[opendtv] Re: Here’s Comcast’s Version of Apple TV
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 16 Jun 2013 23:43:24 +0000
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
>> Anyone who doesn't have a vested interest in walling up the Internet,
>> with a conflict of interest that would lead them to create
>> site-specific hardware or hardware that deliberately filters out the
>> very vast majority of the Internet.
>
> So anyone OTHER than the oligopolies that are walling up the Internet.
Again, you're looking at the wrong source. Who is walling up the Internet now,
wrt TV content, are companies like Roku, Apple, the CE vendors, and all those
who create "connected" boxes that block the super vast majority of what's out
there on the Internet. The oligopolies at least put a lot of their content
online, at various free or for pay OTT sites. So who is walling up what?
> So once again I'll ask: Who is going to bust this anti-competitive
> trust?
The FCC could go a long way, by forcing the content owners to use the same
rules for selling content to MVPDs to sell it to OTT sites.
> I'm not sure how they can make a difference if they cannot offer a
> price advantage.
Competition works, Craig. **As long as** the hardware device manufacturers are
not in bed with OTT sites, these OTT sites compete in a way that your
monopolistic MVPDs don’t. So for example, OTT sites can easily create bundles
of lower cost programs, like programs from Canada or elsewhere, where your
monopolistic MVPDs don’t need to. So this puts downward pressure on how much
the congloms can ask. It's all a process of gradual automatic controls. The
more people use alternative methods of getting TV, the more this inelastic
demand for MVPD subscriptions becomes elastic.
> The one area where things could change dramatically is making
> everything that is now delivered in "programmed time slots" available
> on demand. This works for the vast majority of programming on TV
> today, EXCEPT for the live programming that is keeping the bundles
> alive.
Why do you think I called that new Comcast STB "quaint?" Back when I mostly
used the PVR for TV viewing, I still had to worry about time slots enough to
set up the PVR for the next day. That was it. But since then, a few years now,
even that use of "time slots" went away. I'm amazed you think this hasn't
already happened. I don’t even know when my favorite shows air anymore. At
best, the OTT site shows the date of when the program aired, so you can get a
general idea of whether it's a "rerun" or new.
> Truth is that HDTV has not contributed a dime to the bottom lines of
> broadcasters; nor has it helped bring back the audience they
> continue to lose.
Like that matters, Craig. The automobile didn't contribute a dime to those
running stables or making cart wheels and horseshoes either. Not everyone
benefits from innovation. HDTV was so long in coming I couldn't believe it.
Technology moves on whenever it can. And businesses affected by the
technological change have to do whatever to stay relevant.
Bert
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