4Video - What's Happening in the World of Internet Video

DVD Forum selects AAC for DVD Audio Standard

What the heck is AAC? 

Advanced Audio Codec.... if you don't know this will answer most all your questions courtesy of Apple. http://www.apple.com/mpeg4/aac/
What is the DVD Forum?  http://www.dvdforum.org is an international association of over 200 hardware manufacturers, software firms and other users of Digital Versatile Discs. The Forum was created for the purpose of exchanging and disseminating ideas and information about the DVD Format and its technical capabilities, improvements and innovations.
The DVD Forum works to promote broad acceptance of DVD products on a worldwide basis, across entertainment, consumer electronics and IT industries. Not only does it clearly sound better than MPEG2 layer 3 more popularly referred to as .MP3 AAC was perceived favorably by the music industry because of its associated copyright protection measures and a history of use by legitimate, paid music download services such as  Apple's iTunes Music Store.  http://www.apple.com/itunes/  Go download your favorite song for just 99 cents legally. But then just for yucks try and pirate it outside of allowances. You will then appreciate why the music industry is so pleased. If you can find Pepsi with a yellow cap here's a hint. If you simply tip the bottle and look under the cap before selecting the bottle you want to purchase you can tell which ones have a free song code and which ones say sorry play again. 
A good read on this important news development can be found at the register.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/03/23/dvd_forum_chooses_apple_music/

Video in the News - by 4Video

In our never ending quest to bring you the best and most interesting videos on the net from all over the world.  A story caught my attention in the Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/04/04/ncat04.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/04/04/ixhome.html out of Europe. Warning! These clips are not for animal lovers, created as part of an ad campaign for Fords' Sport-Ka - a car not sold in the US by Ogilvy and Mather
http://www.ogilvy.com/ The first ( we won't spoil it for you) with a pigeon was pulled when animal activists complained. A second spot was never supposed to be released, but "leaked" out.

Excerpt from the Telegraph:
Both Ford and Ogilvy & Mather - which handles the car maker's £27 million account - have branded the leaking of the ad "totally unacceptable and reprehensible".  ( So why did they spend several thousand pounds to create it?)
"A full investigation has been ordered by Ford and Ogilvy to determine how this unapproved material found its way into the public domain," said a spokesman for Ford. "The action in the video clip was totally computer generated - no animal was harmed."
But one advertising executive insisted that Ford was protesting too much. "No publicity is bad publicity and the cynical part of me thinks that this 'leaking' was intended all along," he said. "It's got them terrific media coverage, after all."
End of except >

So now your wondering where can you view the clips? They are not on any website I could find after hours of searching, I inquired and by chance got lucky with a UK source ( infamous hacker) who requested to remain anonymous. The person located & e-mailed me the clips and you may download them here each is 1MB : Pigeon  Cat

More women join suit against Hooters for secretly filming them undress.

Full story from Court TV.com
http://www.courttv.com/news/2004/0406/hooters.html
The first Hooters was started in Clearwater, Florida http://www.originalhooters.com/Saga/ where I live. At the time I lived just down the street. The chain has grown to over 300 stores nationally and as one of the first loyal customers, I happen to know one of the founders. I saw him driving his Hooters Land Rover on the beach and waved him over to talk about it. He was painfully aware of it ( He has millions in Hooters stock) and informed me that the actions of 1 pervert manager should not reflect poorly on the entire chain. It's a big PR nightmare. While Hooters will ultimately end up settling the law suit, it is really the criminal actions of 1 person. Not the company. He then added, " I am just as pissed about this as the girls who were secretly filmed". Please go grab a beer & eat a dozen of their famous delicious wings - they are going to need to make up the money somehow.

Consumers Poised to Join Internet Video Subscription Services According to In-Stat/MDR

Read the complete story at Streaming Magazine.
http://streamingmagazine.com/viewentry.asp?ID=281655&PT=Daily+Digest&TI=dailydigest

Also from Streaming Magazine Steven Vonder Haar, the digital media analyst for Interactive Media Strategies has written a very good article.
Platform War Sets Stage For Streaming Seachange
http://streamingmagazine.com/viewentry.asp?ID=265153&PT=Features&TI=thismonth

Sun Makes Peace with Microsoft, No more Ballmer & Butthead jokes.
In a series of bombshell announcements, Sun Microsystems accepted a $1.95 billion settlement to end its legal war with Microsoft. Under the truce terms, Sun ended patent and antitrust suits against the Redmond, Wash., software giant. The companies also signed a 10-year technology sharing agreement. Some are referring to it as a technology division & settlement agreement. There are several articles out on this - but the NY Times seemed to have gotten the scoop out first. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/03/business/03SUN.html?8br 
Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy has long been one of Microsoft's nemesis and was an instigator in the sweeping government antitrust cases against Microsoft in the United States and Europe. What will become of Java based video now?


