Posts Tagged ‘economic downturn’

Some Broadcasters Doth Protest Too Much.

September 25th, 2009

Change is certain, progress isn’t as internet media business models morph by the second in the never ending search for profitability.

Yesterday Erick Schonfeld posted an interesting article on TechCrunchLeaked Email: Quincy Smith Of CBS Wants To Counter “Reckless Hulu Streams,” which included a Contentinople piece quoting members of a recent Advertising Week discussion panel, who disparaged Hulu.com for giving away premium content.

Smith, CEO of CBS Interactive, confirmed the leaked email is real.  What remains to be seen is which entities’ business model succeeds, and which is based on product envy…

Read the full post here.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.“ - William Shakespeare (1564 –1616), Hamlet Act 3, scene 2, 222–230

hulu-logo

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A Netflix Stream in Hand…

… would be a killer app – and in more ways than one; streaming more than one movie would easily eat up most people‘s iPhone minutes package on AT&T without making *any* calls… Today, from TechCrunch, via Hacking Netflix: Rumor: Netflix Streaming Coming To The iPhone by MG Siegler on August 3, 2009 One big story …

Dead Like Me.

I’ve been broadcast/cable tv free for about a month now, with only mild withdrawal symptoms (having really re-run episodes of NCIS makes great white noise for me when I work from home; so now I have to improvise….). Even so – the combination of watching/running Netflix offerings in the background is …

Hulu-baloo.

According to Silicon Alley Insider, with data partly from Comscore, 38 million people watched Hulu at least once in July - a viewership which easily topped Time Warner Cable‘s July viewership of 34 million. That same month, only DirecTV (47 million viewers) and Comcast (62 million) pulled larger audiences: While impressive, Hulu.com has a long way to go before reaching the cable companies’ …

Rescue Me

Each economic downturn brings some cultural shift or change; during this one I realized I’d pretty much given up on network TV. I’ve never watched even one “Survivor,” “Dancing with the Stars,” “American Idol” or “The Apprentice.”  I’m going to keep it that way. Other than some of the original series on cable …

For Whom The Bell Tolls… or, Another Business Model for $0.00

From Techcrunch, last week: At first this announcement appeared to be a good candidate for “News of the Weird:” Microsoft Officially Retires Soapbox, The Poor Man’s YouTube by Leena Rao on July 21, 2009 Microsoft’s YouTube clone Soapbox is officially shutting its doors, according to reports today. Soapbox, which was launched in 2006 as a hub for downloading …

Free is Not Always Free.

So – the featured speaker at the July 2009 Seattle Chamber of Commerce’s speaker at this month’s “Author Speaker Breakfast” is Chris Anderson, author of FREE: The Future of a Radical Price: FREE: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson the bestselling author of the The Long Tail In his revolutionary …

Free is Sometimes Free: The Future of a Radical Price

For those not able to make the Seattle Chamber of Commerce breakfast tomorrow, featuring Chris Anderson talking about his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, his presentation at Wired’s “Disruptive Business Conference” is available online, for free: Related content: Free is Not Always Free. So – the featured speaker at …

Free: The Future of a Radical New Price is now…Free!

Late last month, Chris Anderson released a free downloadable unabridged podcast/audiobook version of his book, Free: The Future of a Radical New Price as zipped mp3 files, and via  iTunes.  It chapter is an individual podcast; all of which are  narrated by Chris…

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For Whom The Bell Tolls… or, Another Business Model for $0.00

July 27th, 2009

From Techcrunch, last week:

At first this announcement appeared to be a good candidate for “News of the Weird:”

Microsoft Officially Retires Soapbox, The Poor Man’s YouTube

by Leena Rao on July 21, 2009

Microsoft’s YouTube clone Soapbox is officially shutting its doors, according to reports today. Soapbox, which was launched in 2006 as a hub for downloading and sharing user-generated videos, was never able to be a viable competitor to YouTube.

MSN corporate vice president and chief media and technology officer, Erik Jorgensen, said that Soapbox delivers less than 5 percent of the overall 480 million video streams worldwide on MSN Video each month. In June, MSN Video posted its best month ever, with 250 million streams. But this nothing compared to YouTube’s streams which top around 1.2 billion per day.

…. Even this past week, Microsoft chose to use YouTube for its Bing Jingle contest.

After thinking about this for a bit, I realized it’s yet another business model for $0.00.

