity can be much higher.

The ranking is useful for choosing an ISP, or negotiating with your current service provider. And, perhaps, from Netflix’ point of view, it’s also a shot across the bow of ISPs that might be tempted to “packet-shape,” or slow down traffic from media companies that don’t pay extra for higher speed.

Globally, Netflix members in Finland have the highest average speed, while Mexican Netflix subscribers have the lowest. And all ISPs in Denmark, Sweden, and Finland delivered better than a 2Mbps download speed.

You can check your results here.

photo credit: DigiDreamGrafix.com via photopin cc

Apple has made the decision to delay its upcoming streaming radio service over royalty-payment disagreements, according to reports by the New York Post and the New York Times.

The Apple streaming radio service has been rumored since September, and it could harm Pandora, Spotify, and other similar offerings because the service would be easily accessible on the many millions of iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches around the world. Apple’s iTunes store is already the number one place to buy digital music, so this new service would act as an extension to that.

The New York Post reports that Apple made an opening offer to pay “6 cents per 100 songs streamed,” which is half of what Pandora pays for its songs. Clearly the music industry didn’t like that Apple — which is sitting on about $137 billion in cash — was trying to be cheap.

“Apple wants a rate that is lower than Pandora’s,” an unnamed “high-level executive” told the Post.

Terrestrial radio-backed services including iHeartRadio reportedly pay about 22 cents per 100 songs streamed. Spotify incurs the highest rate around and pays 35 cents per 100 songs streamed. So Apple’s offer is an even further cry from those rates.

Another thing to consider: Apple reportedly started discussions with Beats, which is launching its own streaming service with help from musician Trent Reznor. That could be part of the discussions Apple is having the industry as well.

Apple very well could bundle the new service with iTunes Match, which costs $25 a year and makes it possible to stream your personal song catalog across iOS devices, Macs, and PCs. The streaming radio service could also help Apple’s iAd platform find new ways to push advertising.

Reports also suggest that Apple originally wanted to launch the streaming service along with the iPhone 5 last September, but it couldn’t get its agreements in order.

Apple with headphones concept via Daniel Gilbey Photography/Shutterstock

Netflix will only produce one new season of the cult comedy TV series Arrested Development, the popular streaming video service admitted today.

Arrested Development is one of a handful of high-profile projects Netflix is producing so it can provide its members with exclusive high-quality content. Its original series House of Cards has David Fincher and Kevin Spacey behind it and is the most watched piece of content on the service right now. House of Cards shows people using Netflix will happily lap up new content if it is good. (The series boasts an impressive 9.0 out 10 on IMBb now.)

Other big exclusive TV shows Netflix has committed to make include Eli Roth’s Hemlock Grove, Jenji Kohan’s Orange is the New Black, and the new Dreamworks kids show Turbo: F.A.S.T. But Arrested Development is clearly in a different boat because it is a resurrection of a series that was prematurely canceled — not a new series.

Netflix told the Wall Street Journal today that it would be “extremely difficult to get the cast together.” Netflix called the new season of Arrested Development a “one-off” and “non-repeatable” event. Basically, it appears Netflix doesn’t appear to have the cash to make another season worthwhile.

While it’s hard not to be blue (like Tobias), fans are likely still excited to get one more season from the show, which become more popular after it stopped airing in 2006. Netflix has committed to make 14 new episodes of the show, and they are planned to debut in May.

Netflix faces steep competition from Amazon Prime Instant Video, Hulu, and other services that also have planned their own original video content. But at least right now, Netflix has done a great job bringing creators to the fold that connect with its viewers. Will the other services be able to say the same?

Check out some of the best clips from Arrested Development below.

Streaming TV startup Aereo has expanded its coverage area to include parts of New Jersey, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania — the first major step in a larger rollout that will likely attract more consumers.

New York-based Aereo puts out HDTV broadcasts from major channels (ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, CW, and others) on smartphones, tablets, laptops, and desktops. On top of watching channels on other devices, it offers a DVR feature so you can record up to 40 hours of video and watch it whenever you want. The service costs $1 per day, $8 per month, or $80 per year. Essentially, if you don’t have a TV but still want to watch broadcast stations as they airs, Aereo could be your friend.

The company announced back in January that it would be expanding to 22 new markets in 2013, including big cities such as Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, and Miami. But with today’s announcement, it looks like Aereo will still be focusing on New York and areas surrounding it in the short term.

To make sure New Yorkers and people in the NYC area know what Aereo can offer, the company will start a new advertising blitz. It promises to market its service on “NYC billboards, phone kiosks, and at key city transit points, including waterways, commuter trains, and PATH transit hubs.”

“Today, consumers are tethered to expensive and outdated technology that limits how, when, and where they can enjoy their own television programming,” Aereo CEO Chet Kanojia said in a statement. “Aereo’s technology now lets us provide simplicity, ease of use and rational pricing –- three things that have all but disappeared for the consumer. We believe that consumers deserve better and we’re committed to delivering on that promise.”

Aereo has raised $63 million to date from investors including Highland Capital Partners, IAC, First Round Capital, and High Line Venture Partners.

Check out the new coverage map below to see what counties Aereo now serves.

