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Will Nasty Fee Fights Fuel Consumers' Cord-Cutting Interest?
Another weekend, another high-stakes fee fight between a multi-billion dollar media company and a multi-billion dollar cable operator. This time around it was Disney's WABC station in the New York City market in a standoff with Cablevision, which has 3.3 million subscribers there, with the Oscars broadcast the main hostage (WABC, which was pulled late Saturday night, came back on the air at 8:44pm subject to an initial agreement between the companies).
This fight, like recent ones between Time Warner Cable and News Corp, Cablevision and Scripps, plus others, is a no win PR situation for its combatants, and in my mind will lead to one inevitable result - heightened
consumer disgust with the hyper-corporatized TV business, where CEOs who are paid tens of millions of dollars per year accuse each other of not being sufficiently focused on satisfying their customers. Inevitably, consumers' disgust will translate into interest in finding alternatives, particularly those that are cheaper. While the WABC/Cablevision brought out switching enticements from Verizon, the real competition is increasingly going to be "cutting the cord" and getting programming from online-only sources.
Generally I don't believe that there's latent cord-cutting interest waiting to explode (even as monthly subscription fees have grown and the amount paid to cable networks is readily available). The fact is that popular cable programs are so diffused across so many channels - and that most of these programs are not available online (the very issue TV Everywhere aims to address) - that cutting the cord is a practical impossibility in most American homes. Sports alone is the ultimate firewall in a huge percentage of homes. How many sports fans would willingly say goodbye to ESPN, Fox Sports or TNT?
That said, more fee fights, affecting more consumers, are certainly in the
offing. While fee fights in the past have focused on amounts paid for cable networks, future fee fights are more likely to look like the WABC-Cablevision one - squabbles over how much cable operators should pay for broadcast stations. These fights are related to "retransmission consent" payments and reflect a very different dynamic unfolding between broadcast stations and cable operators.
In the past broadcast stations were plenty happy to have cable operators take in their feed directly, and then position the station on a low channel number, enhancing visibility. Now, however, with broadcast economics under extreme pressure, and intense broadcaster envy for cable networks' dual revenue model (monthly fees + advertising), monthly retransmission fee payments are the new normal. Never mentioned in broadcasters payment demands is the fact that they still have government-granted access to free broadcast spectrum which should likely be returned to the government if they want to operate more like cable networks. To the contrary, in fact broadcasters are arguing that government efforts to reclaim the spectrum for higher value mobile data uses are off-base. But that's a subject for another day.
Even as big media companies and cable operators are poised for future skirmishes, the online universe marches on. Convergence devices that bridge broadband to the TV are gaining further traction. And services like Netflix, iTunes, MLB and others are increasing consumers' expectations for what's expected and possible. As I've pointed out before, big media companies and cable operators have a mutually shared interest in defending the current subscription-based model. Nonetheless, how that model's riches are apportioned between the parties is what's being hotly contested. As they do this though, they risk killing the golden goose.
What do you think? Post a comment now (no sign-in required).Categories: Broadcasters, Cable TV Operators
Topics: ABC, Cablevision, Disney
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VideoSchmooze is Coming on April 26th - Save the Date
Be sure to save the date - April 26th - for the next "VideoSchmooze" Broadband Video Leadership Evening. Once again the location is the gorgeous
Hudson Theater in Times Square, NYC and the time is 6-9pm. The evening will include cocktails/networking and a panel discussion I'll moderate. The topic is "Money Talks: Is Online Video Shifting to a Paid Model" in which we'll explore the trends influencing paid options (e.g. TV Everywhere, paid mobile video apps, Netflix, etc.) and how these are balanced against free ad-supported online video. I'm finalizing the panelists and early bird registration will go live soon. Once again, I expect 200-250 industry executives, making VideoSchmooze a premier networking and educational opportunity.
An added bonus of this VideoSchmooze will be a 15 "stage-setting" presentation by Emily Nagle Green, CEO of The Yankee Group, a leading market research firm and former head of Forrester North America. Emily is the author of the just-released book, "Anywhere: How Global Connectivity is Revolutionizing the Way We Do Business." I saw Emily present recently and thought her insights and data are particularly applicable to all of us involved in the digital media business.
Akamai is the lead sponsor of this VideoSchmooze and supporting sponsors include FreeWheel, Horn Group, Irdeto, NeuLion and Panvidea (sponsorship opportunities are still available; please contact me if you're interested). I look forward to seeing you there!Categories: Events
Topics: VideoSchmooze
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Comedy Central Pulls Out of Hulu - Was This Really a Surprise?
This week brought news that Comedy Central was pulling its programs, including its hits "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" and "The Colbert Report," from Hulu on March 9th. Both had been available on Hulu since the summer of 2008 in what Comedy Central had initially positioned as a test. Both will still be freely available at ComedyCentral.com.
The Daily Show in particular had been enormously popular on Hulu since launch, so in this respect losing it is a setback for Hulu. Still, Comedy
Central's decision should come as a surprise to nobody. As I've been saying since I wrote "The Cable Industry Closes Ranks" in November '08, a bright line is being drawn in the broadband world between programs that consumers currently pay for and those that they don't. The industry is determined make sure the former stay that way and don't leak out onto the free Internet (in this sense, it's actually amazing to me that the Comedy programs are still available for free on its own site, but that's another story).
