Sony splashes out on video site Grouper
Today’s news making headlines around the world are mainly technology related. Film giant Sony Pictures Entertainment has bought video sharing website grouper.com for $65m. This calls upon financial and market analysts to speculate what company might just buy YouTube.
On a separate story, it is now official that social networking site Facebook has entered into a deal with Microsoft.
Today’s topics are:
- Sony splashes out on video site Grouper
-Microsoft adCenters on Facebook
Some had long been speculating that Sony could just buy YouTube which has traffic at least 30 times that of Grouper.com. If YT was to sell today, in order to be fair it would go for no less than a $1bn.
Marshall Kirkpatrick doesn’t think the comparison is all that applicable, though. His thesis: Sony is buying Grouper for the P2P, and while $65 million might be a trivial expense for Sony, why not use The Torrents if all you are mainly interested in is P2P distribution?
That’s a fair question, but with all due respect to this type of argument, I think that YouTube is not about distribution so much as it is an opportunity to monetize the content contributions and associated product and lifestyle marketing choices that tie in with audiences of millions who create their own digital content.
Grouper has build three key technologies: an online video sharing site, a desktop video editor, and a closed p2p network for distributing media content. Sony was attracted to Grouper by is p2p client network which it says will help it to share low quality videos online and distribute DVD quality video.
The big question now remains who is going to acquire YT. I think that the rationale for a YT deal would follow more of a Flickr or MySpace acquisition model. Some of the potential buyers for YT include Yahoo or any of the media giants like Time Warner and News Corp.I still think Yahoo! would be the best acquirer, if only for the opportunity to build on their Flickr base.
That’s not to say some other companies would do well to pursue content distribution deals with YouTube. What about, say, Time Warner. affiliating with, or buying a minority stake in YouTube and then offering self-made video distribution to all those Match.com members?
Microsoft adCenters on Facebook
Microsoft is said to have entered into a search and ad banner deal with Facebook. This is seen as an opportunity for Microsofr to counter the most recent deal struck between Google and Myspace for search and ad banners.
Facebook has so far made light use of of advertising on its site. It has only experimented with light user generated “flyers” and sponsored groups by companies like Apple.
Facebook has about nine million members, compared to MySpace’s 100 million.