Joost Turns to Ooyala for Self-Serve Video Uploads

Written by Ryan Lawler

Wednesday, February 25. 2009 at 03:30 PM EST Post a comment

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Online video portal Joost is getting a little help with the ingestion, transcoding, and management of some video uploads, with the announcement today that it is deploying Ooyala Inc.'s video platform for some of its content partners.

Ooyala worked with Joost to develop a co-branded version of its Backlot video management platform, which will enable certain publishers to upload their video assets into Joost's system without having to involve the video site's professional services team.

Joost chose the Ooyala platform after evaluating several video management platforms. But to make the system work, Ooyala had to do some integration work, according to Ooyala CEO Bismarck Lepe. That included creating an admin console that Joost could use to manage uploaders, as well as providing some support for Joost's metadata scheme.

While Joost's choice of Ooyala's Backlot stands as a validation of the company's technology and a foot in the door at a major broadband video company, it's important to note that the scope of the deal will remain limited. 

Joost CTO Jason Gaedtke says his company generally breaks its content partners down into Gold, Silver, and Bronze tiers -- with Gold partners being high-touch, major media companies with thousands of assets and Silver partners being those that require professional services but may not have personnel dedicated to them.

With that in mind, Gaedtke says that the publishers using the Ooyala platform will be confined primarily to those that fall into the Bronze category, or those that don't have a ton of assets to upload.

"The Ooyala component is a low-friction on-ramp for our Bronze content partners," Gaedtke says, stressing that the is "very committed" to investments it has made in its own upload and management platform, which it will continue to use for larger media partners.

Even so, Ooyala's Lepe says that the deal with Joost is just a start for the company. Now that Ooyala has built out the admin console that Joost is using to manage its content partners, Lepe says that deals with other major video destination sites are in the works.