We have eight one-hour public service health videos we wish to place
online within a new website and make available on demand. We'll
outsourc the web development, but want to know which online media
player--or combination--is the best to use (Real, Windows Player,
Quicktime), what are the limtations regarding the stream length (is
one hour okay, or should it be segmented) what are the bandwidth
considerations, etc.? The programs will be housed in a database
management system called CONTENTdm, which is being used to archive
academic material in our university's historical collection, and it
will point to an external streaming server. Thanks in advance for your
help as we prepare to plan this project.

It's only audio (no video), but perhaps you can take a look at Living
on Earth's website, National Public Radio's enviro-news show:
http://www.loe.org

They are streaming hour-long shows every week both via RealPlayer and
as mp3s. RealPlayer files are segmented in different pieces, but are
also accessible as one continuous show. The set-up for mp3s is
similar, although that requires an actual hour-long file in addition
to the segments.