Yes,  Microsoft is diluting its own brand value by broadcasting a jingle contest for its new search product via Google‘s YouTube – but at the same time it’s using – for freeGoogle/YouTube‘s bandwidth, and its user traffic – to draw attention to its competitor for Google Search.

Hmm.  I wish I could view those Google Analytics.

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Rescue Me

Each economic downturn brings some cultural shift or change; during this one I realized I’d pretty much given up on network TV. I’ve never watched even one “Survivor,” “Dancing with the Stars,” “American Idol” or “The Apprentice.”  I’m going to keep it that way. Other than some of the original series on cable …

Free is Not Always Free.

So – the featured speaker at the July 2009 Seattle Chamber of Commerce‘s speaker at this month’s “Author Speaker Breakfast” is Chris Anderson, author of FREE: The Future of a Radical Price: FREE: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson the bestselling author of the The Long Tail In his revolutionary …

Free is Sometimes Free: The Future of a Radical Price

For those not able to make the Seattle Chamber of Commerce breakfast tomorrow, featuring Chris Anderson talking about his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, his presentation at Wired’s “Disruptive Business Conference” is available online, for free: Related content: Free is Not Always Free. So – the featured speaker at …

Adobe Software Needs to Eat Its Own Dog Food.

<vent> Why do so many of Adobe’s web apps crash my computer?   My lastest Adobe-induced issues come from Shockwave hanging both Google Chrome and Windows IE; but for *months* prior, other Adobe apps *always* caused IE to hang until I had to manually kill the thread.  I don’t get it.  Why doesn’t …

And One More Thing…

Steven Jobs, cofounder of Apple, has been labeled many things, from visionary to egomaniac. Often I think he is inspirational too: We’re here to put a dent in the universe. Otherwise why else even be here? Innovation is the distinction between a leader and a follower. The system is that there is no system. That doesn’t …

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Rescue Me

July 27th, 2009

Each economic downturn brings some cultural shift or change; during this one I realized I’d pretty much given up on network TV.

I’ve never watched even one “Survivor,” “Dancing with the Stars,” “American Idol” or “The Apprentice.”  I’m going to keep it that way.

Other than some of the original series on cable networks FX, TNT, USA, and HBO, I really don’t miss regular – or the extended digital cable package -Tv.  Chris Anderson is right – $0.00 really is the future of business.

After all – the FX, TNT and USA series I like – The Closer, Burn Notice, Monk, Pysch, and Rescue Me are available on Hulu and/or Boxee -and both are $0.00.  I’m also a big fan of several of HBO’s original programming – Big Love, True Blood, and No. 1 Ladie’s Detective Agency (which is actually the BBC’s original content); but I can rent those from Netflix under my existing eco-friendly monthly online and mailed dvd subscription.

At least the cable networks have realized it’s better for their original series to have short seasons with new episodes, then slot them so at least one series starts its season as soon as another of the network’s series airs its season fnale.  Besides adding some interest for the viewer, it no doubt keeps the paid subscriber base fairly stable.  I deliberately waited until after No.1 Ladies Detective Agency completed its six episode first season run before canceling my digital cable subscriber package.

Similar to the auto manufacturers, broadcast networks loudly struggle to identify new business models which both draw viewers and are profitable, too.

In fact,  Hulu is co-owned by NBC Universal, News Corp. and Providence Equity Partners, although operated independently by a dedicated management team with offices in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Beijing; its full disclosure about its corporate culture is both noteworthy and commendable – although I’m relieved they don’t currently have an office in Seattle; we have plenty of existing corporate culture challenges to work | life balance.

Note to Hulu (and with special thanks to Gerry Mooney):

Diminishing returns.  It’s not just a good theory.  It’s a LAW.

I’ve given up TV before and spent more time with friends, family, and pets; working out; reading; and quilting.  And yet – once in a while a new TV series turns up which draws me back in…

“We are continually faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as insoluble problems.” - John W. Gardner

Related Content:

Free is Not Always Free.

So – the featured speaker at the July 2009 Seattle Chamber of Commerce‘s speaker at this month’s “Author Speaker Breakfast” is Chris Anderson, author of FREE: The Future of a Radical Price: FREE: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson the bestselling author of the The Long Tail In his revolutionary …

Free is Sometimes Free: The Future of a Radical Price

For those not able to make the Seattle Chamber of Commerce breakfast tomorrow, featuring Chris Anderson talking about his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, his presentation at Wired’s “Disruptive Business Conference” is available online, for free: Related content: Free is Not Always Free. So – the featured speaker at …

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