[opendtv] Re: 5 Reasons Why Apple TV Is (Still) Boring
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2010 07:42:05 -0400
At 7:24 PM -0500 9/9/10, Manfredi, Albert E wrote:
In spite of what you say, OTA TV is standardized, your water,
sewage, and power utilties are standardized, and yet the FCC could
not manage to get MVPDs to go to something like CableCard. So you,
the MVPD subscriber, should have known from the start what you were
getting into.
The FCC absolutely dropped the ball with respect to cable. They had
the authorization and mandate from Congress to open up the market and
they have done nothing.
Then again, they did exactly what they did with the DTV transition.
They let the industry they regulate create the standard with
virtually no input from the FCC. In the case of cable, they let Cable
Labs create the standard and then watched as the Cable industry
thumbed their nose at the FCC.
There are some variations, but the cable industry has standards for
their digital plants too. Any company could build the boxes, but they
don't because the cable industry has captive suppliers and they have
made it nearly impossible for third parties to play with two-way
services.
Imagine the uproar if your local power company had the option of
feeding your home with 270V and 75 Hz, just so they could then
mandate that you use their appliances and/or their various
transformers and phase converters.
Imagine how absurd your statement is...
There is no magic in terms of dealing with cable and DBS digital
streams. They use essentially the same encoding and transport
streams. The only magic is in the structure of their 2-way services
and the security standards they employ. They got away with keeping
this proprietary for more than a decade until Cable Labs finally,
reluctantly published the one-way standard that has allowed CE
vendors to create receivers with a smart card slot. The 2 way
standard is still stuck and the FCC seems incapable of doing anything
about it.
So, you accept this way of operating from your MVPD, you accept and
support their proprietary in-network DVRs, and then you're surprised
that the prices are too high? Hello?
I don't have a problem renting my DVR from the cable system. I have a
problem paying subscriber fees for all the channels I don't watch. I
could choose to use only the analog tier, which would not require a
STB, but I would still have to pay all the subscriber fees.
That's the way the market is supposed to work, Craig. If the sports
fanatics are happy to do this, and absolutely all indications are
that they are happy enough to increase, if anything, their
subscriptions, then they deserve to pay those prices. As long as
demand does not level off and start declining, the umbillicals can
go on raising their fees.
No Bert. this is NOT the way the market is supposed to work. It is a
gross distortion of the marketplace because one company has a huge
pile of cash that they can use to buy up the rights for major sports
franchises. And the reason they have all this cash is because every
extended basic MVPD subscriber in the country is paying close to $4
per month for ESPN, despite the fact that a huge percentage of MVPD
subscribers don't watch ESPN.
By the way, many sports fanatics spend more than $100/mo. paying for
every available sports channel and exclusive services like NFL Prime
Ticket from DirecTV.
We have already seen what happens when broadcasters pay too much for
exclusive rights to sports. It killed OnDigital, but thankfully led
to FreeView. All of the U.S. networks have written off billions
because they spent too much on NFL, Olympics and other sports rights.
And one more thing. This is only possible because Congress gives the
NFL and other sports leagues an exemption from the anti trust laws.
They STILL can black out games in a home market if the stadium is not
filled, and black out out of market games when the home team is
playing.
This is not the work of the marketplace. It is the work of special
interests who keep helping the politicians that give them their
anti-competitive power re-elected.
What you seem to not acknowledge is that it's not all or nothing.
The supply/demand model is continuous. The curves have no sharp
edges. So all it would take is for SOME restraint from SOME of these
subscribers, for ESPN to change its tune. Start driving those MVPD
subscriptions downward, just a few percentage points, and it would
be amazing to see just what "choices" become available.
This is not a marketplace Bert. As you keep pointing out it is a
walled garden controlled by a handful of media companies and the
content franchises they enrich. It should be clear that they have no
desire to change a thing, just as broadcasters had no desire to
change NTSC.
And it should tell you something that the DTV transition did not
change a thing in terms of broadcasters, other than allowing some to
deliver sub-channels. They could have used the technology to create a
new business model, but chose instead to protect the old one. Even
support form mobile - the one thing that broadcasters have a
technical advantage with - had to be welded onto the ATSC standard -
it should have been the heart of the standard from the beginning.
I guess I'm saying, as long as you show no restraint, you are part
of the problem. And when you say "little choice," my sense is "no
restraint."
Unfortunately, MVPD service has become a necessity for many people,
no different than the electric or water bill.
The good news is the behavior of people under 25 is changing. The bad
news is that we are looking at another decade before things will
change enough to allow for a real marketplace again.
Regards
Craig
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