If you have not yet witnessed the KFC/Taco Bell video exposing the 6th Avenue restaurant’s highly visible rodent problem, you may seriously want to consider how soon you would like to eat again before watching it.

Advertising Age published an article yesterday on the video documentation of the rat problem entitled, “Taco Hell: Rodent Video Signals New Era in PR Crises”. The article critiques Yum Brands for perceiving-and therefore portraying-the highly publicized rodent problem as containable and local. Such a miscalculation meant that Yum Brands got caught trying to fight the wild-fire, negative publicity with antiquated speed and technique. Yum Brands’ statement–posted on their home page after the news footage had already begun circulating the web–could not undo the horrible images that the rapid sharing of the video online had planted in consumers’ minds.

Today it may be harder–if not impossible–to escape exposure once the footage hits the internet. Whether you are the hysterical, hair-cutting bride of YouTube fame or Yum Brands trying to fight the association of rats with your restaurants, that users can upload, search for and share videos of your worst moments is a concern uniquely connected to new technology. Everybody and anybody can end up on YouTube; the new challenge may be for individuals and organizations to deal with the exposure of their less than shining moments.

An interesting report recently emerged from the research firm Broadband Directions which claims the big TV networks aren’t adapting quickly enough to the internet in regards to offering broadband video service.

The report claims large file sharing sites are the true innovators here and the TV players really should be paying closer attention. Specifically, interactivity of content was one area the report saw huge discrepancies between the two. The users of file-sharing sites such as YouTube, Metacafe, and PodZinger are encouraged to share files with friends via links and email and embed files on their own profile pages or websites. Researches on the study typically found network sites only offering the ability to email files but were even quick to call this feature “sub-optimal”.

So what’s the solution?

As mentioned in an earlier post, CBS is one network touting their commitment to online broadband service through their partnerships with specialized technology providers. These providers are a who’s who of the Web 2.0 set, which get ease of use, interactivity, and the importance of open sharing capabilities as much as the big networks get creating ad revenue and producing high-quality content for mass-consumption. It’s too early yet to determine the compatibility of these new partnerships, but nobody doubts a successful marriage of their strengths will pay off in dividends.

Once enigmatically entitled “The Venice Project,” Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis’ Joost has begun stirring things up in the television industry, on the internet, and in the exciting, less chartered territory where the two inevitably–and sometimes uncomfortably–collide. Joost is the newest service from the innovators who brought the world KaZaA and Skype. As the recent deal with Viacom illustrates, Joost attempts to solve the conundrum of uniting television and the internet while benefiting consumers and content owners alike.

Two of the enticing aspects of Joost–particularly when compared with YouTube–relate to copyright and advertising revenue. These are the areas which make Joost most appealing to Big Media companies like Viacom, Inc. Unlike YouTube, Joost only allows copyright owners to add their content. Also distinct is the revenue sharing that Joost offers to partners like Viacom for ads played with their content.

It will be interesting to see what impact Joost has on the developing relationship between television and internet. Perhaps the television industry, more comfortable with Joost’s copyright protection and revenue sharing for their content, will be more willing to think outside the literal and proverbial box as they search for new ways to bring programming and advertisements to consumers.

It’s becoming clear that if you want to play in the video search space, you must have your own media player to provide an enjoyable user experience, and hopefully get users to come back to your site. At least that’s what Yahoo and many other players are banking on to tap the fast-growing video advertising market.

If you have ever visited Yahoo’s Video Site, you will know why they’re so eager to improve the viewing experience. If you click on any result to watch a video, it resolves to whatever player you have selected as default on your PC (Microsoft’s Media Player, Real Networks or iTunes). For those of us who are accustomed to viewing video content on a streamlined media player like YouTube, Metacafe or PodZinger’s, Yahoo’s video search experience is very 1990’s and not quite appealing.

It should be interesting to watch if Yahoo’s gamble to improve their media player will erode market share from YouTube both in the minds of users and advertisers.

Are you a creator of audio or video? Do you have a website?

