View a transcript of this interview

Just few months ago, Jeff Bezos announced the expansion of Amazon.com as a web services company, meaning that the infrastructure that made Amazon’s such a global success would be made available to small businesses.  Well, that appears to include online video start-ups too.

Beet.TV has learned that at least one online video company, Diversion Media,  is using Amazon.com as its CDN, content distribution network.  Amazon hosts the company’s services and distributes video files globally. 

So, Amazon is providing services which directly challenges Akamai and Limelight and other players in content distribution space.   Industry sources say that Amazon distibution costs are more than half the industry norms.  Could this lead to a price war?

I sat down with Nicholas Butterworth yesterday in the Beet.TV studio.  Nicholas is known for his groundbreaking work with SonicNet and its integration into MTV where he headed the company’s interactive operations.

He and his co-founder Tatum Lade, previously VP/Technology at iFilm, are pioneers in online media and distribution.  They are creating a custom-made publishing platform for Diversion Media, a growing network of lifestyle video channels including a travel channel Travelistic and a new one on snowboarding that is about to launch.

Nicholas walks us through the process including the use of the On2 codec to create the Flash file. 

Sure Nicholas and Tatum are experienced technologists, and not all video company can or should create a customized publishing and distribution platform, but with encoding software and well priced Web services, it’s getting easier to make it happen.  Nicholas explains the imperative for small and large media companies to create the right platform.

Below is Travelistic’s Tour of PodTech’s BlogHaus During CES — Some nice lookin’ Flash files via Amazon! 

— Andy Plesser

(Coming clean:  On2 Technologies is a client of Plesser Holland, the public relations firm that publishes Beet.TV)

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By Andy Plesser on    @beet_tv