NBC Universal Boss Jeff Zucker Lies To Congress About Boxee

from the but-what-about-the-corn-farmers dept

NBC Universal management gets more and more ridiculous every time we come across anything they do. While they've left most of the more ridiculous statements to their chief lawyer, Rick Cotton (who is worried about the poor corn farmers harmed by movie file sharing), CEO Jeff Zucker has made his fair share of whoppers. While he got a lot of attention last month for his cowardly handling of the whole Leno/Conan mess, his latest move is to flat out lie to Congress. In a hearing in front of Congress as a part of NBC's effort to merge with Comcast, Rep. Rick Boucher asked Zucker about Hulu being forced to block Boxee (a battle that's gone back and forth a few times). When the whole thing started, Hulu management was very upfront about how they were pressured by their content partners like NBC to block Boxee, which is just another browser. It was quite clear that Hulu didn't want to do the block, but had no choice due to pressure from the likes of partial owner NBC:

Our content providers requested that we turn off access to our content via the Boxee product, and we are respecting their wishes....

The maddening part of writing this blog entry is that we realize that there is no immediate win here for users. Please know that we take very seriously our role of representing users such that we are able to provide more and more content in more and more ways over time. We embrace this activity in ways that respect content owners' -- and even the entire industry's -- challenges to create great content that users love. Yes, it's a complex matter. A tough mission, and a never-ending one, but one we are passionately committed to.

For those Boxee users reading this post, we understand and appreciate that you're likely to tell us that we're nuts. Please know that we do share the same interests and won't stop innovating in support of the bigger mission.

So how did Zucker respond when asked about it by Congressman Rick Boucher? He blamed Hulu for making the decision, and falsely claimed that Boxee illegally access Hulu content:

Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA): What about Boxee? Mr. Zucker you probably are in a better position to answer that. Did Hulu block the Boxee users from access to the Hulu programs?

Zucker (NBC): This was a decision made by the Hulu management to, uh, what Boxee was doing was illegally taking the content that was on Hulu without any business deal. And, you know, all, all the, we have several distributors, actually many distributors of the Hulu content that we have legal distribution deals with so we don't preclude distribution deals. What we preclude are those who illegally take that content.

Of course, that's a flat out wrong, as Boxee was not illegally "taking" the content at all. Boxee is a browser, like Firefox. If what Boxee does is illegal so is accessing Hulu with Firefox or IE. But it's even worse than that, because last year, in a different situation, Zucker admitted that he had been a part of the decision makers to have Hulu block Boxee, telling Kara Swisher that "our vision" was to block Boxee in an effort to keep "Hulu being an online experience" rather than one you could access via a TV.

So why would Zucker flat out lie during a Congressional hearing, and throw Hulu under the bus while doing so? Does he not understand how Boxee works? Did he forget his own dealings with Hulu? Or is he just making stuff up in a Congressional hearing?

Filed Under: browsers, congress, content, jeff zucker, merger, online, rick boucher
Companies: boxee, comcast, hulu, nbc, nbc universal, universal

Of Course Most Content Shared On BitTorrent Infringes; But That's Meaningless

from the who-cares? dept

I was going to ignore this, because based on what's known there's not much interesting or surprising, but people keep submitting the research done by a student of professor Ed Felten of a sample of some content available via BitTorrent (erroneously described as a "census" rather than a "sample") that suggested that 99% of what was available on this particular slice of the BitTorrentsphere was infringing. While there may be some legitimate concerns with the methodology, I have to say that my response to the original was: of course. So what?

Of course the majority of files shared on BitTorrent are infringing. And I don't see how it much matters if the percentage is 60% or 90% or 99%. I don't think anyone has ever denied that a ton of infringing content is shared on BitTorrent -- and, as some have rightly suggested part of the problem is that those who provide the content haven't done a good job making alternatives available, and that drives people to these potentially illegal options.

But what I don't get is the claim by industry lobbyists and lawyers that this somehow proves that BitTorrent needs to be stopped/fixed/held back/filtered/whatever. I read into it exactly the opposite. It shows what a piss poor job so much of the industry has done figuring out how to embrace the obvious demand that's out there, and how to leverage that smartly. The fact that so much is infringing should be a siren waking the industry up that it's time to stop fighting what people want, and start figuring out how to serve them. And for those who think this is evidence that BitTorrent needs to be blocked (wow) because so much is infringing, I'm wondering how they defend the legitimate parts that do get tossed out along with that. So just because NBC Universal is too clueless to figure out how to take advantage of a great distribution and promotion mechanism, people who want to use those tools and want to embrace better forms of distribution and marketing shouldn't be able to? That makes no sense to me.

