Web Broadcasting Start-up Awaits Bandwidth Revolution

ImaginOn prays for widespread high-speed Internet bandwidth to turn Web sites into TV stations.

By Claudia Kienzle for Digital Broadcasting

A Micro Mass Medium
Should Broadcasters Be Concerned?
Not a Fair Fight

With its new ImOn.comTV Internet broadcast solution-in-a-box, Imaginon Inc. hopes to redefine "broadcast." With this turnkey system, anyone with the money and a good idea for content can jump into the Internet broadcast business, and become a Webcaster, overnight. ImOn.comTV enables any Internet Web site to provide viewer-directed branching video, instant Web page access, enhanced television, E-commerce, and video on demand.

While conventional broadcast television requires entrepreneurs to first obtain FCC licensing, build a plant, and put up an expensive transmitter, ImOn.comTV only requires licensing the turnkey system, starting at $35,000 (up to $84,000), which includes patented authoring and playback tools. ImOn.comTV turns any Internet Web site into a media channel by which the licensee can stream video to any PC or TV in the world, provided that it is equipped with a current web browser, TCP/IP protocol, and an all-important high-speed broadband connection, such as through DSL or cable modems.

A Micro-Mass Medium (Back to Top)
David Schwartz, CEO of ImaginOn, predicts that availability of affordable high-speed services will drive the market for these new media channels.

"We could see 10,000, 20,000, or even 100,000 media channels popping up in the next few years, if the bandwidth becomes available on the Internet to support them," Schwartz says. "By the end of 1999, there were four million high-speed connections, meaning about 8 million viewers. But, this is a very elite, coveted audience target—people with the most money, power, influence, education, and techno-savvy. By 2002, however, there'll be a potential audience of 20 million people, more the beer and potato chips crowd."

Schwartz co-founded San Carlos, CA-based ImaginOn Inc. with partner Leonard Kain in 1996. ImOn.comTV first debuted at the recent ISPCON show in San Jose and at NAB 2000 in Las Vegas in April, ImaginOn plans to show a refined product, configured in three different "Instant Internet TV" packages.

While many vendors already offer realtime media streaming solutions, Schwartz claims that the competing products involve integrating third party software and hardware components, while his system is fully-configured using advanced software optimized for its PC and server package, such as the Sun Solaris server. ImaginOn also runs ImOn.com, a high-bandwidth Internet TV portal set up primarily to show off what the technology can do.

ImaginOn already has its first customer, the RockWindow Television Network in Los Angeles. RockWindow operates a unique Internet broadcast Web site devoted exclusively to classic and modern rock and roll music. According to Schwartz, ImOn.comTV is cost-effective enough to allow users to "microcast" programming for the narrowest interest—like snowboarding, banjo playing, or some political cause. Corporations and retailers can create media channels to demonstrate and sell their products. A companion video search engine called WebZinger will act as an online TV directory that helps viewers find other (ImOn.comTV-powered) Web sites of interest in the sea of new media channels.

Should Broadcasters Be Concerned? (Back to Top)
"As the Internet broadcasting trend gains momentum, traditional broadcast TV station owners are going to lose their long-time monopolies because, with sufficient bandwidth, others will be jumping in with video shows that compete with them," says Gerry Kaufhold, principal analyst with Cahners In-Stat Group, in Scottsdale, AZ.

"But for the foreseeable future, when 25% of the U.S. population still doesn't have access to high-speed modems and broadband services, TV stations will be the only delivery medium for TV fare and therefore, the only medium that can reach that segment of the market."

And in markets where there are PCs, DTV stations have an opportunity to serve that customer as well," Kaufhold added. "By dedicating one of their SDTV channels to transmitting TV programming and data services to PCs this will help them stay competitive against new threats by webcasters."

Schwartz stressed that ImOn.comTV is not tied to broadband cable, or any particular broadband service. So, issues like whether media giant AOL Time Warner might exclude ImOn.comTV Webcasters from distributing via their broadband cable infrastructure is "completely immaterial to us," Schwartz explained. And, while broadcasters will see continued audience erosion from PC use, ImOn.comTV does not preclude broadcasters from using the product to expand their own programming onto the Internet.

Not a Fair Fight (Back to Top)
The emerging Internet broadcasting market draws concerns from some in the industry who think the new players will have an unfair advantage over traditional broadcasters bound by federal regulations.

"The playing field is no longer level," says Kevin Hause, analyst and manager of consumer research for IDC (Mountain View, CA). "While broadcasters are weighed down by a quagmire of FCC rules and regulations, they are going to find themselves competing with Internet Webcasters that are not regulated in any way (except for pornography). We need to re-think the regulatory environment. But it will take a long time before we see any changes, especially since the FCC has demonstrated that it is slow to react to the fast-moving technology issues that have been impacting traditional broadcasters. "

Hause asked hypothetically, "If you can't take regulations off the broadcaster, should you put regulations on the Webcaster for fairness?" But he hoped it would not come to that since he personally does not favor "big government" intervention in the marketplace.

However, through his actions, Schwartz may actually invite FCC regulation. Because bandwidth is so critical to his company's growth, he is encouraging a grass roots lobbying effort to petition FCC Chairman William E. Kennard to allow Webcasters to use the RF (radio frequency) spectrum to alleviate Internet congestion (which he calls ‘Netlock'). Netlock occurs when bandwidth-intensive data, like video information, must grind to a halt to pass through routers and switches along the Internet's backbone.

"Our proposal calls for ‘spread spectrum' methods that will allow the radio spectrum to be shared among multiple applications—making thousands of new, realtime digital data channels available for use by Internet TV portals, quickly and inexpensively," says Schwartz. This kind of broadcasting would mean leveraging high-speed, digital wireless Internet services, which share the analog spectrum currently with other technologies like broadcast television.

But when asked if FCC involvement would precipitate FCC regulation, which would encumber entry into the Webcasting business, Schwartz replied, "That's true. FCC involvement could introduce FCC regulations that we're currently spared. But that's the political tradeoff for gaining the bandwidth we critically need right away."

Claudia Kienzle has been writing for the broadcast industry for over a decade. She can be reached at claudiakienzle@mindspring.com.