That segment of the populace will doubtless be delighted to know that starting this weekend, PGA tour events will be streamed live online, courtesy CBSSports.com and the network’s iPhone, Android and iPad apps. And for those on less-privileged platforms like Windows Phone and BlackBerry who are really hard up for golf, a mobile-adapted web player will also be available at m.dbssports.com.

This weekend’s Farmers Insurance Open is the first-ever PGA tour event for which the full network broadcast will be live-streamed online, but it won’t be the last. In fact, 18 more tour events, all part of the FedExCup series, will be streamed by CBS, and all Golf Channel and NBC telecasts will also be be streamed. NBC’s streaming start begins with the wonderfully named Waste Management Phoenix Open.

I really, really hope the PGA got extra cash for that one.

A thought occurs. On the rare occasions when I actually have watched more than 20 seconds of golf while on my way to the nearest ice hockey game, I find it almost impossible to see the ball in flight on my 42-inch high-def TV screen.

Good luck seeing that ball on your 3.5-inch iPhone or 7-inch Nexus screens.

photo credit: Stuck in Customs via photopin cc

Streaming-music business Rhapsody is finally bringing its service to 16 European countries before the end of the second quarter, GigaOm reports.

Rhapsody has been the longest-running player in streaming music in the United States and has more than 1 million paid subscribers. But it faces a serious challenge with the rise of Spotify, which continues to burn through capital to grow its subscriber base. Spotify recently announced it hit the 1 million U.S. paid subscriber mark as well.

While Rhapsody somewhat has a presence in the U.K. and Germany via its Napster brand, it hasn’t done much internationally. With the launch of Rhapsody in Europe, it can finally fish for users that aren’t just in the U.S. It provide no exact timing or specific countries where the service could appear. But when further announcements hit, we’ll let you know.

Rhapsody also has an opportunity to grow via the use of partnerships and getting its apps on more platforms. It was one a handful that launched an app at CES 2013 that would work with Ford’s AppLink program. The app lets you use your voice to control it in some Ford cars. It also launched a slick iPad app (pictured) in December.

Rhapsody for iPad image via Rhapsody

Amazon has signed a licensing agreement with A&E Networks that will make TV shows from A&E, Bio, History, and Lifetime channels available to watch on Prime Instant Video, the company announced today.

Amazon claims the Prime Instant Video service now has more than 33,000 movies and TV episodes that you can stream instantly on a variety of devices. That’s a far cry from the amount of content provided by its biggest competitor, Netflix, but at least it’s getting better.

“In a year we have more than doubled the Prime Instant Video selection for our Prime members,” said Brad Beale, the director of digital video content acquisition for Amazon, in a statement. “We remain focused on adding TV episodes and movies to Prime Instant Video that we think our customers will enjoy. A&E Networks has some of the most popular shows on television, and we know our customers will love streaming the A+E content with Prime Instant Video.”

Today’s deal will bring some of the highest rated television shows from A&E’s networks to Prime, including hits like Pawn Stars, Storage Wars, and Dance Moms.

Last year, Amazon signed quite a few deals to make Prime’s library of movies and TV shows larger. These include a deal with Epix to get The Hunger Games and The Avengers and a deal with NBC to have shows such as Parks and Recreation, Friday Night Lights, and Battlestar Galactica.

Pawn Stars via History Channel

Streaming music service Rhapsody has launched an attractive new iPad app that could steal a little attention from its biggest rivals, the company announced today.

Rhapsody reached one million paid users in the U.S. far before Spotify did, but Spotify has attracted more attention during the past year or two, thanks to celebrity endorsements and a push to rapidly innovate its products. Spotify has five million paid subscribers and 15 million free users around the world. Rhapsody, on the other hand, has been more methodical — it only offers its service to paid users in United States and focuses on their needs.

While Rhapsody has had an iPhone app for a long while, today’s launch of an iPad app could bring a few more people over its service, especially those who like lounging with their iPads at home. Paul Springer, senior VP of worldwide product and design for Rhapsody, writes:

Our customers are going to be big fans of the latest tablet additions to Rhapsody’s growing product suite. Rhapsody has never looked or sounded better. We built this app from the ground up optimizing for speed, reliability and an effortless discovery experience for our members. We obsessed – and will continue to obsess – over making this the best way to enjoy music on your iPad, whether you listen through the internal speakers, headphones or external speakers using our Airplay and Bluetooth integration.

Rhapsody has more than 16 million songs available on its service and costs $10 per month. Rhapsody for iPad lets you use the service 30 days for free.

Check out the new Rhapsody iPad app from the Apple App Store here.

Nine Inch Nails front man and Oscar-winning musician Trent Reznor will soon launch a streaming music service in partnership with Beats by Dre that will compete alongside services such as Spotify, Rhapsody, and Rdio.

Reznor revealed his plans in a profile in The New Yorker. While that article is behind a paywall, Pitchfork has pulled out key details.

The service will be called Daisy, and it will be launched early next year. Reznor told The New Yorker that it “uses mathematics to offer suggestions to the listener… [but also] would present choices based partly on suggestions made by connoisseurs, making it a platform in which the machine and the human would collide more intimately.”

