The Venice Project has been getting a lot of buzz online as it has released its beta version for users to try out. Their site promises this: "We're working on a project that combines the best things about television with the social power of the internet - a project that gives viewers, advertisers and content owners more choice, control and creativity than ever before."
One of the reasons the buzz has been at least listened to, is that those involved with it have a proven track record. The developers of the project are the same people that brought Kazaa and Skype to the world.
T
he key difference seems to be that it will operate within a copyrighted framework.
"We are in the process of launching a secure P2P streaming technology that allows content owners to bring TV-quality video and ease of use to a TV-sized audience mixed with all the wonders of the Internet," one of its developers, Henrik Werdelin, wrote on the project's blog.
"All content on The Venice platform is provided by content owners directly, and it's all protected with the highest standard of encryption and we are working within the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) framework to ensure that it complies with appropriate content protection and ownership regulations."
This sounds like an attack on MySpace and YouTube. The obvious concentration is on the media owners, rather than consumers, which seems to be the key difference that the Venice Project has to offer. Whether this is good or bad will be found out when we see more of what they're trying to do.
Want to sign up for beta testing? Go to their site.
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