by Jeremy Matthews

Created on: May 17, 2010   Last Updated: May 18, 2010

In the past the Internet was a huge catalog of mostly static websites; which would only change as either company data/information or product sales would change.  In the past several years with the Internet taking a more user-content-created turn, the Web entered into it's "Web 2.0" state.  With websites such as Youtube, Facebook, and Twitter providing much of the regular information used by millions of web user's a day.  Internet video is the same phenomenon.  With the advent of mobile devices and smart phones offering the ability for just about anybody to become a video-journalist it appears that Internet video isn't going anywhere.

In other areas, we see the Internet Video/Internet TV phenomenon spreading like wildfire.  In my area our local phone provider is trying to compete with our local cable provider.  How?  They are starting to offer IP TV in select areas around me.  Every recent smart phone or mobile device released within the last year or so come preloaded with easy access to sites like Youtube.  Personally, I use these video websites to gain access to walkthrough videos for doing repairs on various things or learning how to accomplish a cool feat in a videogame.  And this only covers websites like Youtube.

If you take websites like Hulu for example.  Hulu has business arrangements with many Television Networks to allow themselves to stream recently aired episodes of the said television networks shows.  In return, during a streaming video you get to watch a couple seconds of advertising every so often.  Not a bad deal, because if you were watching the same show on television you would have to sit through several minutes of advertising (unless you use a TiVo).  And this is a growing ordeal.  With more websites popping up every month and many doing very well with gaining popularity.  My current favorites are Hulu and Fancast (or the actual official website for whatever show I want to watch).

Look for Internet Video sites and Internet TV to continue to grow.  With the switch from analogue to digital television within the last year or so, this proves that things can completely change.  Look at how long we were using the analogue television spectrum for broadcasting television over the air; old ways will eventually be replaced.  Until broadband Internet becomes more widely adopted (yep, believe it or not there are still people using dial-up); I don't expect to see a forced switch to Internet based television.  But I do expect more communications companies will start offering Internet based solutions for their customers. 

Learn more about this author, Jeremy Matthews.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.