He compared Daisy to Spotify, the cool kid on the music block, and said Spotify has curation problems. “‘Here’s sixteen million licensed pieces of music,’ they’ve said, but you’re not stumbling into anything,” Reznor said. “What’s missing is a service that adds a layer of intelligent curation.”

Instead of listening to music you already know, Daisy will focus on helping you find things you wouldn’t normally find yourself. It’s “like having your own guy when you go into the record store, who knows what you like but can also point you down some paths you wouldn’t necessarily have encountered,” Reznor said.

While Reznor talks a big game, I’m not sure I believe Daisy will be all that different from what’s already being offered by Spotify, Rhapsody, Rdio, or even popular radio service Pandora. Spotify recently announced new discovery features and confirmed to VentureBeat that its “Spotify Apps” will move over to mobile devices in January.

Trent Reznor photo via Ed Vill/Flickr

Google has released a major update of its iOS YouTube app, and it now supports the iPad and the iPhone 5′s longer display. It also works better with AirPlay, so you can watch videos on the big screen.

Apple dropped Google’s default YouTube and Maps apps out of iOS 6, but Google released a great standalone app that worked on the iPhone and iPod touch. Now that app has gotten much better with this update. (We’re still waiting for the standalone Google Maps app!)

Google writes about the updated app on its YouTube blog:

You love watching YouTube on the go — in fact — more than 25 percent of all YouTube watching happens on mobile. This past September, you got the YouTube app for iPhone and iPod touch to make it easier to find and share the videos and channels you love on YouTube, and you made us the number one free app in the App Store for two months. Since then, we’ve been hard at work to improve the app based on your feedback.

Just in time for the holidays, now you can download or update the YouTube app with a look designed for the iPad and iPhone 5, enhanced AirPlay support, videos that start faster and play more smoothly, and improved accessibility with VoiceOver. Enjoy Tastemade on iPad in full screen glory, or hours of flipping through Ryan Higa videos on your iPhone 5 or iPod touch.

Photo via YouTube

Sony announced today on the PlayStation blog that the PS3 is the number one home entertainment device people use to watch Netflix on their TVs. That’s impressive.

Almost any device, it seems, can stream Netflix these days. Netflix is available on the Wii (and the new Wii U), Apple TV, Tivo, Boxee, numerous Blu-ray players, Roku digital players, smart TV platforms from multiple vendors, and, of course, the Xbox 360.

To lead that pack is quite an accomplishment.

“PS3 is our largest TV-connected platform in terms of Netflix viewing, and this year, at times, even surpassed the PC in hours of Netflix enjoyment to become our number one platform overall,” Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in a statement.

Part of that lead is because PS3 is a very successful mass-market console despite the fact that Xbox has outsold it for 23 consecutive months. Part of it is because PS3 had Netflix early, in 2009, was the first console with 1080p and 5.1 surround sound, and has consistently been on the cutting edge of what’s available, technologically, to control your Netflix viewing.

But part of it is probably also because the Xbox 360, while it offers Netflix, has a wider range of entertainment possibilities, with Microsoft working on original video content, major network TV, YouTube, live TV, and more.

Two newer innovations that Sony has brought to PS3 and Netflix include a new voice user interface system, dubbed “Max,” that is currently in testing, and the ability to pause a Netflix movie on your PS3-equipped TV, and restart it seamlessly on another device, such as your PlayStation Vita.

Innovations like that — and perhaps a breakthrough new console for the coming 2013 updates — might keep PS3 in the lead.

photo credit: CowGummy via photopin cc

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Sept. 9 - 10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Netflix chief executive Reed Hastings took the stage at Amazon’s big cloud event in Las Vegas today with Amazon’s senior VP Andy Jassy, and told the audience that he wanted Netflix to be the largest business in the world that runs entirely on Amazon Web Services.

In spite of the fact, of course, that Amazon and Netflix are die-hard competitors.

“The biggest benefit is the scale,” Hastings said. “Now we’re on a cost curve and an architecture that, as more people use it, gets cheaper.”

Netflix, of course, sells streaming entertainment. So does Amazon … and Amazon also sells DVDs and Blu-Rays. But Hastings said that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has assured him that it is safe to be on Amazon’s cloud services, and Jassy told him that to Amazon Web Services, Amazon streaming and Netflix streaming are just two equal clients.

“Netflix is every bit as important a customer to us as Amazon retail,” Jassy said.

While cost and scalability are the huge benefits of the cloud — especially since Amazon just reduced most clients’ data storage costs by about 25 percent — Hastings also talked about what is not great with the cloud: configuration.

“When you have to pick individual instance types, you know something’s wrong,” the very technical Hastings said, referring to how Amazon packages and prices cloud usage. ”It reminds me a lot of when I started in computing and had to handle register allocation manually before compilers came out … we’re kind of at that stage before the compiler.”

Hastings also provided some insight into how Netflix uses the cloud beyond basic storage and streaming.

“Netflix’s biggest problem is ranking,” Hastings said, saying that the company has the impossible task of fitting 10,000 videos into 10 inches of screen real estate.

