When It Comes to Television Content, Affiliate Fees Make the World Go ‘Round
By far the best article I read today. On how the past and present of the TV business effects digital distribution (including why Hulu is moving to a subscription model) and what to expect in the future.
“We wake up every day and there is some new competitor out there — a Roku or a Boxee. People like to think of cable operators as monopolists, but we face a lot of competition just to keep the business we have.”
If the cable providers made any effort to deliver extra value for consumers instead of cable companies, they’d face a lot less competition. The difference between this mentality and that of Jeff Bezos is perfect.
The start of the women’s 12,5 km biathlon mass race in Whistler, British Columbia, Sunday, Feb. 21, 2010. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)Vancouver 2010, part 2 of 2 - The Big Picture
While Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt and Nastia Liukin made the 2008 Beijing Olympics the most exciting summer or winter games I’ve experienced, I generally prefer the winter games. While I wish it hadn’t been made so obvious before these games started, the winter games are more nerve-racking and interesting to me because they’re more dangerous. The athletes are often battling against gravity and minimal friction creating more tension than when they are competing only against each other or the clock. Despite NBC’s best efforts, I really enjoyed watching this year.
“Franken recalled that back in the 1980s, the television networks urged the FCC to drop its Financial Interest and Syndication (FYN-SYN) rules, which barred networks from owning all but a small chunk of the programming that they aired—which the agency did. The senator recalled that, at the time, NBC executives promised that relaxing FYN-SYN would not lead the network to favor its own content.
‘But by 1992 NBC was the single largest supplier of its own primetime programming,’ Franken continued. ‘Today, if an independent producer wants to get its own show on NBC’s schedule, on any network’s schedule, it is routine practice, and you guys know it, for the network to demand at least part ownership of the show… And that’s just a fact. So while I commend NBCU and Comcast for making voluntary commitments as part of this merger, you’ll have to excuse me if I don’t trust these promises.’”
Boxee Blog » Boxee Beta Goes Public, Download Now
The Boxee beta goes public today. Follow the link and you can download it to your Mac, Windows or Ubuntu machine. New UI and loads of new functionality. Check it out!
The UX/UI improvement from the alpha is enormous and I know they are just getting started. It couldn’t be a better time to cancel cable.
“Paramounts’ letter includes a ‘geek to sleek’ chart that notes that while, back in the day, only ‘computer literate’ individuals could pinch copyrighted content, now ‘anyone’ can do it. And, while early exchange sites had a ‘clear sense of piracy,’ now they sport a ‘legitimate look and feel.’
It’s not hard to sense where this is going—calls for the FCC and Congress to let studios form partnership with ISPs to unleash the cyberdogs of copyright war: deep packet drones, lawyer-bots, takedown ninjas, and whatever other digital wedgie-deliverer a vendor premiers at the next MPAA technology show.”
