Bye-bye Blinkx music (part 2)

Vevo’s “Hulu for Music” Gets a Prelaunch Boost: EMI Adds Its Clips (But Not Equity) to the Mix

Vevo, the “Hulu for music videos” site that launches tomorrow, just got a bit bigger: In addition to clips from owners Sony (SNE) and Universal Music Group, the site will offer EMI Music Group’s videos.

The press release I’ve reprinted below doesn’t spell this out, but I’m told that EMI is only licensing its videos to the venture and isn’t joining as an equity partner; it will get an advance against revenue upfront.

The deal means Warner Music Group (WMG) will be the only one of the four major labels that isn’t working with the video site. But Warner has struck its own deal with Google’s (GOOG) YouTube, which is powering Vevo.

from Media Memo

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Comment: Another Blinkx product that the company failed to promote or monetise becomes an also-ran.

How long are Blinkx management going to be allowed to carry on spending company (ie shareholder) time and money building products (Blinkx Music, Transaction Hijacking, SmartShopper) which they then proceed to do absolutely nothing with in terms of rollout, promotion or monetising deals, and which then get superceeded by other products that come to market?

I think they need to explain themselves. If they have an overarching plan or strategy they should explain clearly to shareholders what it is. Because at the moment - and this is just a personal view - it looks like they're floundering around way out of their depth, failing to get products to market, cut deals, deliver shareholder value or anything very much - except stay lucratively employed at shareholder expense, of course...

blinkx Partners With WWF to Bring Users Live Footage From the Copenhagen Climate Summit

RNS Number : 6495D

Blinkx Plc

07 December 2009



blinkx Partners With WWF to Bring Users Live Footage From the Copenhagen Climate Summit

Clue in to the climate conversation at www.blinkx.com

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF. - December 7, 2009 - blinkx, the world's largest and most advanced video search engine, today announced a new partnership with the WWF's Inside COP15. Between December 7th and 19th, up-to-the-minute footage from the Copenhagen Climate Summit will be available at www.blinkx.com. Leveraging its unique AdHoc platform, blinkx will also place contextually relevant advertising against these videos, and share resulting advertising revenue with Inside COP15.

Inside COP15 was created by WWF to deliver live, on-demand video news coverage of the Copenhagen Climate Summit in Copenhagen, Denmark. The conference will bring together world leaders, civil society, negotiators, and concerned citizens to agree on a new global climate deal. Inside COP15 will produce more than an hour of video news, interviews, and debates each day to keep the global community updated on all conference affairs. Visitors to www.blinkx.com will have easy access to all the latest-breaking Copenhagen Climate Summit news.

"In building up the most comprehensive video search engine available today, blinkx has had the pleasure of adding some of the world's most interesting and diverse video footage to our index," said Suranga Chandratillake, founder and CEO, blinkx. "Inside COP15's clips serve as a perfect example. Our partnership with the WWF gives users unable to make it to Copenhagen a window into a fortnight of important debate aimed at protecting the future of our planet."

"Inside COP15 is a major step forward for WWF to engage new audiences and I'm delighted to be partnering with blinkx to reach as many people as possible," said Martin Atkin, WWF's Executive Producer. "Our online video blog - live and on-demand - will enable people all over the world to feel part of these crucial climate talks in Copenhagen."

As the pioneer in video search technology, blinkx has built a reputation as the smartest way to find rich media on the Web. The company has made more than 650 partners and indexed over 35 million hours of video and audio content to date.

About blinkx

blinkx plc (LSE AIM: BLNX) is the world's largest and most advanced video search engine. Today, blinkx has indexed more than 35 million hours of audio, video, viral and TV content, and made it fully searchable and available on demand. blinkx's founders set out to solve a significant challenge - as TV and user-generated content on the Web explode, keyword-based search technologies only scratch the surface. blinkx's patented search technologies listen to - and even see - the Web, helping users enjoy a breadth and accuracy of search results not available elsewhere. In addition, blinkx powers the video search for many of the world's most frequented sites. blinkx is based in San Francisco and London. More information is available at www.blinkx.com.

About WWF:

WWF's mission is to stop the degradation of the earth's natural environment and to build a future in which humans live in harmony with nature.

