A few months ago, I spotted a new video-on-demand site starting up called Joost (you can click on the image above for the link). At the time I signed up for their beta program and after a while, it was accepted and they sent me the links to sign and and download the client.
Joost is a provider of "streaming" video, but they are trying to move into the direction of a "community" of viewers. Features such as chat to allow you to carry on conversions with others who are watching the same show as you. They have a few features now, but plan to add more to make Joost more than just a video-on-demand service.
As for the video-on-demand part, like I said, Joost using streaming to deliver video. While their buffering seems to help, I think in the long run streaming will not be the answer at least for me. Streaming suffers from network issues, not limited to the providers network, but everything that occurs from the consumer to the provider. It will probably be a long time before network bandwidth and connectivity remains a constant where video-on-demand does not suffer.
For me, I would rather select a show and do something else while it downloads. For example, I could envisionbrowsing a guide for interesting shows and selecting the ones I wish to watch and have them download for me to watch when I get around to watching them. I understand the issues with piracy, systems such as Joost often have their own client application anyway, so I would imagine they could build in a storage system that allows restricted access which I think would be a big hit.
The is another possible issue though that may limit companies such as Joost from using downloads and forcing the streaming method, it may be that the owners of the videos only allow them to stream the videos. If that is the case, I would hope that in the future they would be able to see the potential of downloading over streaming.
During my tests, I had a video dropped twice due to network issues (more than likely my provider having a hiccup). Although, for the most part, once the video begins and it is a few minutes into it, things seem to settle down and it provides a decent somewhat stable image.
Recently, Joost closed down their beta applications and it is now only available via invitation. I happen to have 4 invitations available as of this writing and if you would like to have one, first, post a comment here saying you want one (so that others know once all are taken) and then simply use the "contact" option in the menu above to send me:
- First Name
- Last Name
- Email Address
Once they are all gone, you might want to check back at a later time to see if I have received more.
* Note: Joost is currently only available for Windows XP SP2 and Vista!
Enjoy Joost!