Jeff Louella, a multimedia web developer in Consohocken, PA and self-described “geek who loves computers and technology,” tracks his doomed love affair with Real from the giddy days of Real Audio Player and streaming music to his decision this week to excise Real Media Player from his life. For Louella, the Real Player got too complicated, too bloated and too slow as it matured. The drive to become a subscription media company sent him to other sites for similar, free content — and those sites were using other players. CNN’s switch to free video — and to Windows Media Player — was the last sign for him.
The most important message here reaches beyond Real, though, and that’s the growing consumer frustration over the number of media players it takes to get content from a variety of online sources. As he writes, “I am just tired of having all these media players fighting over which application is going to play my MP3s or streams. … No one should have to install 5 different media players to play a stream off of the internet.” (Via Om Malik)
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