DivX to Nix Stage6
DivX announced today that it’s shutting down Stage6 at the end of this month, putting an end to the video-sharing site’s short, expensive and litigious life.
Stage6 was supposed to be a higher-quality YouTube, and while the site had decent traffic, it never caught fire. As a publicly traded company, DivX felt added pressure to perform, and in July of last year the company said it would spin off Stage6 in a move to decrease operating expenses. The spinoff was supposed to be done by the end of last year.
Stage6 also had legal issues. DivX filed a pre-emptive lawsuit to protect against “unreasonable threats and demands” from Universal Music Group back in September. But the company lost that legal gambit earlier this month.
Given all that, putting Stage6 out of its misery is the best option for DivX as it can now focus entirely on its licensing business. The company made a number of deal announcements at CES this year, among them a partnership with Sony Pictures, as well as a raft of distribution partnerships with Next New Networks, Vuze, Veoh and Jaman for its DivX Connected media player.
Recent
GigaOM Network
Copyright 2001–2008 Giga Omni Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress.com. Marketing consulting by ACS.
Hi,
There are and will continue to be other solutions, because youtube is the warehouse not the boutique, and will never care about specific users or their needs, just the mass, lowest-common denominator.
For example, http://www.SUMO.TV that operate with a different model to youtube and has local operations from Brazil, israel, India to China.
However, sometimes, companies/people just don’t want to fight on.
Yours kindly,
Shakir Razak
Shakir Razak on February 25th, 2008 at 1:15 pm - Permalink
Like Stage6, Vuze (www.vuze.com) focuses on a high-quality video viewing experience. With content from independent as well as larger publishers, we welcome all Stage6 users to check out Vuze.
You’ll be joining a global audience with over 20 million client downloads and counting.
Chris Maliwat
Vuze Product Management
Chris on February 25th, 2008 at 6:00 pm - Permalink
[...] coverage: NewTeeVee, The Business of Online Video, [...]
Ups and Downs of Social Video / Fast Forward - FWD:labs on February 25th, 2008 at 10:10 pm - Permalink
It appears now as an evidence: the diffusion of “full HD” (720 or 1080 pixel height by 1280 or 1920 pixel width screen definition in 16/9 format, with 24 fps and a bitrate ranging from 8 to 30 MB/s) on the Internet will not be done with basic streaming or regular downloading (even with the help of CDNs like Akamai, Limewire etc) for cost issues.
The diffusion of HD, and the online availability of huge catalogues of movies today available in SD but not yet released will force the content providers to use peer-to-peer technologies, or other smartly distributed systems allowing to globally optimize the use of IP bandwidth available worldwide. That is exactly the reason why BitTorrent or Mininova have launched their “low cost P2P CDN” offers.
PS : a very bright showcase of “Full HD” movie (87 MB for 11 s) shot with a professional digital movie camera, available thru regular download:
http://red.cachefly.net/video/milkgirls1080p.mov
as well as on BitTorrent P2P, for lowering the cost:
http://torrents.red.com:6969/torrents/milkgirls1080p.mov.torrent
To discover a new solution to distribute high-definition films in a “new generation & post-DRM VOD” approach, you can try http://exemple.pumit.com (on a PC only, until we raise enough fund to port it on Mac, Wii etc).
To understand how it works, just visit http://www.pumit.com
Finally, to know who makes it, visit http://www.ubicmedia.com
Enjoy :-)
Pierre Col | UbicMedia on February 26th, 2008 at 8:16 am - Permalink
looks like there was a lot of competition for this market anyway. Still, sad to see it go.
jeremy on February 26th, 2008 at 11:17 am - Permalink
[...] Steps Out of the Limelight Among the victims of Stage6’s imminent demise will be its CDN, Limelight Networks, according to CDN business insiders. There is speculation that [...]
Stage6 Steps Out of the Limelight « NewTeeVee on February 26th, 2008 at 2:53 pm - Permalink
I am quite bummed. Stage6 was a great platform for indie producers like us. They’re also super nice people, glad to know they’ll still be active with their DivX Connected platform.
ekai on February 26th, 2008 at 3:07 pm - Permalink
I’m really annoyed about this. Stage 6 was billed as one of the big selling points of the Divx connected machine and now Divx has just pulled the plug on it just like that. It’s still listed on the divx connected website for the machine as a selling point for goodness sake and so far theres no software update for the machine to take out the options yet on the machine either. You would have though Divx would have had the common sense to sort out there existing customers who paid for the machine before pulling the plug. I can’t help feeling a bit cheated
lovespuds on February 29th, 2008 at 2:19 pm - Permalink
[...] to combine Stage6 with its recent Revver acquisition and its LiveVideo site. DivX declined and shut down Stage6. Now LiveUniverse has launched a LiveVideo account (huh?) for shareholders to rally around. (press [...]
Weekend Reader: Hulu, Stage6, WB « NewTeeVee on March 8th, 2008 at 9:31 am - Permalink
[...] was shut down earlier this year as the video sharing site had grown too expensive to maintain and was facing [...]
Is Someone Building a New Stage6? « NewTeeVee on April 24th, 2008 at 3:15 pm - Permalink
[...] for themselves yet. Lack of overseas revenue is hardly their only problem. Earlier this year, when DivX shut down Stage6, its high-quality video-sharing option, it cited operating expenses. Ironically enough, Stage6 (now [...]
Veoh Blocks Some International Access « NewTeeVee on June 1st, 2008 at 8:31 pm - Permalink