A new Microsoft software plus service: Silverlight Streaming
Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie took the wraps off Microsoft's latest example of software plus service (S+S) -- a new video streaming offering called Silverlight Streaming -- during his opening keynote at Microsoft's Mix '07 conference on April 30.
Silverlight Streaming is in alpha. It is a free hosting service for developers creating rich-media content using Microsoft Expression Studio tools and third-party offerings.
To start, Microsoft is offering developers 4 GB of free storage. The company is making available a Silverlight Streaming software development kit (SDK) for download, as well. Users will be able to upload any number of ten-minute video segments, officials said, and Microsoft will provide them with a URL for their content stored on Microsoft's servers.
Silverlight Streaming "will let you post your media to the Microsoft storage service in the cloud," Ozzie told attendees of the Las Vegas conference.
On the software side, Silverlight is Microsoft's cross-browser plug-in, formerly code-named Windows Presentation Foundation Everywhere, that competes with Adobe's Flash technology.
During his keynote, Ozzie also announced:
* The availability of Silverlight 1.0 Beta 1 for download
* The availability of Silverlight 1.1, which adds support for ASP.Net Ajax, Language-Integrated Query (LINQ) support and support for JavaScript, Visual Basic, C#, Python and Ruby, which it will make available via a new Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR) layer
* Final availability of the full Expression Studio suite of tools for designer
* New commercial terms of use for Windows Live
Stay tuned for more Mix '07 coverage through Wednesday....