Introducing Adobe Media Player

The merging of television with the Internet has been hyped for years. If you love television, you've been waiting for these industries to come together. If you're a website or RIA developer working with streaming media, or if you're a content owner yourself, you've waited for this eventuality too because of its obvious potential. I personally have been waiting for it—ever since I saw my first demo and thought this was really cool stuff. Finally Adobe is launching Adobe Media Player.

Adobe Media Player is very different from anything Adobe has created before. Traditionally known as a tools company, Adobe is now working with major broadcasters (MTV and CBS), video bloggers (blip.tv), and producers of short-form serials (such as Stump the Chef and Diggnation) to enrich this unique, cross-platform desktop application that's targeted at anyone who watches video content today.

You can watch your favorite shows or your own personal videos and search for content that is relevant to your interests. All your favorites are at your fingertips, all in one place. You don't need to actively search for content that is appealing to you. Download Adobe Media Player today and see if you agree it will really change the way people view TV and the Internet today.

So what is this excitement all about, anyway? Adobe Media Player is a customizable, cross-platform media player built on Adobe AIR that provides exciting new ways for viewers to discover and interact with their favorite content, while offering revenue-building opportunities for content publishers. We have a unique offering for branding and monetizing advertisements for content owners. You can skin the player to look and feel just like your website. You can also add advertising (banner ads, pre-roll ads, in-roll ads, post-roll ads, and hot spots within video)—all possible because of Adobe Flash.

Adobe Media Player also provides anonymous measurement of key usage data, such as when and how often a video has been viewed, where users starts and stop a video, and advertising impressions. This works even when users are offline; the next time Adobe Media Player is launched while online, the usage data is uploaded to the publisher's Flash Media Server receiver application. Users can set demographic preferences (country, age, etc.) that content publishers can access; then publishers can set up their playlists to deliver certain content (like ads) for certain demographics and other content for others. Users can opt in to send this anonymous information through the preferences tab. Everyone wins: users get free content with ads that are more relevant, publishers can make their content available free for download, and advertisers reach a more receptive audience for their promotions.

In a (technical) nutshell, Adobe Media Player is an RSS aggregator. It consumes standard Media RSS feeds to notify and deliver video content to users. Adobe has defined some extensions to the Media RSS specification to support branding assets, and documentation of these extensions has been posted in the Content Developer Kit. This document gives you all the steps to get started. Download the CDK (PDF, 2 MB)

If you are interested in adding content into Adobe Media Player, contact our business relationship team at Adobe. Tell us about yourself and your content offering by filling out the form. One of our business development teams will reach you.

Download Adobe Media Player (it's free) and check out all the great content that's already there. We add more content partners every week, so definitely check back to see if we have added your favorite shows. For more information, visit the Adobe Media Player Developer Center.

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