With Venice Project, Skype founders test video waters

The people responsible for Skype and Kazaa are starting up a new venture, an interactive video site that aims to combine video with peer-to-peer networking.

According to an article in BusinessWeek, the venture--called The Venice Project--set up a Web site over the summer and will expand its beta test in November. The founders are hoping to get professional media companies to post content and ads online. Consumers would be able to access the streamed content via a secure P2P network, stopping, pausing and fast-forwarding at will, and sharing playlists with friends.

The project has drawn interest because of its founders, and the P2P angle, but it faces intense competition from everyone from YouTube to MySpace to media companies that have chosen to simply post their own content themselves. Will Venice stay afloat?

Blog community response:

"They don't have the same advantage here as they had on the completely fragmented VoIP market, where Skype could stick out (despite established companies like Net2Phone). Many very powerful media companies are already offering or working on offering Internet-based video broadcast services."
--Abiro Mobile News

"Whatever the case might be, this doesn't look good from an eBay investor's perspective. They spent $2.6 billion (and change) on Skype, and the two main guys are busy doing other projects."
--Om Malik

"The pair's track-record at creating havoc, and the high-profile this venture will receive, gives 'The Venice Project' the ability to create some momentum toward accelerated web distribution, and that can't be good for traditional distributors."
--IP And Democracy