Filed Under: bittorrent, content, infringing

Bad Web Experience: This Article Removed Because Of Copyright?

from the wake-up,-get-with-the-times dept

I've really never understood news sites that "remove" old articles. Talk about breaking the way the web works. At Techdirt, we receive a good bit of traffic to our archives, and that's valuable traffic. Not only do such visitors actually tend to be more likely to click on advertisements (regular readers have ad blindness), but they're like fresh "leads" to get regular new readers. And yet, so many publications ruin all that traffic by sending them nowhere. The Associated Press is particularly bad about this, forcing partners who pay the AP for content to remove it after a month. In those cases, visitors are just given an error page. But here's a bizarre one. Jake points us to a story at The Guardian's website, where the headline and the little blurb, along with an image are left in place, but in place of the actual article is just a message saying, This article has been removed as our copyright has expired. How annoying is that? Why do publications even agree to post stories that they will then be forced to pull down in the future? It completely kills the web experience. It breaks any links to the article. It kills off any discussion about the article. It's exactly how not to do things on the web, and it shows, yet again, what the traditional newspapers -- even one that seems to "get it" as much as The Guardian does -- still has a long way to go in adapting to the online world.

Filed Under: content, copyright, journalism, news
Companies: the guardian

The Value Of The Link vs. The Value Of The Content

from the which-is-more-important dept

At this point, we've probably discussed the newly planned NY Times paywall enough, but a blog post by Reuters' Felix Salmon made such a good point that it's worth highlighting. In talking about the paywall, he notes, as I did originally, that people have a lot less incentive to link to the NY Times as they know it will be harder for others to make use of that link. That I understood, but Salmon made a key point that I hadn't really thought about:

I suspect that what's going to happen now is that as the moment of truth approaches, bloggers will increasingly search around for the NYT's replacement as online paper of record: the way that blogs work is that they're backed up by links to reliable sources, and a link is worthless if the person clicking on it risks running straight into a paywall, unable to read the information in question. The NYT's journalism might well continue to be reliable, but its website won't be, any more.

That point highlights the difference between valuing the content vs. valuing the conversation (or even valuing enabling the conversation). The top folks at the NY Times (and many other publications) seem to over-value the content and undervalue the conversation. Thus, they think that the content needs to be paid for, but don't realize that they devalue their role in the conversation.

If you want to make the bet that the internet is more about content delivery than conversation and communication, then perhaps this makes sense. But, almost all signs point to the fact that it's the conversation that's the really important thing online, and devaluing that is almost certainly a mistake.

Filed Under: content, conversation, link, newspapers, overvaluing, sharing, value
Companies: ny times

TV Exec Upset When Daughter Doesn't Want To Bring TV To College

from the your-lot-in-life dept

Just about a year ago, ABC TV exec Anne Sweeney was telling people at CES that they were in the providing good content business, and she wanted to see it delivered however people wanted to watch it, on whatever device they wanted. But, it's a little more difficult to apply that message to her own family, apparently. In the opening to an article about the whole "web vs. TV" debate (as if there really is one) in light of the Comcast/NBC deal, the piece opens with a story about Sweeney forcing her daughter to bring a television to college, despite the younger Sweeney's protests that she had no need for a TV:

"Mom, you don't understand. I don't need it," her 19-year-old responded, saying she could watch whatever she wanted on her computer, at no charge....

"You're going to have a television if I have to nail it to your wall," she told her daughter, according to comments she made at a Reuters event this week. "You have to have one."

Perhaps it's time to recognize that more and more people don't need a TV?

Filed Under: anne sweeney, content, television, web
Companies: abc, disney

AOL's New Strategy Is To Fill The Internet With Crap?

from the pollution-is-in-their-genes dept

Remember how AOL first became "famous"? It cluttered the world (and our garbage dumps) with millions upon millions of CD-ROMs offering "try AOL for free!" It seems that pollution is in AOL's genes, and it just can't get away from it. How else to explain AOL's new plan to rebuild its brand: to flood the internet with poorly written, but quickly written, content based on whatever search terms are hot. Danny Sullivan points out the amusing fact that AOL is looking to leverage search engines for more traffic this way, at the very same time as others, such as Rupert Murdoch, are claiming that Google is "stealing" from him in sending traffic, and he's considering opting-out.