Press Contacts for blinkx:

Tim Turpin

Sparkpr

+1 (415) 321 1894

tturpin@sparkpr.com

Nicole Love

Marlin PR

+44 207 869 8328

Nicole.love@marlinpr.com

NOMAD for blinkx

Charles Lytle

Citi

Press Contacts for WWF:

Martin Atkin

WWF International

+41 79698 2985

matkin@wwf.panda.org

http:cop15.panda.org

This information is provided by RNS

The company news service from the London Stock Exchange

END

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Comment: Yet another totally underwhelming RNS from Blinkx. At a time when shareholders want to know why Transaction Hijacking hasn't been released yet (and when it will be released), when the high-profile rollout of SmartShopper will happen, when Blinkx are going to get smart enough to release an iPhone app and a Facebook widget, when Blinkx are going to cut a deal with a Yahoo! to get their index of video content in front of tens of millions of pairs of eyeballs at a stroke - and we get an RNS saying that Blinkx is providing coverage for a one-off event of dubious monetary value. I say that of course with my Blinkx shareholder hat on and not with my citizen-of-the-planet hat on - of course Copenhagen is important to all our futures, but right now I'm rather more concerned about my immediate financial future!

Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.

Bring on the takeover...

Project Canvas gets a website

"Project Canvas has finally got an official website, allowing the IPTV project fronted by the BBC to begin a lengthy education project for the general public.

Although Project Canvas is still being talked over by the BBC Trust, a website has now appeared at http://www.projectcanvas.info.

"We launched projectcanvas.info today, a hub for the partners (BBC, ITV, BT, Five) to host information about the project," said the BBC's Richard Dalton – Director of Project Canvas in the BBC internet blog..."

from TechRadar

YouTube Offers a Diet Option for Pudgy PCs: "Feather"

"Stuck with a slow computer or lousy broadband access, but still want your fill of dogs on skateboards? Check out YouTube Feather, a lightweight version of Google’s (GOOG) video site.

YouTube is rolling out the option today, via its TestTube collection of beta trials. The idea is straightforward: Make the site work better for people who lack high-powered PCs or robust broadband.

Feather users get the same clips, but with fewer options; Feather doesn’t appear to offer the “high-quality” large-screen option, for instance, and many commenting and sharing options have been removed or stripped down..."

from Media Memo

Why Comcast Will Stay Hands Off Hulu, for Now

"Hulu and its broadcast TV owners have been pretty clear about their interest in creating a premium/subscription offering for the free site. Conventional wisdom is that we’ll see something early next year.

Does Comcast (CMCSA) have other plans? COO Steve Burke made it seem so this morning, when he told analysts that a “Hulu Premium” was “certainly not in the cards.”

An odd comment to make given that 1) Team Hulu’s premium plans didn’t slow down once news of the GE (GE)/Comcast deal broke, and 2) Comcast won’t own NBC, and thus its stake in Hulu, for another year or so..."

from Media Memo

Is YouTube Ready for Primetime? Google Wants to Stream TV, for a Fee.

"YouTube, which is already trying out the movie rental business, wants to get into TV too.

Google’s video site has been trying to convince the TV industry to let it stream individual shows for a fee, multiple sources tell me.

YouTube already lets users watch a smattering of TV shows for free, with advertising. Now it envisions something similar to what Apple and Amazon already offer: First-run shows, without commercials, for $1.99 an episode, available the day after they air on broadcast or cable..."

from MediaMemo

Videos on TV With a Flip of a Channel

"Remember when families used to gather around the television to watch home videos? The process sounds old fashioned now that we spend so much time watching videos on our computer screens. The company that introduced the popular Flip hand-held video cameras, now owned by Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO), wants to send you and your home videos back to the living room.

This week, I tested the device that hopes to do that: FlipShare TV (www.theflip.com). This is a $150 box that’s available as of Wednesday at Amazon.com (AMZN). It plugs into any TV and receives videos that are wirelessly shared. These videos can come directly from the hard drive of a nearby Windows PC or Mac, or via “channels” that you create so you or anyone else can post and share videos via the Internet by simply entering an email address..."

from The Mossberg Solution