Hi,
Perhaps my own case study would provide part of the answer: Although
I'm not a technical guru, I'm adept enough at computer use that I
would have little difficulty in buying and using a computer with an
open-source operating system such as Linux. But even though I don't
particularly like Windows, and even though choosing Linux would have
saved me money, I instead chose to spend extra money on a computer
that uses Microsoft Windows. Why? For one thing, I'm not the only who
uses my computer, and the people I share it with are familiar with
Windows. For another, my work requires me to use certain types of
programs, and those programs currently aren't available with the Linux
system. So just the fact that Microsoft Windows has become so
dominant has made it the obvious choice.
Similarly, I've resisted buying Microsoft Word for a long time. It's
outrageously expensive, and less expensive options do what I need.
But I may be buying it soon -- I need to share fully formatted
documents, and the alternative software packages don't always produce
documents 100% compatible with Word.
Do you remember the Beta vs. VHS war for the videotape standard? The
experts said Beta was better; I unfortunately listened to them. VHS
won not because it was better, but because it had the market share,
and the need for compatibility drove many to choose it over the
superior Beta.
Much the same has occurred with streaming media. Simply put, RealAudio
has become the de facto standard for streaming audio (and RealVideo
for streaming video). Thanks in part to aggressive marketing, as long
ago as 1997, there were 500,000 downloads per week of Real's audio
player, and its popularity. One recent report said some 95 million
users have downloaded Real software -- numbers like that are hard to
ignore! Even Microsoft with all its marketing savvy hasn't been able
to catch up.
http://www.realnetworks.com/company/press/releases/1997/momentum50.html
http://www.realnetworks.com/company/press/releases/2000/rjupdate1.html
http://builder.cnet.com/webbuilding/pages/Graphics/StreamingMedia/?tag=st.bl.3883.dir2.StreamingMedia
In short, then, the BBC and others use RealAudio because they want
people to listen to them. Sure, they could use an open-source
streaming standard, but there would be few that would listen or have
the capability of listening. A proprietary system such as Real has an
incentive to encourage downloads of its product that the producer of a
generic streaming-MP3 product, for example, would not.
At this point, the competition isn't between Real and non-proprietary
products. It's between Real and competing products made by Microsoft
and Apple. But so far, most companies are choosing Real because the
audience is there; if they're using alternatives media formats,
they're usually offering them in addition to the Real format, not
instead of it.
The quality of Real's products also should be noted. Real frequently
updates its system (too often for me!) to take advantage of the latest
technology, and some independent reviewers call its players the best
around.
http://www.pcworld.com/features/article/0,aid,73866,pg,8,00.asp
Real's products also offer other advantages to broadcasters: The
software includes provisions for allowing advertising and for tracking
users that generic products do not. It's easy to learn and use. It
works well. Real promotes the broadcasters that use its system. It
provides for the possibility of pay-to-listen subscriptions.
Keep in mind also that "free" software isn't really free. A company
that has to hire its own programmers to tweak a format and that sort
of thing could end spending far more than it would cost to install
Real's system. The broadcaster also doesn't need to concern itself
with supporting the listeners' software.
And while I don't know how much broadcasters pay Real, at least one
independent reviewer says that Real's production tools are moderately
priced.
http://webdeveloper.internet.com/multimedia/multimedia_guide_realaudio.html
But the bottom line is that broadcasters choose RealAudio is because
that's the format listeners have, and broadcasters would probably
choose RealAudio (at least in the short term) even if it were an
inferior format (which it definitely isn't).
Here are some links to articles you may find interesting:
A look at the different formats available
http://www.cable-modem.net/dl/dl_streaming.html
MPEG4IP, an open-source standard
http://mpeg4ip.sourceforge.net/
IceS, another open-source standard
http://www.icecast.org/
A brief explanation of streaming
http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/s/streaming.html
More about streaming
http://www.servecast.com/faq_general.html
I hope this answers your question. Thanks for choosing Google Answers! |
