Web Media Consolidation

From Gartner.com

The mini feeding frenzy continues as Sony Pictures Entertainment has purchased social video community Grouper for $65 million. This comes a few weeks after Viacom/MTV purchased Atom Entertainment. One of Atom's key components is its popular AddictingClips consumer media site. As with MTV, Sony now has an interactive Web channel to distribute content as well as gather content from leading consumer creators. What separates this deal will be Sony's desire to offer consumer creators small clips from the vast Sony library. One can only imagine the vignettes that a self-proclaimed auteur could create using a 10-second segment from Seinfeld's "Puffy Shirt" episode. Grouper's "Groovie" home editing software also is a differentiator here with its simple mashup capabilities, making the inclusion of proprietary material fairly straightforward for consumers.

So who's left to buy in the social video space? Revver, vSocial, blip.tv, One True Media, Eyespot and VideoEgg, to name just a few. Are we likely to see the media incumbents go after these emerging companies? You betcha … this is a case in which it's certainly faster to buy than to build.

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