Is Blip the Next HBO?

More evidence this week that the line between online video and television is blurring further. As Don Jones @VentureDeal and others tweeted, Blip.tv rebranded itself simply “Blip” in celebration of its third round of venture capital financing and its consequent plans for using the cash….

PaidContent.org reported in an article (Video Network Blip Drops ‘.tv’, Picks Up $12 Million http://bit.ly/bmr3P7) that…

Blip says that it will use the funding to develop more tools and services for web series producers, as well as further investment in its advertising and distribution platforms.

Why the rebranding? Blip says it is to distinguish itself better from so-called premium content brands like TV networks that have made the migration to online streaming.

The making of web-original content is also something being chased by bigger players, too, as they look to create more video inventory and attract ever more users for premium-rate online video advertising. YouTube has embarked on a massive drive to create more channels in partnership with third parties…

Of course, $12 million is not much more than a rounding error for some of the TV cable channels and broadcast networks producing or funding original programming. (Didn’t Charlie Sheen used to make that for half a season’s work?) But deals like this and YouTube’s current channel creation frenzy signal an inevitable shift toward the Internet/TV paradigm predicted for years. As PaidContent.org suggests, it’s yet…

Another signal of the growing attention being paid to the streaming video sector, and specifically the growing emphasis on made-for-web content…

The “attention being paid” is coming from the established media companies who seem to view the Internet as an natural extension of their empire. The online players have proven they can produce (or sponsor production of) consumable content that the established media companies have largely ignored until now. And the online players have also made progress on the monetization front. But is Blip the next HBO? Is it a question of whether investment capital and ad revenue can compete with premium cable subscription revenue? Or is there a place for both companies in the blurry new world of Internet/TV?