Forget Piracy Or Boxee... Could Netflix Take Down Cable?
from the submarine-innovation dept
A bunch of folks have been sending in the recent Wired Magazine article talking about how Netflix's online streaming offering may be a disruptive innovation that takes down cable. The thinking is that, with Netflix service being built into lots of different settop devices, and the ability to watch various TV shows that are offered via DVD (and the Netflix streaming service, as well), why would people need cable any more? They can just wait until the "video" is out, and stream it via Netflix. The article may go a bit far in proclaiming Netflix as the winner of this battle right now, but it does suggest that (whether it's Netflix or some other provider) the model that cable television has relied on for so many years is certainly facing a pretty big disruption, one way or another.
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Filed Under: cable, dvds, movies, streaming
Companies: netflix
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New Netflix Subscriber
In addition, all of those people who are raving about the article must have missed the part where they talked about Netflix only being able to offer so much streaming by slipping throught a windowinging loophole, which may be closed when 'unhappy studios or cable companies... renegotiate their contract with Starz to discourage it from working with Netflix'. Hmm.
Sounds like we don't know how stiff a competitor Netflix is until we see whether or not the cable industry is going to close that loophole. In a few years, let's talk again about this. For now, not enough info.
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Cable is Obsolete!
I've already abandoned Cable TV last spring for DSL + the above mentioned content providers/distribution. Cable TV, particularly Comcast, is becoming way to "lowest common denominator". I just couldn't see spending upwards of $100 per month (internet included) on a service that I almost never used because 99% of the programming was just not of any interest to me and to put it blutly, mostly advertising. I'd rather save that money and put it towards products that I actually had an interest in. Since then I've actually spent more money on DVDs and iTunes MS downloads then I previously did.
Get rid of the middle men, IMO.
Personally, I'm hoping that the entire financing model for video production move away from the current advertising model based on lowest common denomenator advertising dollars to people actually producing quality products and investers seeing that there is a market for such and investing in such productions with an understanding that the market is going to be buying their product directly through either DVD sales, online distribution, or through the model being promoted here at techdirt.
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Re: Cable is Obsolete!
Nope, cable is gone and I have literally had NO desire to reobtain it.
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Still need bandwidth
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Many things will kill cable TV.
Local OTA HD broadcasting is awesome. With that for local channels I can pick up the rest on internet services.
I will never have Cable TV again.
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HD broadcasting was one of the last puzzle piece, asside from the abysmal internet service from Comcast, that led to my cancelation call.
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I have one of those legacy old fashioned roof antenna with a pretty clear line of site to the towers about 20 or so miles away. My reception, most of the time, is pretty good.
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Staged Release Cycle, Anyone?
That said, Netflix's streaming service provides me the same gag reflex as my local Blockbuster. The selection is limited, arbitrary and fleeting. This is not the fault of anyone in the Netflix employ. Netflix simply suffers the hand that feeds the staged release cycle, be it by the MPAA and its affiliates or the major network studios.
Netflix has, in my opinion, the best user interface and user experience of any IP based delivery system (Boxee, Hulu, etc.) that I've used to date. Whether they will be allowed to deliver content is still up in the air.
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Re: Staged Release Cycle, Anyone?
How 1990s. Watch out- a new DVR company called "Pleebo" is going to take over the world. Not only is PleeboDVR working with NetFlix, Rapshody, YouTube, Apple, Amazon, and OnDemand, but they also just struck a deal with Pizza Hut to bring you something called "Professor MovieTime's Movie Satisfaction"
Here's how it works:
If you want to watch a movie but the Jews in Hollywood can't get it to you via the PPV window'ed release, PleeboDVR will automagically try to get it on NetFlix or Amazon OnDemand.
If it can't acquire the movie, the customer is presented with an onscreen dialog window will come up saying it's "buffering" and will be available momentarily. They'll let you watch the trailer on YouTube and also stream the movie soundtrack from Rhapsody.
What the customer doesn't see is a little tricky, so try to stay with me:
In the event the movie isn't available, PleeboDVR will dispatch an all-points bulletin to Pizza Hut and Local Cabbies to stop at RedBoxes in your area to see if your video can be acquired and *delivered to your house* in the next 30 minutes or it's free.
But as Techdirt has been reporting, the Jews in Hollywood usually don't like to have movies available for $1 at Redbox. Naturally, this has created some logistical issues, which PleeboDVR is working out.
So what's PleeboDVR has been working on is it's new Patent Pending "Professor Technology(tm)". Here's how it works-
While you're jamming to the soundtrack, and watching the trailers, your PleeboDVR may interrupt you and offer the movie for $49.95. Now, I know what you're thinking- $49.95 sounds like a lot, but they guarantee delivery.
If you accept the fee, what happens behind the scenes is ingenious: Using it's vast network of Pizza Delivery Chains, PleeboDVR will pick up and dispatch a highly trained idiot savants to the closest movie theater who will watch the movie for you.
The Pizza Hut Delivery Guy will then pick up the idiot savant and deliver them out to you where they will describe the entire movie to you in excruciating detail.
Think of it like sneaking into the theater, but not really. But, all the Hollywood Jews are happy because ticket sales are counted, and that's what matters.