The free ad-only Hulu model is bumping up against the industry's big TV Everywhere push (another effort to maintain the subscription model) and so it was inevitable that Comedy's programs would get pulled. Hulu could make itself more attractive to networks - and open up new opportunities for itself - if it offered a subscription model. This is something I've suggested for some time, however I'm somewhat skeptical that anything will happen on this front until the Comcast-NBCU deal closes. Comcast would then become an approximately 20% owner of Hulu and will surely want to influence its strategic direction.
What do you think? Post a comment now (no sign-in required).Categories: Aggregators, Cable Networks
Topics: Comedy Central, Hulu
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Magazines are Keen on Video; iPad in Central Role
Following up on my post last week about the Wall Street Journal's new "Digits" video series, in which I reiterated my belief that online video is a huge new opportunity for print publishers, this week brought news of new video initiatives from a number of magazines. As reported by AdAge, Sports Illustrated is launching a new 5 times per day news program called "SI Inside Report," among other video projects. Six new employees have been brought on to support the initiative, which has to be a rare instance of new hiring in the magazine industry.
Elsewhere, Conde Nast is continuing to ramp up for the iPad; as the NY Times reported this week it will offer iPad versions of Wired, GQ, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Glamour. Conde plans to experiment with different pricing models and product approaches. But if the demo of Wired's iPad version is any indication, video is certain to play a large role. Wired's Chris Anderson has emerged as the leading magazine industry proponent of the iPad's potential. While the iPad buzz builds leading up to its release, I continue to maintain that unless the price of all models comes down by at least $200 the device is going to remain an early adopter gadget.
What do you think? Post a comment now (no sign-in required).Categories: Devices, Magazines, Newspapers
Topics: Apple, Conde Nast, iPad, Sports Illustrated
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MovieClips.com is Poised to Provide Addictive Fun
With the Oscars coming up on Sunday night (my prediction btw: "Avatar" wins everything) - it was timely to speak earlier this week to MovieClips.com's co-founders Zach James and Richard Raddon. MovieClips.com, which launched in December, just announced that it was taking away its geo-restriction, effectively making its clips available to most of the world. It also released an API so 3rd parties (bloggers and others) can incorporate some of the site's key features.
MovieClips.com is a wonderful example of how online video is unlocking value
in archived assets. As its name implies, the site offers searching and browsing for your favorite movie scenes/quotes. Rich and Zach have been going through the arduous process of signing deals with studios for legitimate rights to index their movies (of course a lot of this already lives illegitimately at social media myriad sites). Their goal is to become the key source of movie clips, supported primarily by ads.
As you would expect from the recently-launched site, clip availability is a still a little hit-or-miss. While Rich and Zach said they believe they have about 65-70% of the most sought after clips, I needled them because I came up empty on my first 3 searches (Terminator 2's "Hasta la vista, baby," The Shawshank Redemption's "Get busy living or get busy dying" and Risky Business's "Who's the U-boat commander?"). I did have better luck on subsequent searches. The company is filled with film buffs and so they have very good insight on what films and studios they need to pursue most aggressively to build out the clip library. A huge part of the site's appeal is the social media opportunities. When you're looking to relive some favorite movie memories, MovieClips.com is going to be very addictive.
What do you think? Post a comment now (no sign-in required).Topics: MOVIECLIPS.com
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VideoNuze Report Podcast #52 - March 5, 2010
Daisy Whitney and I are pleased to present the 52nd edition of the VideoNuze Report podcast, for March 5, 2010.
First up this week I discuss my post from this past Monday, "ABC.com is Now Achieving 'DVR Economics' for Its Programs," in which I described how ABC is now generating roughly the same revenue per program per viewer in online as it is when its programs are watched in DVR playback mode. Albert Cheng, EVP of Digital Media at Disney-ABC had explained to me last week that ABC recently concluded that since online and DVR are both "catch-up" opportunities, it was more appropriate to compare them to each other than to on-air.
Key to this logic is that ABC maintains a release window for its programs, with them being posted on the site 4-6 hours after broadcast. As a result, people who really want to see the program when it's first available still watch on-air (and may in fact re-watch online or via DVR). As long as there's an audience for broadcast, and online doesn't cannibalize it, the logic makes sense to me. Albert also explained that there's further upside in online through increasing the ad load, which is something ABC has experimented with.
Daisy picks up on that point, noting that CBS's Anthony Soohoo told her in an interview for Beet.tv that CBS is considering moving to a full ad load online because the online and on-air experience are converging, which suggests to them that viewers would tolerate more ads. We dig into the interplay between online and DVR usage, which I think is increasingly going to be a key focus for networks in how they choose to monetize online viewing.
Wrapping up, we review what some of the social media "listening" sites that are tracking the Oscar predictions are saying. Daisy appears officially addicted to following the online chatter.
Click here to listen to the podcast (14 minutes, 41 seconds)
Click here for previous podcasts
The VideoNuze Report is available in iTunes...subscribe today!
