Harry Chen Thinks Aloud

YouTube Live celebrates the first streamed event in San Francisco. Part concert, party variety and part party, it brings to life many of the amazing YouTube videos and talent. As I’m watching the live show on my laptop, I can’t help to think how much YouTube has changed the world — the way we consume video entertainment, the lives of thousands YouTube talents, and the whole media entertainment industry.

YouTube may not be the most profitable online video site, but it certainly changes the rule of the game. Anyone with an internet connection can play a role in creating movies, music, news and propaganda (of course). It pushes traditional businesses to think carefully about the internet as the new frontier of the entertainment industry. It reshapes politics and how politicians communicate with the people.

YouTube Live, the event itself, will probably soon be forgotten by most people. But, but the idea it represents will certainly be marked as a significant milestone in the modern media history.

On Nov. 23, 2008, a sister YouTube Live event will take place in Tokyo.

Recently we acquired a Roku box, a Netflix player that enables instant watch of Netflix movies over the Internet. Netflix is known for its subscription-based online DVD rental service. Taking the service to a next level, Netflix players allows rental movies to be streamed to subscriber’s TV over the Internet.

I really enjoy using Roku. It was easy to setup. Took less than 10 minutes to plug in HDMI and setup the Wi-Fi connection. The box takes less than 1 minute to boot. The user interface is simple and intuitive. After entering my account information, instantly I can watch Netflix movies on my TV.

While Roku box is fun to use, but it’s not perfect. When watching movies over the Internet, the video quality can easily degrade if there is sudden burst of network traffic. Although Roku’s media player is smart enough to dynamically adjust the video quality as the network bandwidth changes, but jumping between different video quality settings can be annoying. Another issue with the Netflix player is that not all movies are available for streaming. This is not a hardware issue, but rather a business issue that Netlix currently implements.

I believe watching movies over the Internet is the future. Netflix players are in a head-to-head competition with Apple TV and Amazon’s Video On Demand. I speculate that Netflix players and Apple TV will be the key players in the market.

Watch movies over the Internet will forever change the way to people receive media entertainment. In my home, we canceled our subscription-based TV service (no cable, no dish). To watch TV shows, we use Roku box and an over-the-air HD antenna. To watch news, I switch to online video programs (e.g., CNN and NY Times). There are some limitation to our current configuration. But, we were able to avoid watching TV ads and watch what we want whenever we want.

If you’re a Netflix subcriber, I strongly encourage you to try Netflix players. If you’re in the market for a Blu-ray DVD player or a TiVo player, you can buy combo boxes that come with Netflix player.

Barack Obama will be the 44th President of the United States. As the country elects its first African-American President, it marks the beginning of a new and exciting chapter in the US history. Althought it’s too early to tell whether Obama can actually bring this country back on track, but he certainly can motivate people and give people hope.

Hope is one of the most important idea in life. Our future builds on hope. Without hope, people will stop taking risks and making changes. A friend wrote on her Facebook status: “I remember what hope feels like”. As I watch Obama’s winning speech on TV, I can’t stop thinking millions of people are hoping for a better life and a better country. Obama is their symbol of hope — not just in the US, but also in other corners of the world.

I congratulate Mr. Obama winning the election. I hope he will bring a brighter future to the United States of America.