When the company gets it right, people watch what Netflix is showing them. When the company gets it wrong, he says, people go watch cable. So Netflix analyzes gigabytes of subscriber data on the cloud to optimize its ranking methodology … and ensure that what users see on the first page of Netflix is something that’s actually interesting to them.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Popular video-sharing site Vimeo has rebuilt its iPhone app with the addition of faster uploading and improved social sharing to Twitter and Facebook, a sign it wants to attract more fun content shot on the fly.

“We re-visioned it, refocused it, and simplified it a lot,” Vimeo President Dae Mellencamp told VentureBeat. “People do want to share quick clips from their lives on Facebook and Twitter. You don’t see these brief clips on the Vimeo homepage, but they are very popular.”

Vimeo has had quite the year. Over the past few months, it’s added a new CEO, redesigned the main site with an emphasis on larger videos, launched an array of apps, and given its community ways to make money with a “tip jar” and paywall options. Now it’s gone back to mobile to keep momentum in that extremely important area.

The new iPhone app adds a few key features. First, it makes uploading faster and more convenient than before and it begins uploading the second you put in a video title. Second, users can now pause and resume uploads, which can come in handy if they move between different wireless networks. Third, users can search for and watch other videos while uploading in the background. (A careful warning to iPhone users: If you don’t have unlimited data, be careful about uploading HD video. You could burn through your data cap pretty quick.)

Notably, the iPhone app removes the in-app video editor that Vimeo for iPhone had before. Mellencamp said Vimeo removed this because the experience needed to be streamlined. Additionally, she noted that video editing was difficult on such a small screen.

Next up, the iOS-focused Vimeo team will work on revamping its iPad app, Mellencamp said. In 2013, Vimeo also plans to look at its options at revamping the Android app.

Check out the video below for more.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings will leave Microsoft’s board of directors in November, the two parties announced today.

“I’m thrilled to have served on the board at such a pivotal time for Microsoft, including the development of Windows 8, Windows RT, and Microsoft Surface, which will bring exciting new opportunities for customers and the industry as a whole,” Hastings said in a statement. “I’ve decided to reduce the number of boards I serve on so that I can focus on Netflix and on my education work.”

Hastings joined Microsoft’s board in March 2007 and no doubt provided some ideas to help it again become an innovative force. On top of Microsoft, Hastings serves on the boards of Netflix, Facebook, Dreambox Learning, the Knowledge Is Power Program, and the California Charter Schools Association. That makes for quite the busy schedule, and it’s understandable that he’d want to lighten his burden.

However, Microsoft has signaled its intentions to provide more media services, and it’s possible a conflict of interest is driving Hastings away from the board. With Microsoft adding movies rentals to Windows 8, it may not want to give Hastings info on future plans.

Of course, Microsoft’s statement gives no indication to why Hastings is leaving and simply praises him:

“Reed has been a terrific board member, and his insights and experience have really helped guide us through a critical period of transformation for both Microsoft and the industry,” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said in a statement.

Reed Hastings photo: Flickr

Nintendo entered the media battlefield today with the introduction of its Nintendo TVii service that will be included for free on its upcoming Wii U game console.

In a somewhat unexpected move, Nintendo showed off the Nintendo TVii service today in an attempt to catch up with its media-savvy console rivals, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Nintendo also wants people to use the Wii U instead of media streamers like the Apple TV, Boxee, and Roku.

Nintendo TVii streams movies, TV, and sports from your cable box and from services like Netflix, Amazon Instant, and Hulu Plus. It also connects with your social networks so you can comment on content you’re watching.

The Wii U launches Nov. 18 with two different models — one is the “basic” white edition for $300, and the other is a “deluxe” black edition for $350. Nintendo TVii is an extra that could help someone decide to buy a Wii U or at least deter someone from choosing an Xbox or PS3 because the Wii U didn’t have media options.

Check out the Nintendo TVii service in the video below.

In a strange turn of events, streaming music service Grooveshark has had its Android app removed from the Google Play store just days after it showed back up in the store.

Grooveshark would not tell us the reason why Google kicked the app out. However, we suspect it has something to do with its constant legal battles with major music labels. Grooveshark doesn’t have broad licensing agreements to play the majority of its music (like Spotify and Rdio do) and relies on DMCA rules, just as YouTube does.

Grooveshark has filed a notice with Google and is attempting to get its app back in the Google Play store. A company spokesperson writes:

We have filed a counter-notice and are working with Google and their Google Play reinstatement process to get our app back in the market. Until then, our Android app remains available for all at http://mobile.grooveshark.com/android, and we thank all the users who continue to support open music, open markets, and open Internet.

As mentioned in the statement above, Grooveshark craftily launched an HTML5 web app for streaming music through iOS and Android web browsers in response to bans from some app stores. Looks like Android users will once again be reliant on that mobile app or a direct download from Grooveshark for listening to music with the service.

A Google spokesperson told us that Google has not been working with Grooveshark to get the app reinstated in the store, and that it removed the app because it violated its Google Play policies. Google said it notified Grooveshark about what policy the app was violating and provided details about how it can appeal Google’s decision.

Google would not tell me what policy Grooveshark was violating. My personal guess is intellectual property. Google’s policy states:

Intellectual Property: Don’t infringe on the intellectual property rights of others (including patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright, and other proprietary rights) or encourage or induce infringement of intellectual property rights. We will respond to clear notices of alleged copyright infringement. For more information or to file a DMCA request, please visit our copyright procedures.