Microsoft Sucker Punches Real Networks
If you read The History & Future of Real Networks http://internetvideomag.com/Articles-2004/022324Real.htm article IVM brought you last month. You will have a better understanding of how passionate Rob Glazer is about baseball. Since Real Networks launched a billion dollar lawsuit against Microsoft on Dec 18th 2003. You have to question why Microsoft would suddenly go after Real Networks largest account, subscription revenue and  Rob's personal passion. As reported on Internet News http://www.internetnews.com/xSP/article.php/3329661
Microsoft now has a deal with MLB to make available the games via Windows Media Player. We all know Major League sports anymore is all about the money. Financial terms won't be released. But we can speculate can't we?  Bill Gates is worth about 47 billion personally and has 22 Billion IN CASH in Microsoft's corporate coffers. I speculate he went to the table with the intention and attitude of whatever it costs get the deal done. Just to jab a knife into the heart of Real Networks. Bill Gates is out to kill Real Networks and remove a formidable competitor. No question about that. Is this legal ? Sure, but it also further confirms the way in which Microsoft does "business"


H.263 move over - H.264 Video makes MPEG-4 ready For Prime Time
Our friends at Streaming Media.com first broke this story and is a featured article on their site.
http://www.streamingmedia.com/article.asp?id=8588

DG2L acquiring iVast?
H.264 is subject to the same hype curve that has plagued the introduction of almost every video encoding technology for the last decade. But then why is DG2L acquiring iVast? Because they needed the patents. distribution network and customer base built by iVAST. Announced March 17th visit http://www.dg2l.com/ and read the press release. A hand in glove fit, prepare for major advancements in video distribution - the iVast MPEG4 video encoder
http://www.ivast.com/products/lbe.html  will support the h.264 MPEG4 codec. It also delivers live feeds from an IP head-end or network operations center. TV producers can encode and deliver direct live camera feeds to broadcast to the masses.  DG2L and their industry partners also deliver set-top-box applications supporting live MPEG-4 audio and video bit-streams. Internet TV is closer than you may be thinking. MPEG4 which is based on Apples Quicktime architecture http://www.apple.com/mpeg4/ just took a giant leap with H.264. Today you watch TV with an MPEG2 feed - tomorrow you will watch - and interact - with your TV with MPEG4 feeds. While MPEG4 won't displace MPEG2 too quickly, it will, and in the process I believe force Microsoft to conform to the UNIVERSAL STANDARD everyone else including Real Networks supports and has adopted. The appeal of MPEG4 is the content creators/ broadcasters can deliver video to your TV - Computer, cell phone & other digital devices. MPEG stands for Motion Pictures Experts Group. They will be the decision makers here. Hollywood and the Networks are not going to become the "Box Makers" controlled by Microsoft.

Just my Opinion...
There was a reason for the first 100 years of the telephone AT&T was granted their monopoly in the US, it insured universal service. In 1984 they were broken up. Look how far communication has come since then. Monopolists are not good for society. Our country's founding fathers knew this and wrote it into the US Law from the beginning. In the not too distant future your computer, your Internet enabled TV and digital devices will make the telephone as we know it, the telegraph of yesterday. Imagine full screen video calls to your Mom. All the phone companies must use inter compatible technologies. As the computer & Internet is the new communication network of the new millennium. Perhaps it's time the FCC get a clue of Microsoft's  - Microsoft Only agenda, and step in. Force them to adopt the MPEG4 Universal Standard. Once Internet Video has a standard..... product manufactures will have a solid platform to build and offer products. Users won't have to worry about having the right player in order to view video. Streaming Media hosting companies and content creators like us won't have to encode in multiple formats which requires 3X the time, 3X the server space and 3X the website integration. Which translates to 3X the cost. This will have a dramatic effect on lowering costs, and in turn propel the availability of content because profitability will then be possible.