Smart Computing-Editorial

Learning Series

Buy This Issue
Table of Contents For This Issue


Web
December 2000• Vol.6 Issue 12 Page(s) 102-105 in print issue
Who Wants To Be A Multimedia Player? Discover Music & Video On Portal Sites

Jump to first occurrence of: [RICH] [GRAY]

The latest Christina Aguilera MP3, concert, or music video. The black-and-white version of “Little Shop of Horrors” or a trailer for “The Cell.” NPR’s “All Things Considered,” “Dobie Gillis,” The Bears vs. Broncos game, and the audio version of “A Passion for Life: The Biography of Elizabeth Taylor.” No matter what form of multimedia you’re looking for, it’s probably on the Internet. The big question is: Where do you begin to look for it? You could wade through countless search engines, pawing through a million links looking for a select video or audio clip. Or to be a true multimedia “player,” swing on by a multimedia portal.

These all-in-one sites serve up a wide range of streamed and downloadable audio and video treats, organized so you can easily search for what you’re looking for, or drill down through categories and browse. Many sites now offer special customization features, letting you set up your own home page to spotlight media that interests you. Those with DSL (Digital Subscriber Line), cable, or faster connections will find more broadband sections offering lots of high-bit action (top-quality video clips, movies, etc.). Although a certain amount of uniformity runs through all these sites (both in the types of content they carry and the way the content is displayed), each one is a unique portal, a fact made clear by the player-driven big three: WindowsMedia.com, RealGuide, and QuickTime.

WindowsMedia.com
http://windowsmedia.com/mediaguide/default.asp

WindowsMedia.com is a guide for users of Microsoft’s multimedia software: the Windows Media Player. In association with such content providers as CNN Interactive, CNBC/Dow Jones Business Video, Capitol Records, Bloomberg LP, and more, WindowsMedia.com provides Windows Media Player users with a wide range of entertainment and information resources.

Windows Media Player 7 lets you download a variety of skins from its Web site to completely customize your experience.

The front page of the Web site gives you access to spotlight features, top 10 lists, and audio and video in categories such as Art, Business, Lifestyle, Sports, and TV. Clicking a category title brings you to a Web page stocked with hyperlinks to featured Web sites, headlines, and other information within that category.

Four tabs along the top of the page give you access to the four primary sections of the site: Home, Music, Radio, and Broadband. Home is the front page of the site, where you’ll find the latest and best multimedia, links to categories, etc. The Music section provides video and music downloads, artist profiles and interviews, links to other music sites and more. Music and videos are arranged by category and artist, so you can easily find what you’re looking for. The Radio section features more than 1,600 stations arranged by format and location, and Broadband lets you search through a number of high-bit audio and video resources.

You can easily bookmark the material you access the most with the Windows Media Player, and the latest version of the player features close integration with WindowsMedia.com in its ability to search for multimedia, organize and store songs and artist information, and more. ( NOTE: See sidebar “The Players.”) Although most of the material on WindowsMedia.com is free, some content, such as World Wrestling Federation fights, is available on a pay-per-view basis.

RealGuide
http://www.realguide.real.com/

RealGuide is a site built for users of RealPlayer, by RealNetworks. Even though a lot of this World Wide Web site will seem familiar after visiting WindowsMedia.com, there are a number of subtle differences. One of the biggest is the MyGuide feature, which lets you custom-build a home page and select content based on your bandwidth, preferred top 10 list, and calendar of events entries.

RealGuide also offers categories such as Games, Music, News, and Sports. These are listed along the left side of the front page, which tends to make them more accessible than WindowsMedia.com’s placement along the bottom (scroll, scroll, there they are). Special sections such as MusicNet give you access to music, videos, and MP3 files, and Take5 provides a show of interactive “bits” that you can easily run from the Windows Media Player.

Like WindowsMedia.com, the RealGuide features a special broadband section for those with screaming-fast connections, a variable top 10 list that lets you see top downloads for movie trailers, music, etc., and the ability to search the entire site for titles, artists, and events. RealGuide also offers selections that require you to shell out money to view them, but unlike WindowsMedia.com’s pay-per-view format, RealGuide opts for a much more structured subscription service called GoldPass ( NOTE: See the “GoldPass” sidebar.)

