Ashley Highfield has announced he's standing down as CEO of Kangaroo.
The proposed catch up service from BBC Worldwide, ITV and Channel 4 has sailed choppy waters since the former head of BBC Technology joined six months ago.
The move comes as yet another blow for project. It's currently under investigation from the Competition Commission and Highfield's departure follows that of Patrick Ugeux, ITV's director of Project Kangaroo in August.
Highfield is jumping ship to be MD and VP of consumer and online at Microsoft UK.
Highfield said: "It has been a great pleasure and challenge to take Project Kangaroo to the next stage of its journey. It is something I believe passionately in and I will remain a great ambassador for the project from afar as it continues on the road to becoming a brilliant proposition for consumers in this exciting market".
Oh, Kangaroo, will you ever see the light of day? Or will you be permanently vaporware?
Kangaroo has come up against another set of problems. The joint venture between BBC ITV and Channel 4 has been referred to the Competition Commission by the Office of Fair Trading. And this is before it has even been seen on a computer screen anywhere.
In a statement, the OFT said ...
"In reaching its decision, the OFT carefully considered all evidence as to whether the joint venture would face enough competition from other sources."
"While it is easy to speculate about what different UK viewers might do if the joint venture charged a higher price, there was a lack of good evidence available on these issues."
If this is the sort of problems kangaroo faces before it is available, I dread to think what will happen when or if it ever launches.
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BSkyB, Virgin and online only service Joost have submitted a complaint to the Office of Fair Trading over the proposed video service kangaroo (hang on, isn't this called SeeSaw now?) Mike Volpi, chief executive of Joost had this to say on the matter...
"When you have a situation where so much good content ends up being potentially exclusive through a single distribution channel, it makes it very difficult for any player outside of those three to be competitive in the UK market."
Is Kangaroo doomed? Is it vaporware? Or will it be a storming success? Who knows...
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Ashley Highfield, outgoing director of BBC future technology and incoming Head of Kangaroo/SeeSaw has announced that more than 75 million viewers have downloaded programs from the BBC iPlayer since it launched at Christmas.
That is a lot of people!
Talking at the Google Zeitgeist forum (Where was our invite...?) he also said there had been 21 million download requests in April, up from 17 million in March.
Huge success. Oh yes.
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STOP PRESS: Kangaroo is now "SeeSaw..."
We say: One crap name is a mistake. TWO crap names smacks of carelessness.
Anywho...
According to a report in the Guardian today - Kangaroo, the massive Internet TV joint venture between BBC Worldwide, ITV and Channel 4 is set to launch in September or October. Well, thats what the bosses are "Currently hoping"
On the subject ITV's Chief Operating Officer John Cresswell says..
"It is going really well. Ashley's (Highfield - Chief Executive of Kangaroo from July 1st) appointment is fantastic. With all new technical launches, you always have a soft launch before you unveil the whole thing,"
Which means they'll be beta testing it for quite a while.
Our friends across the pond can finally get their hands on the BBC's content online through iTunes. With the iPlayer only available to us licence payers its great to see the Beeb freeing its programming to the rest of the world for the low price of $1.99 per episode. Although it is getting a little confusing keeping track of whose content is available where. Lets see...BBC on iPlayer, iTunes, Wii and Kangaroo (soon) and ITV on Catch Up, iTunes and Kangaroo (soon) it'll be hard to move through the Internet without bumping into some kind of downloadable show...
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Despite big talk and lofty ambition, Kangaroo - the download service operated by the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 is stuck in developmental quagmire, reports from the Guardian claim. An insider is reported as saying - "Imagine the most difficult joint venture deal you've ever been involved with, and multiply by three!" A service operated by three broadcasters with years of rivalry behind them has some difficulty? I am not surprised.
Also there are worries from the independant content creators and rights owners on whether they will be properly paid for their work.
Ofcom could see the whole operation as a cartel and shut it down or scale it back.
Not particularly rosy news for Kangaroo.
Will it work? Or will it be a disaster on the scale of Waterworld?