Full Stream Ahead As Networks Open Up

Yahoo!7 wants to triple its 5 million monthly video streams and downloads with a new "video hub" that includes channels from QuickSilvers film catalogue, Lonely Planet and the US web-only series Prom Queen to anchor Yahoo!7s Girlfriend network.

The overhaul announced yesterday comes as the producers of Big Brother and Australian Idol revealed this week the shows generated more than 21 million video streams last year and predicted double-digit growth for 2008.

Network Tens general manager of Digital Media, Damian Smith, told the Herald user numbers for Big Brothers website were up 40 per cent in the first two days this week compared to the same time last year. "I havent seen the streaming numbers yet but all things being equal you would expect a relative increase in video consumption. Im feeling pretty good about it," he said.

Hugh Marks, the chief executive of Fairfax Medias Southern Star Group, which produces Big Brother for Ten, played down claims of a poor start, saying Mondays launch was stronger than last year given it had moved from Sunday night to a "less than ideal" start at 7pm on Monday.

The launch had an average of 1.51 million viewers, down on the previous lowest launch figure, last years 1.54 million. Big Brothers biggest launch audience was 2.22 million in 2003.

"Viewers settle into their entertainment shows at 7.30pm rather than 7pm, and if you look at our weakest point, it was in the first half hour," Mr Marks said. "The first half really dragged us down so the results overall were pretty damn good."

He said Big Brother generated 6.5 million video streams last year from free-access archives and 7 million from the premium service.

FremantleMedia, the producer of Australian Idol, is equally upbeat about the online video prospects for its next series. Fremantles vice-president of licensing, Ben Liebmann, said Idol generated 7.5 million streams last year and the figure is expected to top 9 million for the 2008 series.

Fremantle and Ten launched a world first for Idol this year by allowing open access to its back catalogue, with 1200 clips from the previous five years. "Were still the most aggressive market in terms of the breadth of content were offering for Idol," Mr Liebmann said. "No other market has been as advanced in opening up that long tail of content."

Yahoo!7s chief executive, Rohan Lund, said user demand for online video content was relentless and he foreshadowed more alliances with content partners. "We know our audience has an insatiable appetite for consuming great video content ... we expect to see video volumes treble over the coming year," he said.

Ninemsn remains the biggest portal for video streaming, averaging 12 million a month. But YouTubes streaming numbers in Australia, with user-generated content, dwarfs the top five publishers in total. It had 167 million streams in February according to Nielsen NetRatings.

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