[opendtv] Re: What a coincidence: Can TV Broadcasters Really Go OTT?
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 16 Jul 2013 21:18:03 +0000
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
>> If ABC wants to get more revenues for this than they get FOTI, then
>> the only correct way to do it is to charge whatever, $0.50 or whatever
>> it takes per month, to the Internet user. Hardly anything approaching
>> the price of an MVPD subscription. That's why this model is not
>> sustainable.
>
> ABC sells programming in many ways, although not at the price you are
> suggesting.
The price I was suggesting, $0.50 per month, was based on roughly what ABC is
getting now from MVPD subscribers. I don't know the exact amount, but certainly
we have seen a lot of articles recently about how Fox, or CBS, or any number of
the others, are NOT making as much as cable channels get. And most recently
that CBS was NOT getting close to $1.00 per month per subscriber.
So, $0.50 per month is a guesstimate, and ought to be in the right ballpark.
I'm saying, at most they would have to ask for that much over and above the
ads, for *live* online viewing, from *non-MVPD subscribers*. I very much doubt
that the congloms are thinking only along the lines that you posit in this
interchange:
>> For the person who uses only Internet access, for example to receive
>> ABC FOTA content over IP, an MVPD subscription would include a load
>> of expenses he doesn't benefit from at all.
> Nobody said that this is fair Bert. But this IS the current strategy
> of the media oligopoly, in concert with their partners in the
> distribution oligopoly.
I don't buy it, because it makes absolutely no sense FOR THE CONGLOMS. They
stand to lose revenues with such a silly strategy. My guess is that this is
just a quick and dirty mechanism they're toying with initially. On the surface,
it looks like a desperate attempt at keeping that stagecoach route operating,
after the railroad is built. Plus, as everyone knows by now, the networks are
offering their FOTA content FOTI, on demand, next day. So this MVPD
subscription requirement for online viewing does not seem like any long term
strategy to me.
> The oligopolies are making the case that the elimination of MVPD bundles
> would make everything more expensive.
I've gotten all manner of TV content for decades without ever having to worry
about bundling. Bundling has never been the only option. Repeating myself,
bundling and Internet access are certainly NOT MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE, but at the
same time, not likely to suddenly become the only option.
> Who is making the case that ads should be sufficient to pay for a
> program?
"Should be"? Nothing "should" about it, Craig. Ads *are* sufficient, or FOTA
would have died long ago.
Bert
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