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Cable World,  April 17, 2000  by Karen Brown

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The most notable thing about the videostreaming MultiMedia World conference workshop during the annual National Association of Broadcasters' convention in Las Vegas was not the subject, but rather the response.

More than 700 network broadcasters and Web professionals packed a 500-person room to find more questions than answers.

The day-long workshop was dominated by frustration at Webcasting's many uncertainties -- from pinning down cost estimates to choosing among largely untried streaming service providers.

Moderator Scott Salter, director-marketing for streaming service and caching provider Intervu Inc., urged Webcasters to promote events early.

"If you are going to have a concert, you're not going to build the arena the day of the concert or start selling tickets the day of the event," he said. "Why would you do that on the Web?"

A session on gauging costs to produce a Web event was among the liveliest. Presenter Linda Thurman, a Webcasting producer for Los Angeles-based New Media Prime Time Inc., created some audience angst by saying there were no concrete cost estimates for the average Webcast, nor was there much assurance of success.

Another problem: Web broadcasts cost more as more viewers download video-streams. In traditional broadcasting, transmission and production costs don't budge no matter how many viewers watch a program.

"The scariest thing we've done in streaming media is flip-flopped from old media," Thurman said. "With the new media and streaming we are putting out there, you have to be prepared for the cost because of the explosion possible if you are successful. You really can't tell what the numbers are."

That generated a slew of frustrated comments from audience members, who demanded advice on whether to forge long-term contracts with streaming service providers, how to insure the necessary bandwidth and how to pick partners. One man asked Thurman to set up on her Web site some guidelines for matching needs of a Webcast with potential service providers.

"We don't have a day or two days or three days to go around to these companies," he told her. "It would drive us nuts."

The most combative session was titled "What's the Future of Broadcasting on the Internet?" Curtis Palmer of Audio Foundry used his presentation as an unabashed plug for his company's latest audio and video streaming edit programs. After his eye-popping demo, he was pummeled with complaints from the audience -- including one man who called it "astonishing in its arrogance."

"This is the future of broadcast," he said defensively. "It's portability -- it's reliability. It's about making tools available to everyone on the Internet."

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