Netflix has added another content partner to its increasing roster, and this one combines digital downloads with Blu-ray movies. Good news for the companies involved, the consumers, and digital distribution?

Movie and television content streaming company Netflix seems intent on making its service as accessible to as many people as possible, setting multiple partnerships in an effort to enable its content to be delivered to the maximum number of homes.

Sub-$100 Roku Box

This strategy started back in May when Roku released its new set-top box, which came with the ability to stream Netflix movies. The box may have been derided in some quarters, but at just $100, it opened up digital content to a whole new level of consumers on a budget.

Since then, Roku has announced that the box will expand to include other content partners in time. YouTube, Hulu, and Amazon Unbox were cited as the most obvious candidates, but no names have yet been revealed.

Google must be regretting its decision to buy YouTube for such a vast sum of money. Not only is it failing to make any serious money from advertising right now, the lawsuits are coming thick and fast.

While the Viacom court case may be the most high profile, it’s certainly not the only case against Google and YouTube. The latest coming from Italian media company, Mediaset.

Illegal Distribution

Mediaset, controlled by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, is suing Google over the “illegal distribution and commercial use of audio and video files” owned by the Milan-based company. It is seeking damages of at least 500 million euros ($779 million).

We all know that Web video is increasing at a mammoth rate month on month. But new research suggests that not only is the Internet being used as an extension to the TV, it could be replacing it at quite a rate.

Computers and the Web are becoming an increasingly important part of how television shows are being distributed. Whether it be via legal methods such as Hulu and Joost, or illegal peer-to-peer sharing of torrents, the trend is on the rise.

Online Video Up

We’ve already seen online video viewing as a whole grow massively over the first half of 2008, with comScore data for May showing 12 billion videos were watched in the US alone.

This figure obviously includes all forms of videos, with YouTube being the highest percentage of views. But even in the niche of episodic content, especially prime time shows such as Lost and Heroes, the figures are stacking up.

The new Batman movie, The Dark Knight, has been the biggest film release of the year so far by a mile. Warner Bros. has claimed victory in fighting off Piracy during the release of the movie, despite taunting from the torrent site, The Pirate Bay.

Pirate versions of the movie began appearing on The Pirate Bay a few days after the film was publicly released. However, this short piracy free period is apparently very important for the film’s distributor, Warner Bros. With the film being exceptionally popular it is no wonder it was a big target for pirates.

38 Hours = Victory?

It was approximately 38 hours after the film went on general release that The Dark Knight torrent was first spotted on various BitTorrent sites on the Internet. Once it was out, there was little that Warner could do about it, with the film spreading like a virus across the Web.

38 hours may not seem like much, but in this generation of digital distribution, hours are as important as days used to be for the old-school bootleggers on street corners.

Mobile video is increasing in popularity, but while some consumers are happy to pay for premium content, many are unwilling to shell out cash for the privilege of watching video on the move. This means advertising needs to be present to cover the costs of presenting mobile video. 

In the same way that online video sites are struggling to find the perfect solutions for video advertising with YouTube being the most obvious example, mobile video producers need to find solutions as well. If they get it right, the possibilities could be boundless.

Brands Eager To Exploit Mobile Video

Patrick Maurer is no techie. “I can barely work my toaster”, says the lanky 29 year old sales rep with the self-described “tennis player” hairstyle. But Patrick may represent the most promising aspect of mobile marketing- mobile video advertising. While checking his mobile Yahoo account, Patrick watched a video from Jaguar that eventually led to a dealer test-drive. “I hadn’t really looked at the Jag before that”, he said.

The opportunity for brands to tell their story with sight, sound and motion has agencies and advertisers eager to experiment with mobile video advertising. This nascent sector probably has the necessary technology to grow. What is lacking now are clearly defined business processes.

The MPAA has had a slight change of focus and now wants to educate instead of irritate with a central website to help people find legal downloads, but is it doomed to fail?

This is an attempt to draw people away from the piracy realm. While this seems like a step in the right direction the issues of excessive DRM and over-pricing will likely make it an ineffective strategy. People will continue to be drawn to piracy when it offers a better service than the legal alternative.

The MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) is the organization charged with protecting the rights of movie studios in the US, and seeing as that’s where Hollywood is, that’s a pretty large chunk of the worldwide movie industry.

Fight Or Promote?

Since the emergence of the Internet as a viable source for obtaining copies of movies, a large part of the MPAA’s fight has been online, promoting legal sources of movie downloads, while trying to inhibit illegal sources.

Attack on illegal sources such as torrents and peer-to-peer clients has included legal shut-downs, filtering college campuses, and that whole sorry TorrentSpy mess.

Now, rather than going after what it deems the bad guys, the MPAA has decided to instead focus on promoting the legal destinations for movie downloads. To that end, it is in the process of setting up a one stop shop for legal sources such as Amazon, Netflix, Apple iTunes, and others.

From September, fans of American football will be able to watch NFL games live online for free. This is massive news, which signals a significant change of strategy from the National Football League.

The NFL has until now kept a tight rein on the rights to its games, but this move to the Web shows a willingness to move with the times and experiment with Internet streaming.

NBC Streams Live Online

According to the LA Times, NBC will make its television feed of Sunday Night Football, including play by play, and commentary from John Madden, available on multiple websites. Some will be NBC sites, while some will be owned by the league.