Justin.tv - 24/7 Live Streams In Flash
By Stefan Richter
Expert Author
Article Date: 2007-04-13
I'm going to be proven right: live Flash video is going to be huuuge this year. Take Justin.tv as an example - this guy wear a webcam strapped to his head and he does this around the clock.
Looking behind the scenes it appears that the feed is once again courtesy of Vitalstream (any reason why these folks don't drop me a press release when stuff like this goes live?) and while it's being hammered with traffic you do occasionally see a message of servers being full. I suspect this is to do with how much bandwidth Justin can afford to rent - which poses the question: why has nobody from the CDN space stepped in and offered this chap some free capacity? Surely this sort of thing is great publicity if it was powered by XYZ in big letters. But what do I know about business...?
So the point being is this: live Flash video will be big this year (and next), not as big as on demand footage a la YouTube was (and still is) last year but it will become very popular.
More and more end users will be able to broadcast *live* (stickam is showing the way to some extend) rather than upload pre-recorded clips, and Flash Media Server (version 3 coming up later this year) will play a big role in making these apps happen. Throw Flex and Apollo into the mix and you'll be seeing some neat applications popping up. And why not - broadcasting live in Flash is so easy. Get yourself set up with a server, or rent some third party FMS space (see the ads to your right for some options), plug in your cam and off you go, instant webcasts. The new Flash Media Encoder makes this even easier and I'm myself building more live Flash video apps these days than on demand stuff. I'm also planning to run a few webcasts myself this year, maybe organize a little 'chat-with-stefan' feature. Scary thought, I know...
At the same time we'll be seeing more live webcasts on mainstream (no pun intended) sites where previously such events would be planned long and hard and when they actually happened turning out to be quite boring. But plug some live video into a rich Flash/Flex UI, make these events less formal and you'll see quick adoption both on the broadcasting side as well as with end users. Now if only FMS became a little more affordable we could be onto another mini video revolution, similar to what cameras on mobile phones did to instant news coverage. Just mark my words: live Flash video will be big over the next 12-18 months and be pushing into a space which was previously occupied by our older cousins, Windows Media and Real.
Justin's just gone to bed by the way, time for me to get some work done ;-)
Feel free to leave me some comments on this topic.
Comments
About the Author:
Stefan is a certified Flash Developer who has been involved with Flash Media
Server since its very early days. From his home office in the UK he has
handled a variety of projects, specializing in Flash Video and Rich Internet
Applications for clients that include CNET, USA Network and Unilever. Stefan
is the author of a series of Adobe Developer Center articles, has spoken at
several industry events and contributes a regular column on Flash Video to
Streaming Media Magazine. His site www.flashcomguru.com is one of the
largest online resources on Flash Video. |
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