John Friedman, Columnist for MarketWatch, moderated a panel trying to find the leading edge of broadband services. [NOTE: After two days of live blogging, even folks like me get a little tired, this will be a less transcriptive entry]. Interesting mix of panelists - Nicholas Ascheim, Entertainment, Video & Audio Products, New York Times Digital, Randy Kilgore, Chief Revenue Officer, Tremor Media, Cyrus Krohn, Director of Content Production, Yahoo Media Group.

Nicholas: Nice broadband traffic now, probably 5 percent of what it will be down the road. Will come a time when it's what people expect to find everywhere. Randy: just because it's there on the front page doesn't mean that it's relevant. Cyrus: we just surpassed our record for streams ("Most beautiful woman" post), users spending more time watching 60 minutes online than on TV channels. Nicholas: Footage of the longest skateboard jump, absolutely insane, discussed on YouTube big-time. Art Buchwald's self-produced obit video was huge. Obits require a lot of promises that content will not be disclosed until after death, but works well. Cyrus: Would call political consultants on the carpet, one of the last to go online, traditional political pc

Who wins? Randy: Those who figure out how to create content that's a strong business model. Cyrus: Reuters wanting to compensate "stringers" who submit interesting photos, people are still struggling with monetization models. Randy: Winners will be Times or Journal-like portal that integrates video effectively. John: Using videos to finance campaigns? Nicholas: we'll treat any kind of content as content, haven't aggregated much. Cyrus: the traditional political consultants have been slowest to move online, they make commissions on ads, so motivations need to be changed. As publishers, have an obligation to address it, little government intervention. When candidate says I want 50 percent of your inventory, how do we handle this.

John: Handling costs? Nicholas: most expensive part is the journalists, but working to take down costs, for example put camera in hands of reporter [COMMENT: hmmm, or usgen media around the corner]. Right now it's not cheap to do it. Randy: Costs are coming down, not so much a factor for the technology. Nicholas: Advertisers balked early on at 15 second spots at same prices, now going along. Need to think about how to make money a few years from now is key [KEY THEME: We've lost the five-year horizon in corporate planning against disruptive forces, while startups post five-year business plans to exploit against them and execute those plans.] More journalists want to do this now, but it's really a process. John: Audio/Video content: how fast vs. how complete? Randy: Will journalists tell stories forever? Nicholas: Some have a real talent for it and will bubble to the top.

John: What has not worked? Cyrus: Adventure travel feature, have people go off and report back, found that richness of page wasn't conducive, need to be aware of real interest levels. New March project for Yahoo, stay tuned, new approach to news talent [SCOOP!] Nicholas: Just started a site for collectable cars, a hit, doing more of these.

John: AOL? Randy: Getting smarter. Cyrus: Bylines are their strength, retaining bylines will be key. Nicholas: Separate editorial function, degrades quality of product, NYT integrated teams so that they can contribute equally. John: Free/fee? Randy: Can't go backwards, has to be virtually indispensable. Nicholas: Times Select has been successful, take most successful behind wall you take away stickiness, still an experiment.

Good stuff, that's all I can do right now, fading. Not really addressed: monetization via ads from YouTube and other methods making content more useful away from originating portals for contextualization.