We posted the updated player penetration survey results today. The survey was taken in March 2004 by NPD Online Research.

Here’s a quick summary (worldwide averages):
Flash Player 7: 52.5%
Flash Player 6: 93.5%
Earlier versions: 98%

The December survey showed Flash Player 7 at approximately 34% penetration, so this growth rate is very nice to see.

http://www.macromedia.com/software/player_census/flashplayer/version_penetration.html

I remember seeing this effect used in the “Shrek” microsite on HP.com. I can’t remember exactly what the point of their campaign was, but I remember this page-turning effect.

This is the online version (literally) of the booklet that we gave out at the NAB show last week. It’s actually a very interesting read and a great resource to point potential clients to.

http://www.macromedia.com/go/videoguide

If you attended NAB last week you surely heard this question asked by our booth staff over and over again. “Question the rectangle” was our catch-phrase for our NAB showing. Our objective was to show video professionals that the current state of video on the Web is dismal. Only one technology allows us to truly break out of the “rectangle” of Web video. My favorite question, which I asked my audiences over and over again, was “What should happen when you click on a ‘play video’ button on a web page?” The intuitive answer for everyone was, “A video should start playing!”

I wish this were always the case, but it rarely is. All too often we’re redirected to a “Pick your player, pick your bandwidth” page. Or worse, we’re sent off to install a huge player that we don’t already have (good luck finding the free version!). What about clicking “play video” and a new browser window spawns with a non-contextual use of video? Or even worse, a player launches with a proprietary UI that forces advertising down your throat.

Our “Question the Rectangle” theme was all about giving developers and video producers full creative control. This is something that they’re not used to having when it comes to delivering their video on the Web. We also used this expression to stress that video should be used contextually within a web browsing experience. CNET does a great job of this, as does Ford.

Now, where am I going with this? Well, I wanted to point out an example that truely questions the rectangle. Visit the Vodafone Future Vision site and mouse over “Quick Launch” and select “1. Entertaining”. In this section you can “experience” a visual bracelet a-la Dick Tracy. Notice how this video is not delivered in the traditional “rectangle.”

Enjoy!

Why did Red Bull energy drink have Odopod build them a fantastic site dedicated to a motorcycle sport?

It’s all about brand marketing. Companies like Red Bull want to associate their brand with certain target markets, like adventure sports enthusiasts.

Along the same lines, check out this fantastic marketing campaign produced by Adidas.com.

http://www.adidas.com/campaigns/impossibleisnothing/

Associating history’s greatest athletes with your brand can be crucial to your success if you are in the business of selling athletic wear – or perhaps “great athletic experiences.” :- )

Be sure to check out the “Athlete Stories” section and view the video piece featuring basketball superstar Kevin Garnett.

I’m sure this has been mentioned in other blogs, but it’s worth mentioning again. This is a great tutorial written by Dan Carr in conjunction with Macromedia’s Multimedia Marketing team.

There is a lot to learn about Flash development in this article. Please take some time to download the files and step through it.

http://www.macromedia.com/devnet/mx/flash/articles/vidgal_structure.html

Macromedia is fortunate to attract some of the most brilliant and creative minds in the industry. We have been putting many of those brilliant minds to work on finding ways to make the Flash video platform even better – in fact, make it the best (of course some of us think it already is!).

We’re not ready to reveal some of our ideas yet, but I’d like to give some of you in the community a chance to voice your opinion. Please post some comments with your ideas for Flash video. Do you have ideas for new authoring features in Flash? How about other tools? Do you have ideas for codecs, streaming, hosting, etc.? What about making great experiences like Red Bull Copilot easier to build? How can we make that happen?

This is one of your chances to voice your ideas. We’re listening…

I’ve been answering this question all week. :)

Easy answer:
Flash (version 6) is deployed on over 93% of all Internet-connected desktops worldwide. This means that 93% of Web users will be able to experience Flash video instantly, without downloading a player.

If they don’t have FLP6 or above, it’s a very small download (476KB on Win and around 1.13MB for Mac – includes SA installer). And best of all: when you install Flash Player we don’t ask you for any information! Why should you have to go through a nine-plus step process (*cough* Real *cough*) just to watch a video? And why should you be constantly pestered to join a pay-for service? And why must it take over every media type on your system – and require a reboot? And why must they spam you? And why must you create a username and login just to use their player? And WHY MUST VIDEO ALWAYS BE A SEPERATE EXPERIENCE FROM THE REST OF THE WEB CONTENT??? If I want to watch a video on the Web, I want to watch a video on the Web! I don’t want to spend my afternoon downloading massive players and joining services and getting barraged by advertising in the player.

Anyways, back to the numbers. Flash Player with video support is on 93% of Web-connected desktops. How does that compare to “the other guys”?
(Penetration stats determined by NPD Online research)
* Note: It’s important to recognize that the Results of the NPD survey sample the general browsing public so the penetration numbers contained within this post may vary in circumstances like corporate intranet use, education, etc. Also note that the actual numbers may be generous in some circumstances as they sample multiple versions of other players, not just the most recent. [updated 4/25/04]

No. 2: Windows Media Player at approx. 61% penetration
Approximate download sizes
- 9.66MB for Win XP
- 13.3MB for Win2K, Win98/ME
- 6.9MB for Mac OS X (no WMP 9 support though)

No. 3: Real Player at approx. 57% penetration
Approximate download sizes for the hard-to-find free version
- 11.68MB for Windows
- 9.4MB for Mac OS X (RealOne player, older version than Windows)

No. 4: Quicktime Player at approx. 47% penetration
Approximate download sizes
- 11MB for Windows
- 19MB for Mac OS X (ouch)
- 10MB for Mac OS 8.6/9

What about quality? Well, see for yourself. Check out one of the sites in my “Showcase” post earlier today. Note that CNET and Comcast are using the Flash Video Streaming Service (FVSS) powered by Vitalstream. This is a fantastic solution for taking advantage of the power of the Flash Communication Server on a high-powered global network without needing to own the infrastructure.

Enjoy!

We all love to get inspired by great works. Here’s a list of the sites that we showcased during our theater demonstrations at NAB this week. All of these sites were chosen due to their innovative use of Flash video.

- www.redbullcopilot.com
- www.cnet.com
- www.comcast.net
- www.rr.com/flash
- www.fordvehicles.com/trucks/f150
- www.americanexpress.com/jerry

I did a seminar tour with Pinnacle earlier this year and learned just how cool Liquid Edition is. This is a very powerful video editing suite with tremendous capabilities. My favorite feature: a free, downloadable plug-in that allows you to export directly to the Flash Video (FLV) file format.

If you’re in the market for a good editor, make sure you evaluate Liquid Edition. After watching the same demo about twelve times I was convinced that this is a great tool. :- )

http://www.pinnaclesys.com

Also, be sure to click on the “Flash Spoken Here” badge on the right-hand sidebar of the product page to get the plug-in.

This is an old technote but I was asked about this by a customer at the NAB show this week. Apparently, when installing an ActiveX control through IE on Windows it will ask you (not require you) to restart your machine if the ActiveX control that you were installing/upgrading was already in use when you began the installation. This means that Flash developers should not put any Flash content on their pages that launch visitors in a new browser window over to the player install page on macromedia.com.

I thought it would be nicest to bring this up to eveyone again, in case you weren’t aware. Read the technote here:
http://www.macromedia.com/support/flash/ts/documents/ie_reboot.htm