Shark on beach photo via gadgetdude/Flickr

HBO will soon launch its first-ever streaming-only service with access to its extensive catalog of great TV shows and movies. Unfortunately, for now, the service will only be available in the Nordic countries and nowhere else.

Cord-cutters in the U.S. and around the world have been clamoring for some time for a way to subscribe to streaming-only HBO Go service without having to pay for cable. Regardless, HBO had continually pushed back and said only cable subscribers will get access to HBO content online.

But now it looks like HBO has decided to experiment with the Nordic countries. Variety reports that the new “HBO Nordic AB” service will be available in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland starting in mid-October. It will cost less than 10 euros a month.

Without mentioning it, HBO is setting itself up for a bloody fight with Netflix in international territories. Netflix just announced a few weeks ago that it intended to launch in the same four Nordic countries as HBO’s new service before the end of the year.

What we’re really interested to see is if HBO’s Nordic opportunity is successful, would HBO be willing to bring a streaming-only service to those in North America or other territories? Our guess is that HBO’s model is too profitable in U.S. right now for the company to offer Americans a streaming-only option. But other parts of the world could be looking at an HBO online invasion if the Nordics gain traction.

“Each market is unique, and HBO approaches each one with what we consider to believe the best business model specific to that territory,” an HBO spokesperson told Variety.

Game of Thrones photo: HBO

Sept. 9 - 10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Video sharing service Vimeo has finally integrated with cloud storage service Dropbox after many requests from the vocal Vimeo community, the company announced today.

With the integration, Vimeo users can now add their Dropbox account on the Vimeo upload page or in their account settings. This will allow them to automatically or manually upload videos through a “Vimeo” folder in Dropbox.

“Integration within Dropbox is something our community wanted for a while,” said Vimeo CEO Kerry Trainor in a statement. “This is another tool for them to upload and share their videos with friends and family or the rest of the world.”

The Dropbox integration adds to the many moves Vimeo has made this year to solidify itself as the go-to destination for high-quality online videos. So far in 2012, the company brought in a new CEO, redesigned its main site, and launched a wide array of apps to bring more mobile users into the fold.

Check out the video below for more on the Dropbox/Vimeo team-up.

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Streaming TV and movie service Hulu could soon have a new CEO and lose many of the exclusive content deals that have made the business as successful as it is, according to a confidential memo obtained by Variety.

It’s been rumored for some time that Hulu CEO Jason Kilar would leave the company as soon as he could cash out his equity. That timing is pegged for September. Kilar was in the running for the Yahoo CEO position before Marissa Mayer stepped in, but he loudly declined.

But even bigger than potentially moving to a new CEO is a radical change to Hulu’s business model. Right now, Hulu has an exclusive on streaming much of TV’s current season content. This is why, say, Netflix only streams episodes from last season of your favorite show that’s airing now.

Hulu is a joint venture by News Corp. (Fox), NBC Universal, Disney (ABC), and Providence Equity. The three broadcasters are buying Providence out, so the networks will get more say over everything. They are reportedly planning to kill that current-TV-season advantage for Hulu and let other sites get in on the action.

The memo outlines the following big changes to Hulu’s content deals:

• No more exclusivity for current-season content once restricted to Hulu and the networks’ respective websites. Now Disney and News Corp. can turn around and license programming to another third-party, i.e. YouTube, which could dilute Hulu’s competitive advantage in the marketplace.

• No more content parity. ABC.com and Fox.com will be able to hold back certain content to differentiate their own sites from Hulu, which was once entitled to everything on the networks’ sites.

• Exclusive “super-distribution” rights Hulu once retained to syndicate content to third-party sites like Yahoo and AOL would revert back to Disney and News Corp.

• Fox wants to increase to four ads per commercial pod on Hulu.com.

If all these changes do go into effect, no wonder Kilar would want out. It would make the company a less attractive destination for online viewers and increase the importance of subscription-based Hulu Plus to the company.

Jason Kilar photo: CharlieRose.com

In late 1958, John C. Koss created the first portable music system, the Koss 390 phonograph player.

Bulky and heavy by today’s standards, it was compact for a time in which stereo systems were more like furniture. But when Koss showed the player at an audio exposition, audiophiles virtually ignored it, gravitating instead to the true innovation: the world’s first-ever stereo headphones Koss paired with it for demonstration purposes.

Fast forward 60 years.

In 2010, the Koss company found an old battered 390, literally at a garage sale. The company bought it and restored it. Then earlier this year, John’s son Michael, now chief executive of Koss, connected his father’s first invention to one of his own: the first Wi-Fi-powered internet-addressable headphones available on the market.

He then put a record — one of this father’s favorites, Sinatra’s Fly Me to The Moon — on the turntable, and listened to it in the highest possible MP3 quality, wirelessly. The first true over-the air internet headphones were born.

Fly me to the moon

John Koss started the Koss Corporation with a $200 wedding gift that he diverted — with his wife’s permission — to buy 20 broken-down TV sets to refurbish and rent.

But it was only in 1958, when he paired the first stereo headphones with his “portable” music system, that he introduced the world to personal music … sparking a revolution that lives on in the ghetto blaster of the 80s, the Walkman of the 90s, and the iPod of the 2000s.

