With broadband Internet becoming more accessible, Net start-ups are aiming to fill those high-speed pipes with bandwidth-heavy content.

The Spring Internet World conference in Los Angeles this week may offer a hint to the high-speed future. A number of companies at the show unveiled new software to improve on current video streaming and instant messaging technology. Internet Pictures, which has developed new video software with features allowing 360 degrees movement within an ongoing movie, builds on its iPIX viewer. The company's iPIX viewer previously offered a 360-degree view of still photographs. Another player in the market, On2.com offers software that allows users to view high-resolution, full-screen video streamed over the Internet. The software is being showcased through On2.com's broadband portal, which competes with similar sites offered by Comcast Online and Excite@Home. MShow.com's conference and collaboration software, in another niche, integrates video, instant messaging and online whiteboards. Other makers of online collaboration software, which can be used for everything from business seminars to online learning to teleconferences, include Centra and Lotus. In a somewhat different category, Oakland, Calif.- based DigiScents offers hardware and software that will allow users to smell Web sites and email. DigiScents signed an agreement last year with RealNetworks to have Real distribute DigiScents' ScentStream software with its RealPlayer.