Thanks, PleeboDVR!
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Thought I was odd one out...
Some folks at the office freak out when I say I don't have a TV, then they ask me how I know about all the stuff we talk about with current shows and such.
Personally online books (not Kindle book rental thank you very much.), google news, webcomics, MMORPG's, Hulu, and the occasional DVD are all I need.
Hulu has shown me that I can stand commercials much better when they have a count down timer.
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I wish
Big cable will do a lot of things to protect their business. I think we are about to see a historic amount of predatory pricing. :)
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I have been a Netflix subscriber for years
This will of course make the net neutrality discourse right now even more important.
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there are still people around that have to be drug kicking and screaming into the digital age by paying for them to have a digital receiver... the same people i might add who would not have the foggiest idea of how to set up a media server or use netflix to stream.
cable will be around for a looooooooong time to come.
I have my media server in the living room (behind my tv actually) running xbmc and acting as a whole house media server, an old xbox1 that is also running xbmc as a client machine and a couple laptops that run xbmc when in other rooms rather than having tv in them. quite honestly, i still get a lot more for my bucks with cable than i can with any combination of any kind of streaming right now.
until streaming media sites can give me the ability to watch what i want when i want to for a competitive price (say around $30 a month TOPS) then they will never be able to fully replace what i can get now from either the cable or satellite companies.
(and yes, i do realize i cant watch whatever i want whenever i want, but on demand services are getting closer to that and i only pay the aforementioned $30 per month now so they would need to give me more for my bucks before i would consider such a change)
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Content and advertising is chosen by the channel operator, not the cable company. The cable co has the option of carrying the feed, or not to carry; never do they have direct access to change the content/adverts on that feed.
Cost is always a factor, but the main cost to cableco's is the yearly increases in carriage fees; i.e. the fees charged by the channel operators to the cable company. These go up every year, and the cable co is in the unenviable position of either dropping the feed (and potentially loosing that paying audience) or paying the new fees and passing the costs on (which and potentially loosing large groups of paying customers)
Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Here in Orlando Florida, Brighthouse seems to be pinning hopes on Business class services like 24 line Digital Phone, PBX emulation, and Dedicated Access (Fiber to the business.)
At least, that’s what it feels like. I rarely see residential service commercials from them, just company branding. But I do see an almost overwhelming amount of Brighthouse Business class adverts.
And lastly, I do not see anyone saying that cable providers are in a sense becoming like Netflix themselves with on-demand programming, Virtual DVRs, and expanded interactive programming and applications. I do not see anyone saying anything about IPTV from carriers like uVerse and FIOS.
IMO, cable isn’t going anywhere, it’s changing how and what it delivers, but it'll still be here 5 or even 15 years down the road.
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Cable is a tough business.
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1) Loss of subscribers when the costs were passed on.
2) Caving into Viacom opened the door for *all* other channel operators to demand gigantic increases in carriage fees.
The impact equaled something like this:
TWC has about 13.3 million subscribers.
39$ million cost increase divided by 13.3 million customers is roughly 2.90$ increase per subscriber. But that fee wasn't passed on to every subscriber; you have to take into account that not everyone has the TV package that includes Viacom channels. Some just have internet or phone, or just basic cable; so the cost to the *affected* subscribers was like 4$ or more. That *is* though business for both the company and the consumer.
http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jan/02/business/fi-viacom2?pg=2
"That adds up to a rate hike of about 12% for the package of Viacom cable channels. Time Warner estimated that amount would increase its payments by $39 million a year."
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Torrents still rule
There's no Netflix in our neck of the woods. Hulu doesn't work here either, at least not easily. So guess what is the best way to get "TV" content.
Anyway, even if Netflix and Hulu would be available here torrents would still be the best solution. I just got into Friday Night Lights which started 2006. There's no way that would be available on Hulu. And Netflix doesn't seem to have the recent releases. So torrents seems to be the only "service" that provides all that is needed.
Maybe someday there will be a service that beats piracy. I hope I'm still alive when that happens. I'm not holding my breath, though.
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Re: Torrents still rule
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Re: Torrents still rule
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Cables competition is:
* 1-2 other cable providers (Orlando has Brighthouse or Comcast for example)
* Satelite services like Dish
* Various IPTV services offered by several telco's and independants
* OTA broadcasts
Whether you specifically have access to these is irrelivant. The competition for the overall market still exists.
People who complain about the cable companies having shit programming/ too many ads are ignorant of the reality of the situation. They have no control over what the channels they carry show.
Claiming that the cable company is responsible for the ads/programming of a carried channel is like blaming Ford Motors for drunk driving deaths.
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the internet is just tubes
What comes out of the tube or what it is connected to is really of no importance to the internet provider. I think we need to have a look into which hat the company is wearing while making internet service policy.
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Kill
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Same in the UK I think...