QuickTime
http://www.apple.com/quicktime

The last of the player-specific portals we cover is the QuickTime portal, which is built around the cross-platform QuickTime Player by Apple. QuickTime offers content broken down into three areas: Movie Trailers, Hot Picks, and QTV (QuickTime TV) Channels.

Apple's QuickTime Player provides media content in the form of Movie Trailers, Hot Picks, and QTV Channels.

Movie Trailers features teasers of recent and upcoming movie releases in its Now Playing section, and lets you browse through releases by studio.

Hot Picks provides you with the widest array of content on the site. Under the Hot Picks umbrella, you will find events, games, sports, music, radio, news, and much more—a kind of potpourri of links that send you out to other Web sites or to topic pages onsite (Music, Education), which then break down into hyperlinks to content on other Web sites.

The QTV Channels section incorporates the greatest integration with the QuickTime Player you’ll find on the site. Here you can select a variety of “channel” options—including top content providers such as Rolling Stone, CNN’s Hollywood Minute, FoxNews, HBO and more—all of which you can store as Favorites in the QuickTime Player tray for quick access.

Yahoo! Events
http://www.broadcast.com/

Broadcast.com, a streaming portal, has combined with Yahoo!, which has one of the largest events directories on the Internet, to form Yahoo! Events. Putting a Yahoo! spin to the former Broadcast.com has yielded a multimedia portal with an immense collection of content that you can play with either RealPlayer or Windows Media Player.

With many clips, you even get your choice between the two the players, but to fully enjoy all the content available on this site, make sure you stroll into it with both installed.

At the very top of the front page, you’ll find a Spotlight section that brings you upcoming events in several areas, including Entertainment and Sports. The Categories listing on the left side features a number of different topics such as Business & Finance, Cultures & Lifestyles, News, Politics, Sports, and more.

Clicking any of these will bring you to a page for that topic, which offers topic-related Spotlights and additional subcategories in the topic (Home & Living breaks down further into subcategories such as Automotive, Decorating, Gardening, etc.).

Among the features of Yahoo! Events is the ability to play a wide range of full-length CDs in various formats.

Click one of these bottom-level subcategories and you will see headings such as Today’s Events, Upcoming Events, and Archived Events, where past events are available on-demand. Although this structure can vary a bit from category to category, it’s largely consistent and makes finding things on the Web site quite simple.

Another large section of the Web site is its Featured Broadcasts section, which lists various media areas that you also can find along the left side of most top- and middle-level pages on the Web site (including the front page).

Radio. This area of the Web site lets you browse through stations by format or search through them by keyword, such as Country. Clicking through to the station listing will give you an idea of which media players are available for that stream, as well as where the geographic location of the station.

Television. Although slow to embrace the Internet, television is still represented by a handful of stations broadcasting full-time, and many more stations that put a select portion of their programming—usually local news or news shows—online. You will find links to many stations here.

Broadband. As with other World Wide Web sites, those with really fast Internet connections will find high-bit movies, films, and music in the Broadband section. Unfortunately, those with 56Kbps modems need not apply.

Video. The Video section of the site covers quite a bit of video area, including music videos, education materials, movies, and more.

CD Jukebox. Although you won’t find anything here that is riding high in the pop charts, you will find a tremendous collection of full-length albums in categories as diverse as alternative, Celtic, children’s, funk, punk, and techno/dance.

Audio Books. The Audio Books section of the site, while certainly not unique to the Internet, is notable for its size and scope. Genres such as Biography, Poetry, Romance, and Philosophy share space with author profiles, speeches, and more.

If you’re uncertain whether you have the proper equipment to enjoy the multimedia content, Yahoo! Events can help you find out with its Test Your Player section. If you have trouble playing the Windows Media Player or RealPlayer test files, Yahoo! Events can assist you with configuration, or point you in the direction of the latest downloads for these players.

StreamSearch
http://www.streamsearch.com/

Calling itself “The remote control of the Web,” the StreamSearch Web site features a 2 million hyperlink strong multimedia database offering content in a variety of speeds and formats such as RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, QuickTime, and Liquid Audio formats. Both speeds and players needed are conveniently listed on all clips, so you know at a glance whether you will be able to play them.

