Viacom18 Digital Ventures’ online video streaming platform VOOT has gone live. The service is available as both a desktop website, and as mobile apps for Android & iOS. As of now, VOOT is free to use and uses an advertising business model, although the company mentions that it will evaluate freemium and subscription models in the future. VOOT currently lists various Bollywood movies, new and old, as well as various Hindi TV shows. Interestingly, the platform also lists a ‘kids zone’ which features various cartoons like Dora the explorer, Chhota Bheem, Pokemon etc., as well as categories like Indian folk tales, bedtime stories, doodles, art and craft etc. Although free, the website offers users a chance to create an account and login. This enables users to password protect everything but the kids zone. This is a pretty neat and unique feature that parents will likely appreciate, and we fully expect other VoD players to follow suit. Overall, the website interface appeared a little sluggish to us, but given that it says ‘beta’ we expect it to get better over time. Original content: Viacom18 mentions that it will look to roll out shows in both long and short formats across genres as original content. It mentions that it has tied up with actors like Gulshan Grover, Baba Sehgal, Alok Nath and other scriptwriters, to develop these shows. As of now, the company provides content from COLORS, MTV and Nick. Viacom18 had announced that it would launch a mobile video streaming platform…
