Wireless Web Video Rapidly Becoming the New Hot Thing

Now that mobile phones have started connecting to the Web, a handful of technology companies are rapidly pushing wireless networks to the next level: delivering video streams from the Web to mobile phones and hand-held devices.

Today, San Diego-based PacketVideo Corp. will launch the first Web site that delivers video over any U.S. wireless network to hand-held computers. Later this week, SolidStreaming Inc. of New York City expects to offer a wireless video player and links to several Web-based feeds, ranging from traffic cameras to shopping services.

Also today, Microsoft Corp. representatives are expected to demonstrate cell phones and portable devices that can send and receive wireless video in Japan. Meanwhile, some Europeans with Compaq hand-held computers are wirelessly tuning in cameras on the set of the original “Big Brother” TV show in Holland, using technology from Geo Interactive Media Group of Israel.

The main barriers to video have been the limited capacity and unreliability of wireless connections. Although companies such as PacketVideo have overcome those technical problems, the pictures they squeeze through most U.S. networks tend to be small, blurry and jerky--hardly what consumers are used to seeing on TV.

Nevertheless, PacketVideo has lined up nearly 40 media companies to supply video feeds for wireless users with Microsoft PocketPC-based hand-held computers, such as the Compaq iPaq. The reason, said Lauren Cole, chief operating officer of PacketVideo’s applications and services division, is that no one wants to miss the boat on wireless Web video.

“This is kind of like the Internet in 1993,” Cole said. “Of course it’s going to get better. It’s really a test environment at the moment. ‘You guys are the first ones to see it,’ that’s what we’re saying to consumers.”

The goal of the PacketVideo site is to get video producers and software developers interested in wireless Web video, priming the pump for media that would work well on today’s wireless networks.

“Anyone who has digital media, or digital assets, realizes that what you can do with the Web with hand-held appliances will be completely different from what you can do at your desktop PC,” said James Carol, the company’s chief executive.

Analyst Robert Fagin at Bear, Stearns & Co. said that approach has been “a good model for a lot of companies, which is basically get out there and seed the market.” He added, “Consumers will realize it’s evolutionary. If they’re trying it now, they’ll have to understand . . . the quality will get better.”

Picture quality is mainly a function of how fast the network can transmit the millions of bits of data that make up a video clip. Most wireless networks in the U.S. transmit less than 20,000 bits per second, although those speeds are expected to jump in the next few years as a new generation of networks arrives.

Also on the way are new wireless phones with color screens that are better suited to displaying video. For example, Samsung is selling one in Korea with Geo Interactive’s technology built in, and several of the top suppliers of microprocessors for cell phones have signed deals to incorporate PacketVideo’s technology.

In Japan, NTT DoCoMo’s Personal Handyphone System network can deliver up to 64,000 bits per second, enabling smoother and more detailed wireless videos. That network uses Microsoft’s Windows Media technology, which won’t yet work on the lower-capacity U.S. networks.

The main business for privately held PacketVideo, Carol said, is enabling wireless carriers to offer services built around video. And what carriers are most interested in, Cole said, are games and video-based communications, such as video conferencing and greeting cards.

Other possibilities include wireless streams from traffic cameras and other forms of surveillance, such as Web cameras at a day-care center. One application favored by college students: wireless video feeds from bars to see who’s gathered there.

The PacketVideo demonstration site (https://www.pvairguide.com) includes short films, animations, news clips and movie trailers from the likes of Warner Bros., Fox Filmed Entertainment, Sony Pictures Digital Entertainment and Universal Pictures.

Unlike the PacketVideo software, which is available only for PocketPC devices, SolidStreaming’s player can run on every personal digital assistant on the market, said Edward J. Bronson, the company’s president. Consumers will be able to download the player off SolidStreaming’s Web site later this week, Bronson pledged, and use it to tune in feeds from a variety of sites.

Those sites will enable users to send video e-mails, view traffic cameras and tourist attractions in major U.S. cities, and get daily news, sports and weather videos, Bronson said. Also in the works is a shopping service that will let consumers see short videos of items for sale.

Bronson said the company expects to offer a more extensive version of the service through Sprint PCS by the middle of next year.