The front page of the Web site gives you easy access to new additions (look under New Today); Most Popular downloads in the areas of movies, music, and sports; and a channel bar at the top of the Web page that hyperlinks to Movies, which contains trailers, interviews, and shorts; Sports, which has game-day previews, news, and interviews; Radio, which lets you browse by region and format; and Live Events in many different areas. Most channels follow the front page format of offering new content and most popular downloads right up top.

In addition to browsing through the audio, video, and broadband materials, you can also run keyword searches that you can narrow down to specific media types and formats; this is a real plus if you are just looking for files to run on a single player.

Like the RealGuide Web site, StreamSearch lets you create a customized home page called My Streams so that only genres, formats, or styles you specify will appear. (You can access this feature by clicking the My Streams hyperlink in the channel bar.) And like Yahoo! Events, a “Player Sniffer” feature can probe your Web browser (but it does not touch your hard drive) to see if you have the necessary equipment to play specific media formats on the World Wide Web site.

iBeam
http://www.ibeam.com/

We’ve seen several multimedia portals that have been built around a specific media player. The final portal we look at is one that was actually built around not a player, but an infrastructure. iBeam Broadcasting uses MaxCaster media serving systems to transmit multimedia to various Internet service providers. This system makes it possible for streamed content to reach your computer without it having to travel over quite so much Internet, making possible a higher quality and faster stream.

In addition to providing streaming services for the general business community, iBeam also provide them for a number of Web sites that specialize in providing streamed multimedia to Internet users. The Channel Guide on the iBeam site links to sites in various categories, including:

•Lifestyle: eHow, PixelWorld Beach Cam, The Howard Sheldon Show

•News: MSNBC Cable News, Prowebcast

•Sports: Boxingline.com, Quokka Sports

•Entertainment: AdventureTV.com, IFILM, BreakTV.com

•Music: NetRadio, Launch.com, Cable-Music.com

•Special Events

In the past few months, multimedia portals have made a slight shift toward offering more content at a higher bit-rate, but they still cater by and large to dial-up users. There’s also been a bit of fraying around the “free” edge as portals experiment with pay-per-view features and subscription services.

Barring a major technological shift that will suddenly make broadband more widespread, the appearance of faster media on these sites should be slow, paralleling the growth in the percentage of audience that can view them.

And the money angle? There are many forces at work here, but so long as so much multimedia is available for free on the Internet, and the potential market for broadband remains relatively modest, it’s hard to envision a traditional pay-per model being a huge hit. But as faster connections proliferate and online multimedia content grows, chances are that someone, somewhere will find a way to make a profit.

by Rich Gray

The Players

You know where to find audio and video files of every size, shape, and color . . . now what do you need to play them? Each of the three following players comes with its own portal stocked with multimedia content, so any one will give you a rich, and free, experience. To gain access to the most content, you may want to consider stocking your hard drive with two or more of the players, but be forewarned: These all play a wide variety of file types, and each is sure it should be the default player for all media types and will try to claim them as its own. Largely, they are pretty polite about it; each player asks if you’ll permit it to reign supreme. You can set which media players play which file types from the players’ preference or options dialog boxes.

Windows Media Player
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia

Microsoft’s Windows Media Player 7 is the first player to offer all-in-one integration, letting you play and burn CDs, play audio and video files, tune into Internet radio, transfer music files to portable devices, browse and search the Windowsmedia.com guide from within the player, and access a media jukebox. With one application, you can now meet a lot of your multimedia needs, including managing and storing audio, video, and radio; copying entire CDs to your PC; and even creating your own custom CDs from your personal music collection.

Windows Media Player 7 comes with a lot of toys, as well. Video controls such as brightness, contrast, saturation and hue give you fine control over video quality. Two- and three- dimensional animations, or visualizations, let you set up your own bizarre light shows that pulse to the musical beat. And what a beat! SRS WOW effects and TruBass add deep bass, dynamic range and improved sound. A 10-band equalizer lets you tinker with the sound even further. A number of different skins let you drastically change the way the player looks and feels, and you can download more skins and visualizations from the Windows Media Player Web site. The player also can access the All Music Guide, a database with artist information, ratings, and reviews.