“Now, we want to deliver that same experience via the web, wirelessly, directly addressable to any individual wearing this device,” says Michael Koss.

Personal music, without wires

The new product is Striva Pro. Koss sent me a pair of the $450 over-the-ear headphones to test — and they’ll be hard to let go after this review is written.

The goal was simple: freedom from wires. All wires.

“We’d been doing a ton of research on headphones, and the one thing that came out was a consistent complaint about wires,” Koss said. “While we’ve had wireless solutions since the 70s … infrared … radio … BlueTooth … we wanted to make something that works over Wi-Fi.”

Wi-Fi has become so ubiquitous that the company would be able to ride existing wireless infrastructure practically everywhere. That realization gave Koss an idea.

“When we did that, we realized we could run it in an infrastructure mode, and anywhere those headphones could connect to the internet … they could receive the same data from our transmitter.”

That’s the key innovation behind the Striva Pro.

It means that I can put on the Koss Strivas in my home, connect to my home Wi-Fi, and enjoy any stream of music available on the internet, wire-free. And I can take the Strivas to Starbucks, my office, the gym, or any other location on planet earth with open Wi-Fi and do exactly the same.

The Strivas have a battery, Wi-Fi chip the size of pencil eraser, and a tiny microprocessor all onboard. Everything is self-contained, wireless, and simple.

Rock it old-school and new-school

Or, of course, you can also just attach the Strivas to my iPhone and play music right from there, just like ordinary headphones.

But what if you want to be wireless even when Wi-Fi is not available? Koss has you covered with the ability to stream wirelessly to the Strivas from non-internet sources.

Source: Koss

The CAP, or content access point. About the size of a book of matches.

Along with the Striva headphones, Koss includes a content access point, or CAP. Tiny, the size of a book of matches, the CAP  plugs into any headphone jack. Attach your CAP to your iPhone with the included cable, and you’ve just set up a Wi-Fi transmitter. You could conceivably leave your MP3 player in your gym bag, and go work out wirelessly without the need for a publicly available Wi-Fi access point.

“Our chief financial officer puts his phone in his locker and listens to the music in the gym … up to 300 feet away,” says Koss. “We’ve had it up to 500 feet.”

Or you can simply plug the CAP into your computer and stream wirelessly from iTunes, Windows Media Player, or any other app playing sound on your PC.

Frankly, it’s a game-changer: music from the cloud — or your hard drive — straight to your headphones. It’s all of your music plus the infinite variety of the internet, all available without cables.

How does it work?

Koss didn’t spare much with the Striva. In the box you get no fewer than nine components: the headphones themselves, one charger for both the headphones and the CAP, the CAP itself, and a variety of wires of varying sizes for every possible need. Plus, you get a very nice case.

Source: Koss

Selecting the streams and channels you like …

Once out of the box, you pull out the headphones, plug the CAP into your phone, and go to MyKoss.com.

There you walk through a process of syncing the headphones to the CAP and setting up your music preferences, which involves choosing various channels and streams from internet-based radio stations. Channels are groups of similar stations; streams are individual stations.

None of the music originates with Koss: MyKoss.com simply is the handshake that connects your ears with the internet radio stations you’ve selected.

Once you’ve set up your preferences and synced your CAP and headphones, music from whatever channels you’ve selected will flow automatically to your Strivas. It’s not difficult, but it’s not as easy as it could be either (don’t expect granny to do it herself).

Using the Strivas takes a little bit of instruction, something you might not have had to undergo for any other pair of headphones before, due to Koss’ Apple-ification of the user interface: as few buttons as possible. In fact, there are just two controls: a joystick-like uni-button (my term) on your left ear, and a volume control strip.

Source: John Koetsier

Everything but the kitchen sink …

Turn the Striva on by pressing the joystick — a short press to go into Wi-Fi mode, a long press to look for a broadcasting CAP. Swipe it back for the next stream, forward for the previous stream, push up to “approve a song” … or hold back for the next channel, hold forward for the previous channel … you get the picture.

After a while it’s second nature, but you will be checking the (very good) visual manual more than once.

Volume is a bit of a tricky beast: A long control strip curving up the side of the left headphone. It senses your finger and adjusts the volume up or down as you swipe.

Well, that’s the theory.

In practice, volume control is a little hit and miss, and you’ll find yourself adjusting up and down multiple times to get exactly what you want. I tried different methods: full finger, fingernail, fingertip. Ultimately, a full finger press moving at medium speed seemed to work best. There’s a definite cool factor, and fewer moving parts mean great reliability, but the control strip is exactly optimal right now.

What about the sound?

And audio quality? I asked Michael Koss about that.

“Like everything else, it’s garbage in, garbage out. We’re dealing right now in a society that’s very used to compressed sound … it boggles my mind that I can walk through an airport see teens sharing ear buds, but people have gotten used to that level.”

In practice, I found the headphones to offer excellent sound — depending, as Koss said, on the audio source. Where available, the entire Striva system scales to the quality of 320 kbps MP3 files. That’s better quality than typical music downloaded from iTunes, which is 256 kbps AAC (a different audio codec from MP3).