The 'grey area' for this at the moment is TV licensing. We still pay the government for the right to own a TV, which is ridiculous, but it allows the BBC to run commercial-free, so nobody complains too much or too loudly. This tends to freak out Americans the first time they hear it. We hear about global nasties like Iran and China broadcasting state-sponsored TV, and this is almost always portrayed as a Bad Thing, but we in the UK also broadcast state-sponsored, publicly funded TV... However, we're only paying for this to watch TV as it is broadcast, as BBC's iPlayer is only too keen to point out. So if I (hypothetically) never watch TV, I don't even own one, and I only watch the programmes online, then I don't need to pay for a TV license, right?
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The model IS changing...
And Michael Whitetail is (sort of) right about the programming; the channel providers sell their channels to cable companies in blocks and they make it extremely difficult to renegotiate the distribution rates. In fact, the honor of the highest costing block of channels in your cable bill actually belongs to the Disney/ESPN block of channels; it wouldn't be an exaggeration to equate a pro football player's renegotiated contract with a higher cable television bill. That money's got to come from somewhere and the bill eventually gets passed on to the consumer.
I've had conversations with some of the higher-ups in my company and they're not oblivious to the technological changes affecting our industry. They definitely understand that delivering television is basically just moving data, and they seem to internally suspect that it won't be long before the channel providers are going to be contending with more agile competitors in the very near future that will be able to deliver programming and content that consumers want over the Internet, on demand, at very cheap rates, which will naturally drive down the price of television at the provider level.
Netflix is a fantastic example of this principle at work; I've met dozens of cable consumers in just the past few months who have reduced or elliminated their cable television service in favor of a home media server and a Netflix subscription. These same consumers then exchange cable-television dollars for increased Internet bandwidth from their cable modems. For cable companies, delivering bandwidth is FAR cheaper than delivering cable-telvision, so the exchange of services is a profitable one for the cable company, even if it hurts the channel providers' revenues.
From the evidence I've seen, it seems that cable companies are currently working to reduce debt-load and trying to take whatever reveneues they can in order to expand infrastructure so that, as consumers abandon their subscription-based television programming and turn to more agile and less-expensive alternatives, the cable companies will still be able to deliver a relevant and competitive product in the form of cheap bandwidth, which everyone will need anyway in order to access their content.
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Pull vs. Push
The only drawback I've found is with real time or near real-time programing. I need a place online to watch breaking news video, and I wish I could watch NFL games (within some reasonable amount of time after the game finishes) online somewhere. I'm willing to subscribe/pay for news & sports. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.
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Re: Pull vs. Push
Now before you slam me and say I should just put up an antenna, you should know that I can't. I live in a town that is in a valley that is at 2000 feet above sea level, but all of the mountains around are 8000 feet higher or more (we have the tallest mountain in the continental US in the mountain range near us). So OTA TV is just not feasible. You might get 2 or 3 channels, like PBS and the local city council meetings, but none of the networks. And I just can't justify paying for a Cable or Sat. TV subscription that I am just not going to use.
When we did have Cable TV, we only watched maybe 7 channels, CBS, FOX, Disney, Discovery, A&E, Food Network, and maybe one or two others. Now if they offered some type of Ala Carte programing fee, I might be more interested, but for now, I'll just stick with my Hulu and Netflix watching for TV and movies and NBC on Sunday nights for my weekly football fix.
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Weak argument
The same reason people go to movies, or watch shows live even though they have DVR--if you really like the content, you don't WANT to wait. People will pay to see it NOW.
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That's great. What if you're a sports fan?
Yes, the combination of Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, video podcasts and OTA DTV would be enough for most people, but not for me. I'm a huge NFL fan. I watch a lot of college basketball, especially here in the ACC. I follow the English Premier League and UEFA Champions League, and I think I might like to watch those Real Madrid v. Barcelona battles this year, too, or the occasional Serie A or CONCACAF battle. Where's the Netflix-like alternative for me and all those others like me?
Yes, the baseball fans can get live games on their Roku player. Can college football fans get that? What about NBA and NHL fans? ESPN 360 doesn't work with my ISP, and the ISP it *does* work with here can't give me reliable service.
Yes, tons of people who aren't sports fans are cutting cable and dumping the dish. Good for them. This ignores the fact that there's still a huge market here that remains untapped. So what's the solution for us sports fans?
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Re: That's great. What if you're a sports fan?
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I don't like anything on Hulu
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Hulu?
A BBC Radio 2 host, with a long career, today mused that all media will become internet media within 10 years. With the internet I do not have to listen to those miserable local radio stations, nor confine myself to US stations.
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Sports fan
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Cable is the next RIAA. In a couple of years, Comcast and its ilk will be suing anyone it can find claiming that the defendants are unfairly destroying cable industry's long held municipal charter monopolies.
Look at the similarities between Comcast and the RIAA:
-Anti-technology
-Controlled by old men
-Unwilling to adapt or change
-Blames everyone but itself for its business failures
-No sense of the future
-Hatred of its own customers
-Would rather litigate than innovate
-Uses government lobbying to protect interests
-Views the world as "us v. them"
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Yes, interesting comment. What if - when DSL first came out, the Telco(s) who did it - copyrighted 'broadband' and we were stuck with DSL?
I bet we'd still be at 128K.
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add one to the no cable tv column
Just wish they'd get their targeted advertising a bit more accurate. Or make those Summer's Eve commercials more explicit.
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