RealNetworks unveils RealPlayer 7

RealNetworks has today announced a raft of new measures to improve its media offering to surfers searching for video content over the Internet. It has launched a new site - http://www.real.com, along with the latest version of its media streaming technology, RealPlayer 7.

RealNetworks now claims to have over 85 million users of its RealPlayer software, a figure which has doubled in the last year making it the most prolific media streaming technology on the Internet.

RealNetworks is also promoting a network of media programming from 100 of the largest media companies. Content providers signed up to this Real.com Take5 network include the BBC News Online, ITN Online, CBS and MTV

The latest version of RealPlayer will, for the first time, allow users to surf for media content direct from the Web site via Real.com Take5.

However Noah Yasskin, Analyst for Jupiter communications was sceptical whether RealNetworks' portal would be able to challenge the dominance of established portals such as Yahoo!. "Video and Audio doesn't target specific people, so RealNetworks will have to compete with the general portals. It is quite late to make an announcment like this - RealNetworks could have done this years ago".

The announcement comes a week after allegations against the company for its use of RealJukebox software and today's security issue relating to RealPlayer (see 'RealNetwork offers patch to combat personal data 'error''
http://www.silicon.com/a33784 and 'Security flaw found in RealPlayer' http://www.silicon.com/a33861 ). The media streaming specialist currently faces an impending investigation by privacy organisation, Truste.