“We’re quite comfortable with the product we’re releasing. It’s getting the best throughput you can with that technology,” Koss says. “But if the source material is lousy  … we can’t do anything about that.”

Would I buy them?

$450 is not a cheap pair of headphones. And the earbud versions, which are coming in a few months, are $500 … the cost of extreme miniaturization.

There’s also room to improve. The volume control can be made more reliable, and MyKoss could be made into a platform that, perhaps, tweets songs that you say you like.

But having all the music on the internet in your head is compelling. And the music you love, wherever you go, without wires … I’ve fallen in love.

Perhaps it’s sort of like the Retina Display iPad or MacBook Pro. Once you’ve used it, you can’t go back (but if you’ve never experienced them, it’s hard to tell what you’re missing). Having experienced my music wirelessly anywhere I wanted it, it’ll be hard to go back to cords.

And Koss hasn’t skimped on any components with the Striva: all the connectors and wires you need are right in the box.

So would I buy them? I’d have to say yes.

As Michael Koss says, “It’s an IP addressable end point that you stick in your ear.” Welcome to the future.

photo credit: S. Randall Saffen via photo pin cc, flyzipper via photo pin cc

Streaming music service Rdio has partnered with independent music aggregators TuneCore and CD Baby, bringing its catalog to more than 18 million tracks, the company announced today.

“Independent music is a vital part of Rdio’s catalog,” CEO Drew Larner said in a statement. “We’re glad to support hundreds of thousands of self-released artists by connecting their work to new music fans from all over the world.”

Rdio competes with Spotify, MOG, and Rhapsody in the streaming music realm, with Spotify reigning as the innovation king over the rest. Rdio, at least, does have a dedicated fanbase and a strong emphasis on social.

Rdio redesigned its main site in May to help keep up with its strong competition. Rdio gives listeners a limited amount of free use, and you can listen to unlimited music for $5-to-$10 per month, depending on whether you want mobile app access. There’s also $17.99 or $22.99 per month options for families.

On the mobile front, Rdio offers iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry apps. It also works with Sonos and Roku, if you’re more inclined to jam out in the living room.

Photo credit: Rdio

Not surprisingly, high up on the list is his new startup, Spreecast.

Google Hangouts on air, the Google+ video-conferencing technology that allows anyone to broadcast video to ten, a hundred, or a thousand people, just added Studio Mode, with higher quality audio — a feature aimed at musicians who are connecting with fans.

That prompted Fluhr to start telling his story a little louder … which included previewing three new features for VentureBeat that the Spreecast just launched today.

Source: John Koetsier

A spreecast with me, Jeff Fluhr, and a Spreecast staffer

Though Spreecast came out of private beta last fall, it’s still very much a beta product, sporting a beta tag just above its logo, and not even starting to focus on monetization yet. But the product is designed for real, deep engagement with tens, hundreds, or thousands of users.

And it does have a compelling story.

Social means what?

“The reason I started the company was I felt like the way we were all interacting on the Internet was dominated by text-based faceless interactions,” says Fluhr. “Tweets, status updates, posts … they’re all threaded, asynchronous conversations. There’s value to do that, but also disadvantages.”

The advantages of Spreecast, Fluhr says, include a better communication, a focus on nonverbal cues, and deeper understanding … all of which, he believes, allow people to get more done in less time. And he’s not too sure the current “social” vogue is all that social.

“Up until 10 years ago, ‘social’ meant you were going to do something with someone, live, together,” he says. “Now that word has changed … and it means something text-based online.”

So he started Spreecast to “make social face-to-face again.” And he doesn’t think that Google Hangouts on Air qualifies.

Better than Hangouts?

“Google Hangouts is limited to 10 people who are on-camera … the others are just watching,” Fluhr says. “For Spreecast, there could be thousands of people watching, and it’s very interactive. They can chat together, interact, or ask to get on camera.”

Source: John Koetsier

A viewer requesting his 10 minutes of fame

Plus, Google Hangouts is a Google+ service. That limits its effectiveness, according to Fluhr.

“You can only invite Google+ users, and anyone who wants to join your show has to sign up for Google+.”

Spreecast allows anyone to join, using Facebook or Twitter logins, and can be embedded on any site: a company’s home page, a blog, or even a Facebook tab. The service is platform agnostic, Fluhr argues.

Finally, Spreecast builds in features that enable simple management of events: the ability for fans or audience members to ask to go on camera, functionality for the moderators to preview them before putting them live, and the ability to put them on the main feed — and dump them if needed.

New features

To the existing Spreecast functionality, the company added three new features that Fluhr believes further enhances the platform for multi-directional communication.

First, Spreecast has created channels that brands, stars, or anyone can embed on their websites. Simply embed your channel once, and all your previous shows are accessible. Start a new show, and it’s automatically available to join at the top of the list.

Source: John Koetsier

Apparently Coco is popular on Spreecast. Two guesses what industry she’s in …

“We’ve also added clips functionality,” Fluhr says. “Most spreecasts are between 20 and 40 minutes, but if you want to share 30 seconds that’s really funny or really emotional, now you can grab just that clip and share it.”