Categories: Advertising, Broadcasters, FIlms, Podcasts
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mPoint Becomes Panvidea, Streamlines Video Preparation and Post Production Processes
Yesterday mPoint, which had been a cloud-based video encoding platform, re-launched as Panvidea, with an expanded focus on streamlining video preparation and the post-production process for professional media companies. Panvidea also announced new customers A&E Television Networks, Fox Broadcasting and Getty Images. Chris Cali, CEO and co-founder and Doug Heise, VP of Marketing brought me up to speed and gave me a demo last week. Panvidea has done extensive product development to differentiate it from other on-demand, cloud-based encoding providers. The company is positioning itself as a full-scale alternative to expensive post-production house services or as an augment for customers who have some digital video preparation capabilities in-house but want to limit their additional capital outlays. Panvidea has expanded its offering to include a full suite of ingest, editing, encoding, metadata management, formatting, subtitling, and packaging/distribution to multiple platforms.
Chris explained that cloud-based video preparation services like Panvidea are gaining steam as media companies look to reduce the complexity and cost they are encountering in the broadband era. The proliferation of outlets and formats is making the preparation process more involved than ever.
In particular, Chris said that with Panvidea as an option, companies that are still relying on tape-based work flows can leapfrog the step of building out digital infrastructure and instead move directly to cloud-based services. Chris cited direct response TV companies as one such example. They have extensive needs to update phone #s, switch out offers and modify their distribution, both on-air and online. A number of DRTV companies are now using Panvidea for these work flows, bypassing expensive post-production houses they traditionally used.
Panvidea has also enhanced its system performance and changed its pricing model to emphasize HD quality video. The company is no longer pricing based on gigabytes in and gigabytes out; instead it is simply pricing on the basis of number of hours of video output. That change is important so that customers are not in effect penalized for wanting to do higher bit-rate (and therefore larger file) encoding.
Panvidea is further proof that even as online video consumption expands and complexity grows, the network is getting more robust, allowing traditionally high-end, expensive services to be delivered online. This self-reinforcing loop suggests that the quality and quantity of video moving online is poised for continued rapid growth.
What do you think? Post a comment now (no sign-in required).
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thePlatform Rolls Out Social Media Features; Video Interviews Available
This morning thePlatform is rolling out its latest Player Development Kit (PDK) which offers its media customers the option of turning on a series of video sharing/social media features for their users. Marty Roberts, thePlatform's VP of Marketing, gave me a demo last week. One of my key reactions is that interest in the PDK by thePlatform's customers shows how much media companies' executives' mindsets have evolved in a very short time.
With the player enhancements, users are able to embed video into ten of the most popular social networks: Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Digg, Reddit, Stumble Upon, Delicious, Windows Live, Yahoo! Buzz and Vodpod. All are pre-integrated by thePlatform so just a couple of clicks by the user places the video player, complete with its original branding, into these 3rd party sites. All of the advertising logic flows through to wherever the player is distributed, so ads run according to the same rules as they would on the destination site. All of the views are reported in the admin console, including detail on where the videos played.
An additional feature is the ability for users to clip a specific segment out of the underlying video and embed just that segment into these social networks. That means that users no longer have to say to their friends something like "check out the joke approximately 45 seconds into the attached 3 minute clip;" instead they can embed a new segment with just the joke itself. thePlatform has also handily integrated URL shortening, so embedding in Twitter is a snap. It also exposes hash tags in the meta data which are automatically added to the tweet.
Marty explained that thePlatform's customers, recognizing their users' interest in sharing clips, have pushed for these new social features. That's a pretty remarkable evolution in thinking by big media companies, which not that long ago were focused both on driving users only to their own destination sites for online viewing and also on bearing 100% of the promotional responsibility for doing so. By advocating for these new social/sharing features these companies are recognizing that online viewing should happen wherever users decide to hang out (this is the premise of the Syndicated Video Economy I've discussed many times) and that users themselves should be considered a critical ingredient in promoting content.
Gone too appears to be traditional concerns about the environment in which branded video would show up. I can't count how many times over the years I've heard content executives express worry about having their brands and programming end up in semi-pornographic or amateurish user-created sites. I asked Marty about this evolution in thinking and he said that even some of thePlatform's most conservative customers now seem to be over this perceived problem. Looks like Dylan was right, "The times, they are a-changin.'"
Separate, I recently conducted short interviews with a handful of industry executives who attended thePlatform's customer meeting in NYC, and I'm pleased to share them today. Browse below to see several minute-long Q&As with Bill Burke (Global Director, Online Video Products, AP), Ian Blaine (CEO, thePlatform), Channing Dawson (Senior Advisor, Scripps Networks), Kip Compton (GM, Video and Content Platforms, Cisco) and Stephen Baker (Chief Revenue Officer, RAMP). More interviews will be added in the days ahead, so please check back again.
Categories: Technology, Video Sharing
Topics: Delicious, Digg, Facebook, MySpace, Reddit, Stumble Upon, thePlatform, Twitter, Vodpod, Windows Live, Yahoo! Buzz
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