for the past few months i have been attending the NY Video 2.0 Meetup.

this week the format was a bit different. there was a panel discussion regarding online video advertising moderated by Dan Rayburn of Streaming Media. the panelists were from NBCU, OMD, DoubleClick and ScanScout.

i didn’t know the space too well (still don’t), so it was very educational. it seems there is lots of common wisdom and tendency to try and copy what had been worked in TV advertising.

without knowing much about either TV advertising or Online Video advertising, i think it is a safe bet to assume that copying the TV model will not succeed. like overture/google that came up with the search keyword ad model, there will be innovators that will optimize a model for online video.

we are probably 2-3 years away (maybe more) from seeing a model that really works. attracting more ad dollars away from broadcast and cable television.

in the meantime i am not sure the insane numbers of online video startups will be able to survive when everyone will be fighting for a limited ad-spend, and when the VC funding will (eventually) dwindle.

i am glad we’re not building our business case on video ad dollars..