This article might have been relevant a decade ago. Now it's just old news.
The author rightly views broadcasters as the conglomerates that own and program
the broadcast networks. Locally produced content is a sideshow, mostly news, a
dying market among the younger audiences the author is describing as the vector
of change.
The "actual broadcasters" are largely an artifact - the vast majority of their
remaining audience no longer watches the broadcasts, choosing instead to pay
for a MVPD subscription or to stream this content on demand.
Not sure how Bert came up with the "cloud based" conclusion. Basically the
author is telling us that there will continue to be a high value content
creation market - the congloms - and an increasing amount of user or
independent producer created content enabled by the low cost tools that have
decimated the companies that once produced "broadcast quality equipment."
This will be on full display in a few weeks in Las Vegas, at the National
Association of Broadcasters trade show...
If you spend some time reading the names and companies on the name badges you
might be lucky enough to find a real broadcaster among the new generation of
video professionals who attend this NON-Broadcast event.
Regards
Craig
On Mar 13, 2017, at 8:27 PM, Manfredi, Albert E
<albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
This blog seems to conflate "broadcasters" and "TV networks." It dwells on
social media, or now also OTT sites with original content, potentially
bypassing TV network content, but it doesn't mention the role of the actual
broadcasters.
The last segment, "Staying Relevant," only talks about vendors of production
hardware, and how production has to become more "cloud-based." Hardly what I
was expecting.
Bert
--------------------------------------------------
http://www.tvtechnology.com/opinions/0004/bypassing-the-broadcasters-tv-in-the-social-age/280551
Bypassing the Broadcasters: TV in the Social Age
What kind of threat do social media and streaming video pose to linear TV?
March 13, 2017
By Niall Duffy, Renegade Thinking
We are witnessing demographic shifts in the age of linear TV viewers, with
millennials and younger consuming more content online, and increasingly
mobile; social media outstripping TV as the primary news source; Youtube
showing the Champions League and Europa Cup Finals, Twitter streaming the
NFL, and Facebook Live. The broadcast industry has gone from seeing social
media in particular as having only marginal impact to something far more
threatening. This potential threat was neatly encapsulated in a recent Royal
Television Society (RTS) event 'Social media muscles in on TV' which had
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube on the panel. However, the panel members
emphasized that they:
*operated distribution platforms, that enabled content makers to publish
their content, and were not content makers themselves; and
*already had established partnerships with existing broadcasters, rights and
content owners
The implication is that social media may offer more opportunities for content
owners or producers rather than threatening their existence.
ERA OF COMPETITION
This is not the first time that disruption has caused concerns for linear TV
broadcasters. The deregulation of TV in the 1980s and 90s focused on
increasing competition through program quotas and licensing more channel
capacity.
The most significant impact came from digital thematic channels at the time
more TV capacity was seen as heralding an era of competition, greater
consumer choice and where Public Service Broadcasters would no longer be
relevant. Of course, this did not happen in that way. These new channels
needed content-but high-quality, and well produced high-quality content costs
money-which most thematic channels operators did not have . The winners from
that deregulation were actually the people who were predicted to be the
biggest losers -the producer-broadcasters. They were the only ones with the
talent, resources and budgets to produce high-quality content. It is only
many years later that the successful thematic channels could afford to
commission originated content.
The intent was to broaden the market (as shown in the diagram in red) and
deliver niche segmentation rather than diminish the existing players.
With hundreds of channels, the thematic genre-based broadcasting model was an
effective means of providing more choice. The impact on production was more
mixed. Program quotas opened the market for independents and there was a
demand for more content but there was not the same increase in budgets, which
were stretched further. The 'atomization' of production-the ability for
smaller new entrants to compete-did increase. This was enabled by lower cost
file-based HD cameras, but it did not radically alter the cost or process for
making content.
SOCIALISM
So what will be the impact of social media?
The first impact of social media has been to massively increase 'atomization'
of viewers to the point of 'hyper-segmentation,' where it is now affordable
to serve segments that are very small. So the first effect may be to generate
even more revenue for existing content producers, just as the multi-channel
model generated a new wave of revenue in the 80s and 90s. This reinforces the
conclusion that the producer-broadcasters are content owners rather than just
broadcasters.
But there are threats. This time social media coincides with the dramatic
fall in the cost of production of technically high quality content. Whilst
smartphones and consumer video cameras may not meet the UHD (or even HD)
standards of traditional broadcasters, this is not an issue for social media.
New formats, such as AR, VR and 360 may bypass broadcasters altogether. This
enables far greater democratization of the production market and the minimum
equipment investment for a production company making high quality content has
never been lower, and importantly the route to viewers is no longer bound to
broadcasters. But is this good news for production companies? The growth in
demand for content on social media may well fuel demand for their services,
but the pressure on cost is also likely to increase, and so yet again they
face a world of "more for less, please".
STAYING RELEVANT
For broadcast technology vendors, the market for specialist hardware is only
going one way-down. Whilst not yet a 'meteorite' moment, it will be essential
for traditional broadcast technology vendors to embrace cloud technologies if
they want to stay relevant.
We are moving inexorably towards a binary market in 'broadcasting'-we will
have the known high-end world of premium content commissioned by big
broadcasters and global OTT providers, where production values remain high
and technology innovation will be expected to drive operational and
infrastructure costs down.
At the other end, we will have the chaotic and brave new world of atomized
markets and production processes-where it's all about personalization,
mobile, on-demand, produced by commoditized tools and systems. For those
willing to adapt and embrace the change this is a compelling opportunity.
This story originally appeared on TVT's sister publication TV Technology
Global.
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