They also opened up their Beta accounts today. Now current Beta testing can invite as many ‘friends’ as they want to join.

Holy Shit - thats a lot of cash.

Guess they will need it for what they are doing ……………. if the service fking works that is.

I’ve tried it about 10 times and its just too slow. Seems like $45 Mil is still not enough to get it working

I think I called this a while back…as a matter of fact…I think it was the day YouTube was acquired. (I may have called it in your comments section)

The wild west is back.

I love it.

If anybody still needs an invitation, I have unlimited invitations at my blog.

If it’s slow it’s because there’s only a small number of users on the network at this stage. If the take-up is anything like skype and kazaa was, it will leave the centralised streaming of video (youtube etc.) for dead.

let me know your email or email be at cmosripper [AT] gmail [DOT] com…… i have few invites to give away…….

Overall my experience with joost has been 8/10

Too much Joost news. I know its counter-intuitive, but I have a feeling this thing will go down as one of the most spectacular busts of the internet age. Can you say Pets.com

http://www.ebizmba.com

Joost is really nice actually. I was impressed when I did get an invite. I don’t watch much tv, so it I ever do, it will be a nice to have service.

Rex

why does joost need funding if the founders are the previous skype founders? Don’t they have alot of money?

pwner,

The funding is not because the founders don’t have the money. It’s to get into bed with CBS and Viacom so that they have skin in the game. And who wouldn’t want to get investment from Sequoia?? Think about the connections and expertise these guys have…an Internet company acquired a video company recently, and they had a common investor.

So far, I like Joost. When I first downloaded it had not much content but I just fired it up again today, and some stuff I’d actually want to watch is creeping in there. Then I opened up an issue of Newsweek and there are the Joost guys. All I can say is they got me to download the client - it works okay - and I’m just sitting here waiting for something cool to be shown on it.

Joost is amazing. They have really outdone themselves this time. These guys are freaks. They are seriously bringing TV to the net. This will be a powerhouse and viacom sees it.

Haven’t used Joost much yet as I’m not a big TV fanatic, but it looks very promising. The point of the financing is to get those partners to have a real stake in the game. Oftentimes for big partnerships, you give up some equity and get some cash to make the relationship closer.

Michael - you really need to chill out with the “Clown Co.” crap. You have hundreds of clowns featured on this site - many of them are companies like Scribd which you call a winner.

Tim. L @5 - I think what you’ve brought up is an interesting problem. Skype and Kazaa you leave running the whole time. But who watches TV the whole time? (yes it’s the same MidWest housewives who made online gambling a success!

I see Joost wants to leave itself running when I’m not watching, I wonder if that benefits the network if I’m not downloading/uploading? So the upshot is if the quality of a particular show’s stream is based on how many other people are watching at the same time … well, I guess that explains why big media loves it right? Market your shows better and your viewers will get better QoS and the “long tail” Youtube-style content gets relegated by poor QoS.

Andrew @12 - great insight…. LOL

I disagree with comments on here about Joost service. At work our connection is fairly unstable, as such whenever I watch online video its intermittent at best… however I’ve been using Joost for several weeks now at its the best experience I’ve ever had. Not only has the playback been completely seamless but the UI is child simple so finding a program to watch is easy as pie. The only fractionally flaky part of the app is the widgets area, but at this point its also the least important and has time to harden up. Overall I give this a 50 on a scale of 1 to 10. Simply phenomenal! Its actual TV on the internet!

P.S. No I don’t watch poker all day at work.

Where I think Joost will work is that it’s accessible and workable. I will also add that it’s not something devised just to get rid of YouTube, unlike Clown Co, which I believe will fold after three years. Here’s why:

http://zennie2005.blogspot.com.....-jeff.html

When has streaming video actually worked - I mean reliably, every single minute of every day, like, er, ummm your Cable TV connection?

So what makes people think Peer-to-Peer streaming will be better? Can you imagine the overhead of reconfiguring your stream every time one of the nodes disappears and stops sending packets? Or do you have redundancy? If so, say it again “massive overhead”.

I know I am going to be in a minority, but read my blog “7 reasons Joost will fail … and one reason why it might not”. http://l3media.blogspot.com

I’ve downloaded this since the very early betas. And i’m still waiting for something even remotely worthwhile to watch.
i know i know, i’ve heard the fanboy arguments too, quite incessantly actually…the content will come, thats why it’s called beta stupid blah blah blah. Fact remains, its just as uninteresting today as it was 7 months ago.

unlike what Tim L thinks, i gravely doubt it’ll replace the likes of youtube or blip.tv. Its basically apples and oranges. They have user content, and SEARCHEABLE. What is joost offering that sopcast or tvu isn’t doing better already? if i want trite content from ABC, i can just get back to my living room and watch my box already.

