What: Searchforvideo.com, Seattle Who: David Clarke, 47, vice president of business development Mission: Become the most powerful consumer-based search engine, displaying multimedia content not available in a standard text search. Big three: Searchforvideo.com is part of FUSA Capital, which has search offerings for a trio of content types: video, audio and podcasts. The results are listed in a thumbnail format and are played in their native viewer when selected. According to Clarke, this circumvents any copyright problems. "Content producers don't mind if you watch their video, they just don't want you to change it," he said. Employees: 10 Financials: The public, debt-free company makes its money through advertising, placing sponsors' results at the top of every search-results list. Cream rises: After awhile, users will determine which sites are worthwhile and which should be ignored. Much of this depends on what users need to do to access quality content. "If you need to sit through a 15-second 'pre-crawl' in order to view the content, it better be worthwhile," Clarke said. Content buffet: Clarke thinks digital content falls into one of three categories; bites, snacks and meals. An iPod or a computer screen is an acceptable viewing medium for the first two. Meals — a full-blown movie or TV show — requires a larger screen, he says. Even so, Clarke wishes the smaller morsels could benefit from higher quality. "Whoever can make shorter videos effortless to watch, to sit down on your couch with a remote, will be tremendously successful," he said. Test cases: "The great thing about the Web now is we can put things up and play with them for a while to see if they work," Clarke said. "You have the opportunity to see what people like or don't like. Before, you were locked in; once something was up you couldn't change it for months." — Charles Bermant  |
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