All spreecasts are recorded and archived, and any user can take any slice, anytime, and embed it anywhere, share it on Facebook, or Twitter, or Google+, allowing the entire library of content to be shared in much more digestible bite-sized pieces.

And finally, the company added producer volume-control functionality. One of the problems with video conferences is differing volume levels … this allows a producer to simply level and standardize volumes for everyone.

All these features are leading to results.

Celebrities as diverse as Reese Witherspoon and Donald Rumsfeld have used Spreecast to speak to their fans. Actors from Glee and studios like Warner Brothers and Viacom have helped the site drive weekly active users up 240 percent since the beginning of this year … and overall user count has spiked by 33 percent in just the last month.

Better than Google+?

Every entrepreneur automatically thinks his or her solution is better than any competitors. If not, they shouldn’t be in the game.

Whether others agree or not … that is the question, no?

One plus to Google+ (oops) is that even though potential Hangout users need to be members, that’s still a large pool, probably well north of 250 million by now. That may not sound like much next to almost 1 billion Facebook users, but it is certainly nothing to sniff at.

And whether or not those 250 million are actually daily active users who are on the site, they’re people who don’t have to create a new account to see your content.

But the management and engagement functionality of Spreecast, in which any of 10,000 audience members can instantly become the star of the show, is a massive leg up on Hangouts on Air. So is the ability to embed the broadcast anywhere you want.

And they are a few features that Google should maybe consider.

photo credit: Stuck in Customs via photo pin cc, moriza via photo pin cc

I get it. The Olympics are incredibly expensive to produce and broadcast. I shouldn’t expect to be able to watch it the way I want to, when I want, absolutely free.

I haven’t found a Flipboard for TV that somehow magically lets me skip past any paywalls and reformat the world’s most valuable media property for my iPad’s convenience. It probably doesn’t exist, and for good reasons.

Still, NBC had a huge opportunity to cash in on the rising wave of Internet media, and it blew it.

NBC paid $1.18 billion for the broadcast rights in the U.S., including Internet broadcasting. Through a partnership with YouTube, it offered 3,500 hours of live Olympics coverage in HD for free — but with a big catch. You had to be a paying subscriber to a cable or satellite TV service that includes NBC.

That irritates cord-cutters like me, who don’t like paying top dollar for a hundred channels of crap just to get the one or two shows we’re actually interested in. I’d rather pay a few dollars a month and wait for the shows to appear on Netflix, thank you very much. (Or find some kind of workaround.)

So, congratulations on a historic Internet first, NBC. But thanks for nothing.

More significantly, NBC’s policy meant that it lost an opportunity to build and make money from a new audience. Internet viewership is on the rise, and people are looking to share their thoughts about the Olympics online. Eighty-seven percent of fans planned on sharing news about the event via social media, and people aged 21-35 are the most likely to use social networks by far.

Give those people links to live content or clips, and they will share them. Over time, that audience will grow. And that audience is certainly monetizable.

NBC said yesterday that 219.4 million people watched the Olympics through the network, making it the most-watched event in U.S. television history, ahead of the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. In addition, the network delivered 2 billion page views and 159 million video streams during the two-week event.

So despite the outlandish pricetag, NBC executives said they expected to break even on the event, thanks to the large viewership. It may even turn a bit of a profit in the end, when all the residuals and collateral benefits are toted up.

But let’s compare those figures to the social media impact. To take one small example, Netbase counted 93,000 #NBCFail posts on Twitter this month, generating nearly 148 million impressions. Sure, an impression on Twitter is worth a lot less than a few minutes spent watching YouTube or the TV. Still: 148 million negative impressions count for a lot against those 159 million video streams.

NBC’s short-sighted Internet strategy hurt the Olympic committee, too, by curtailing the audience of young, tech-savvy people who want to curate their own media, thank you very much. Many of these people would watch sports that escape the notice of the short-sighted NBC programmers, who seem to think the country is obsessed with watching hours of volleyball (and not the interesting kind of volleyball, either) and rhythmic gymnastics. Interesting and obscure sports like the omnium and the steeplechase might finally get their due, not to mention insanely popular but strangely neglected ones like soccer. (Yes, NBC, a lot of Americans like to watch soccer.) If you wanted to watch diving all day long, knock yourself out.

NBC also cut off a promising route around the time-zone problem that has plagued it for years. Instead of holding the news for the prime-time broadcast, it could simply broadcast everything on the Internet, like the BBC did. They could have reached a huge new audience, what viral marketing genius Jonah Peretti likes to call the “Bored at Work Network“: office workers who would be happy to spend a few hours at working slacking off by keeping a livestream open in a corner of their desktops.

I have a modest proposal for the next Olympics. It starts with the Olympic committee, which needs to sell Internet broadcasting rights separately from television rights. Cash-rich tech companies like Google or Facebook might see a lucrative opportunity in buying these rights, and they’d certainly do a better job than NBC did this year. Heck, even Yahoo could probably beat NBC’s Internet performance.

Maybe NBC will buy the Internet rights, too, and if so, fine. But at least it will realize that it’s paying for a valuable property and have some incentive not to squander it.

Top image: NBC’s Olympics homepage looks pretty, but it’s a huge missed opportunity.

Homepage photo credit: Fallen cyclist/Flickr