Atanu has a point in this. The interface is not appropriate at the moment - no searching, no re-arranging of the contents by the individual users, hardly any attempt to use the “wisdom of the crowds”.

I’m surprized that Joost will be launching given the problems it is having with scalability from the influx of users.

all technical questions aside, how much of this “content” (the same crap that caused me to get rid of tv in the first place) will be available outside the US?

considering in canada alliance atlantis channels aren’t even available, are we (non-US) be restricted to what’s available (and what there is to date is nothing but the worst of the worst) because of broadcast deals with local broadcasters? will sci-fi shows not be available because of contracts with spaceTV or sci-fi channel? remember the fiasco around battlestar galactica’s first season?

will we have this to look forward to? i’m beta testing joost and tho i like the interface i am appalled at what’s available right now to canadians.

Haven’t had a TV at home for almost 4 years now. Don’t miss it either. But I like to fire up Joost from time to time. (Will be doing it a lot more often now that they have Bab5 on it :P)

It never ceases to amaze me how poor developers are at judging the viability of a technology or service.

@Simon M, there is a search box right on the controls, bottom center; and, one can specify “my channels” for quick access to personalized choices. Perhaps “my shows” will be a later option, but this is still early, it has even had an official launch.

@Chris, What about peer-to-peer don’t you understand? “Scalability from the influx of users” is not the smae issue for joost as those using CDNs to get their content out. I’ll spell it out for you: More users = greater performance. That does not mean there aren’t kinks to work out, but I’ve had great experience for the 25 shows I’ve seen.

More content is needed, even here in the US it is a bit anorexic, this event should help to remedy that a bit.

Let’s see what happens 3 months after launch.

yeah 45 million is a lot.

- But it might be worth it - if they can secure 2nd if YT wins lawysuit
and secure 1st if they lose it!

- Also this puts Clown Co; at a very distant 3rd spot. They better get on the ball.

-RB

Help me catch the wave dudes! I need an invite! How do I get?

Wow. That’s a lot of cash. Nice score for Joost.

Booooooooring. Joost blows. Content is poor, quality is ok but I still have to download a client. My time is better spent on TV Link (http://www.tv-links.co.uk/) than this.

If these guys build they will come. Does Sequoia just mint money or what….This will become a major stand alone company or they get sold to Google as YouTube did. Helps to have people on the board, they will roundtrip the money and Sequoia and others will reap the rewards…Money make money and this is a big money making deal.

I think things like this are better:

http://www.shoppingbox.com/shoppingbox/

Real time TV content 24 /7, with the ability to by what you’re looking at, not bad network TV shows on my computer.

===========================
TubeHunter downloads YouTube/PornoTube/xTube/YouPorn/yuvutu videos to MPEG/iPOD/PSP/Zune
http://www.neoretix.com

That is a serious pile of money

I think they obviously are taking a very logical approach to internet video or everybody wouldn’t be stacking up next to them like this. Note this a European start up - I think Europe is kicking our ass when it comes to video and the internet, as users and as vendors.

With Sequoia on board, I wonder if they are looking at a quick acquisition play. Sequoia provides widespread access to suitors for Joost - I think we’ll see something in the next year.

You guys should read this from joost’s TOS:

http://digg.com/apple/Joost_go.....s#c6442464

Can anybody point out the competitive advantage of Joost over the other companies, such as Brightcove? Why Joost gets so much positive publicity?

I wonder how google can save youtube. i’ve seen demo of joost. It’s killer app.

I think Google should fireback or attack viacom!

@ 36 - thanks for demonstrating to Joost and their board why user generated content sucks….

The problem is…. Google can’t buy joost

Only top competitors such as Yahoo or Microsoft deals. Oh yeah, they are going to take huge revenege on Google.

I like to say goodluck to Youtube teams…

Galaxi, for one it is peer-to-peer vs. CDN, which gives them a serious advantage for reducing OPEX. Then, there is the number of content deals they’ve signed (and this deal only helps that). Because it is a separate download, the UI is more responsive and allows for 3rd party integration of apps. I’m sure someone here could rattle off a few more, but that’s off the top of my head.

@ Galaxi (and adding to what bdb said) - the squeaky wheel gets the grease. joost has made smart marketing and pr moves from the get go. It’s all spin and buzz right now - how it actually does is another story.

Anybody know anything about the valuation - that’s a lot of moolah for a series a.

bluskys - check here: http://digg.com/tech_news/The_.....loser_look

The linked article talks about the valuation (pre and post) and gives more detail than most of the initial reports.

So did Viacom and CBS actually contribute capital or did they simply allow licensing as their investment.

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