Users of Windows Me will find Windows Media Player 7 already heavily integrated into their system. Users with earlier versions of Windows will probably find some form of the player already on their computers, but they can download the latest version for their operating system from the Microsoft Web site. There is also an earlier version for Apple computers.

RealPlayer
http://www.real.com/

In terms of features, RealPlayer 8 is quite similar to Windows Media Player 7, but it breaks its product down into a couple of different parts: RealPlayer 8 and RealJukebox 2. RealPlayer lets you play audio and video files, listen to more than 2,500 radio stations, and it gives you easy access through its interface to special Channels (from content providers such as CNN.com, DiscoveryOnline, and more) and the interactive Take5. Like the Windows Media Player, it gives you visualizations such as Nebula and Annabelle The Sheep (see her eat, see her boogie) to keep you mesmerized while you’re cranking out National Public Radio.

RealJukebox lets you play and record audio CDs and makes it easy to find and download music, manage music, track information, and more. It also provides support for portable music players.

RealPlayer 8 gives you easy access to special features such as Channels and Take5.

The Basic package is free, and when you go to download it, you’re given several download options, including a minimum version (4.4MB) that just contains RealPlayer and a complete version (11.6MB) that bundles RealPlayer with RealJukebox, Net2Phone, RealDownload (an application that makes Internet downloads easier and faster, and lets you pause and resume downloads), and more. If you want a player with a richer feature set (including enhanced picture controls and a full-sized graphic equalizer), the RealPlayer 8 Plus is available for $29.99.

Versions of RealPlayer exist for the PC, Mac, and other operating systems.

QuickTime Player
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download

QuickTime has long been a complete and outstanding technology for handling video, music, animation, graphics, 360-degree virtual reality scenes, and more, and the QuickTime Player (now up to version 4.1) puts a very attractive interface on the package. The player lets you experience more than 200 kinds of media, and it has feature controls for treble, bass, and balance; a drop-down tray to store Channels and other Favorites; and more.

Although the Basic version is free, by spending a little more ($29.99) you can upgrade to QuickTime Pro, which provides you with the tools to create and edit music and movies, compress media and add effects to it, and save media in dozens of different formats. QuickTime 4.1 is available for many Windows systems and for Mac OS 7.5.5 or later.

GoldPass

Calling it the “logical next step for RealNetworks, and an important step for the industry,” RealNetworks launched its subscription service, GoldPass, on Aug. 15, 2000. This all-in-one media subscription service gives users of the RealPlayer Plus premium content; automatic software upgrades; and exclusive Real.com services, help, and support for $9.95 a month. The “premium content” includes special programming from providers like ABCNEWS.com, exclusive videos such as SI Swimsuit 2000, and on-demand concerts from the House of Blues (Berlin, Duran Duran, etc.). RealNetworks is hoping that this is the shape of things to come, but is it?

There are many battles presently underway that may determine how a lot of multimedia is accessed over the Internet, not to mention in what form it comes. MP3-sharing sites have taken a lot of the flack, with lawsuits by the Recording Industry Association of America and Metallica’s actions against the file-sharing software Napster leading the way. Microsoft, meanwhile, is trying to diffuse the whole situation by supplanting the MP3 format with its own WMA format. How this all will shake out is far from clear.

By tying a monthly plate of special content to a variety of services, RealNetworks may see some success with its formula, but it’s hard to imagine much money flowing over this issue yet. Multimedia on the Internet is still an emerging technology, but when broadband is more widespread and the media and delivery systems become more controllable, subscription services such as GoldPass may do quite well if they package their multimedia with additional perks like enhanced software and services.

Web sites that attempt to make money strictly through their multimedia will probably find more success with a piecemeal structure, charging users by track, performance, or movie.

Want more information about a topic you found of interest while reading this article? Type a word or phrase that identifies the topic and click "Search" to find relevant articles from within our editorial database.

Copyright & Legal Information Privacy Policy