Inside Facebook

Live streaming on Facebook is now more affordable for smal businesses and individuals thanks to StreamAPI, a new product from live-streaming company Stickam. StreamAPI is built around Facebook’s Live Stream widget, which was recently opened up to anyone wanting to add a dynamic stream of Facebook status updates around live events on their website.

StreamAPI is slightly different from the currently available service from Ustream, which has been used in many of the live streaming events to date but has setup costs as high as $15,000. With StreamAPI, there is no set up or monthly fee; instead, users pay 45 cents per gigabyte. There’s support for HD video as well. Stickam has plenty of experience with live online video, providing its service to stream content for MTV, CBS Radio, and G4TV, amongst others.

New services like StreamAPI reflect the increasing interest amongst web video publishers for the social context that Facebook Connect brings around live events. New products and pricing models like this one are opening up the market to a larger variety of long tail publishers.