YouTube, MeTube, EveryoneTube and another few dozen video sharing companies...

Paul Kedrosky is fond of saying the venture business is a bubble business. This ties into the truism that competition in a segment "validates the opportunity." Intuitively, it would be silly to think that any idea with real merit wouldn't invite multiple startups and VC backing; particularly in an environment where there's too much capital searching for too few deals.

Perhaps no segment better exemplifies this paradigm than the online video distribution and sharing market.  Just a few months ago, there was plenty of debate about which company and approach was the best. I had profiled a few of them including Kontiki [since acquired by Verisign] and Brightcove, but obviously the tour de force has been YouTube and it's $1.65B acquisition by Google. YouTube's massive takeout is quite likely going to be the best exit in the current vintage [regardless of segment]; or at the very least right near the top; and that means plenty of other people are going to try to ride the crest.

Light Reading, best known for its coverage of telecommunications equipment and networking news, has a fantastic profile of the video sharing space. Phil Harvey profiles 61, yes, SIXTY ONE!!!, companies that are attacking the space in some way, shape or form.

• Web Video Cheat Sheet [Light Reading]

I also threw the data into an EditGrid spreadsheet. Please make sure to give credit to Light Reading though if you re-use the data for any reason.

• EditGrid Live Format
• PDF Format
• HTML Format
• Excel Format

It would be fascinating to tally how much venture money has gone into these 61 companies; if anyone out there had access to this information and would be inclined to run the numbers, I would be most interested in hearing the outcome.

Note: Hat tip to Tom Forenski, who first made mention of this article in his own blog

Note: At the time of this writing I, and/or funds I maintain discretionary control over, maintained long equity positions in MSFT and YHOO. We did not maintain a position, long or short, in TWX, GOOG, VRSN, NWS or SNE. We also may, at times, carry derivative options on underlying positions as a hedge.

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Comments

[Kevin]

Our money is on Brightcove, since that's what we use for our TasteTV (http://www.TasteTV.com)