If you answered yes to both these questions, PodZinger is about to make your content MUCH easier to find. As part of our latest site enhancement, we have added the ability to create your very own PodZinger search box for placement on your website.
Here’s an example of how it looks (we apologize for the low-quality image, it’s really much prettier!):

Now you can allow your audience to search all of your audio and video content the same way they search for anything on the web. PodZinger searches the spoken words within your audio and video, not just the titles and meta-data. This provides more opportunities for your audience to find the good stuff in your material.

To get your customized search box, you will first need to sign-up with PodZinger, register your content, and follow the simple instructions in our “notices” section.

The 2007 Grammy Awards took place this Sunday with the reunited Police kicking off the evening of awards and entertainment. Other performances included Beyonce Knowles, Best New Artist winner Carrie Underwood, Hip-hop duo Gnarls Barkley, and The Dixie Chicks–winners of both Album and Song of the Year. Check out the video of their award-winning song “Not Ready to Make Nice” below.

dixie chicks not ready YouTube.com: pazu7 - Dixie Chicks - Not Ready To Make Nice

You can find video clips of your other favorite Grammy-winning artists on www.podzinger.com

The answer to this question depends on who you ask. If you were to ask an online viewer, he or she will most likely tell you video ads should be no longer than 10- to 15 seconds in length, and that they should also be very relevant to the content viewed (see PodZinger Market Research Study, 11/20/06, “Video Ads Should Be Short, Relevant”).
But if you’re an advertiser who’s main interest is to create deep awareness of your products or services and excellent brand recognition, most likely you’ll want the video ads to run for as long as possible (at least 30- to 45 seconds) to get your message across, and a positive ROI. After all, most online video consumers prefer to watch video ads than having to pay a fee to view the content. (see Advertising.com 02/06/07 “Online Video Study”).
So who’s right as to how long video ads should be? The answer to this question should become clearer in the months to come as more and more advertisers begin to test the waters placing video ads on across websites like PodZinger, YouTube and Google Video just to name a few. User tolerance, or intolerance of ads for that matter, will become present as content viewing patterns on video websites remain the same or begin to drop as users begin defecting to other sites that do not server as many ads.

At a recent meeting some of my co-workers and I got slightly off topic as we couldn’t help but discuss the recent Aqua Teen Hunger Force guerilla marketing campaign in Boston. Like many in the younger, often more Internet-savvy generation, one person at the meeting had figured out that the mysterious packages were a marketing campaign before Boston officials made the announcement. Simply by searching online–the natural response of people in our generation looking for quick answers–he found various blogs that talked about the how the campaign was carried out. Such a simple method of investigation seems to have evaded Boston law enforcement officials however. Thus the combination of Turner Broadcasting System’s marketing and Boston’s reaction have created legal and financial issues while also raising questions about the level of digital disconnect older generations have when it comes to new media.

Another staple of the Internet generation’s online consumption, YouTube, has recently come up against legal issues with some of its most popular content; the content in question, most inconveniently, belongs to Viacom.

“YouTube removing Viacom TV Shows Media firm says ‘Daily Show,’ MTV snippets must go,” San Francisco Chronicle, February 3, 2007
San Francisco Chronicle Article

The above article highlights the tension inherent in allowing YouTube users to access “The Daily Show” clips with the ease and freedom they expect having grown up in the age of search-driven Internet consumption. Can YouTube keep one generation of users happy, abide by the laws and keep media companies from holding all the power?

It looks like younger users may have to reconcile themselves to the fact that new media still must abide by old laws, and some in older generations could use a crash course in some of the new online communication forms to get them fully up to speed.

We are proud to announce the release of a new, larger video player on PodZinger! For easier viewing, the size of the player has increased to 480 x 425 pixels. We’ve also introduced the new ZingLinks set of features, which include:

• the ability to embed audio and video on a users page via PodZinger generated html code
• the ability to send audio and video to friends via a PodZinger generated url that will bring you directly to the content
• the ability to email audio or video to friends directly from the player

I’ve posted a clip of a pretty cool commercial on Toyota trucks. Or go to the PodZinger page directly to take a look for yourself



super bowl commercial YouTube.com: AnthonyL - Toyota Tundra TV commercial “Ramp” (2007)