But, of course, that doesn't make AOL's strategy very well conceived either. Farhad Manjoo makes the case for why this is a dumb plan, and there's plenty to agree with:

The trouble with AOL's plan, then, isn't that it's based on data-mining. Instead, it's what the company will likely do with search data--publish quick, vapid posts that do little to advance any hot story and instead feed readers a collection of factoids gathered from other places. How do we know this will happen? Because AOL's model is strikingly similar to that of Demand Media and Associated Content, two start-ups that also use search data and user contributions to build Web content. Indeed, AOL's Armstrong--who was an advertising executive at Google until earlier this year--is reportedly an investor in Associated Content, whose CEO is also a former Googler.

Associated Content stands as a cautionary tale for anyone looking to do news by the numbers. It is a wasteland of bad writing, uninformed commentary, and the sort of comically dull recitation of the news you'd get from a second grader.

Effectively, it's a plan based on adding crap into the system to trick search engines. It's pollution and web spam as a business model. But as folks like Umair Haque are fond of pointing out, business models based on tricking people and not adding any real value aren't business models that will last. They're short-term scams. Manjoo, in his writeup, helps explain why:

Will this plan do wonders for AOL's bottom line? It very well might, at least in the short run. If AOL can replicate the success of Associated Content across its network of sites, it will surely see huge gains in traffic and renewed interest from advertisers. But this plan hinges on something that can't be guaranteed for long--a weakness in search engines. By any measure, stories like those found on AC don't deserve top billing in search results. If you search for "Tiger Woods mistress pictures," you should get pictures of Tiger Woods' alleged mistress, not a story that repeats that phrase a dozen times. Google and other search engines constantly battle search engine spam, and over time they're sure to steer people away from sites that rely on such trickery to get visitors. Then what? Associated Content gets 90 percent of its traffic from search engines. Once Google and co. wise up to AC's schemes, its business model is toast.

A short-term strategy based on polluting the internet with bad content may be a last-gasp effort to revive a dead brand, but it's difficult to see how that's any sort of long-term strategy to survive.

Filed Under: business model, content
Companies: aol

Entertainment Giants Looking At The Future... And See Cable?

from the future-hazy,-please-try-again dept

We've discussed in the past why we think that the cable companies' "TV Everywhere" strategy is destined to fail. If you don't recall, it's the way the cable companies are looking to respond to the rise of competition in the form of Hulu, Netflix, Redbox, Boxee and others -- not by offering something more compelling, but by putting up a giant wall around content and forcing you to keep your cable subscription (which fewer and fewer people seem to want) if you want to access TV shows online. Reid Rosefelt has a nice rant explaining why this won't work, pointing out (quite accurately) that all those competitors are winning because they deliver what people want, and locking things up doesn't make customers want cable any more:

Why do we enjoy free-with-ads sites like Hulu and Crackle? THEY HAVE FEWER ADS! And we can watch what we want whenever we want to.

What do we like about Netflix? For a fraction of the cost of cable, it gives you DVDs by mail plus the ability watch a lot of movies instantly, either on your computer or with their many compatible set-top boxes.

What do people like about Redbox. One buck! Pick it up and return it to the supermarket!

What do we like about cable?

Ummm, cable is a monopoly. You only get one store. You may only want a pair of socks and a shirt, but you are forced to buy a Yankee cap (even if you are a Mets or a Sox fan), cufflinks, perfume, towels, ladies underwear, two ties, a bedspread, low-slung hip-hop shorts, and a lamp. The kicker is that the price goes up all the time and the Calvin Klein shirt you actually came to buy costs extra. And of course LOTS AND LOTS OF ADS!

It's not that we don't like cable any more--we've always hated it!

But the key insight in the piece is how this, combined with Comcast's attempt to buy NBC Universal, show the backwards thinking of industry execs:

There's one tiny hitch though. Every single TV show and movie from NBC and Universal is available for free to anybody who has ten seconds to look for them. So what exactly is Comcast locking up? This isn't 1995, you know. Either you just shrug your shoulders about file-sharing or you start offering some alternatives that have benefits that people are willing to pay for like Hulu, Netflix, Redbox, and iTunes. Or maybe you work a little and come up with something new? Bill Maher said recently that the Republicans looked into the future and saw... radio. These entertainment giants are looking into the future and they see... cable.

Bingo. It's yet another case of execs looking to lock up content and block value, rather than providing additional value to users. It's people thinking about the way things used to work and trying to recreate it with a digital facelift, rather than looking to actually take advantage of what the new technology enables. That's only a snippet of Reid's analysis, so go read the whole thing.

Filed Under: business models, cable, content

Companies Realizing That Content Is Advertising Via Web Series

from the well,-it's-a-start dept

The NY Times has an article about the rise of online "web series" shows that are suddenly popular, noting that many brands are creating such things as a way to produce interesting content online while getting some attention for their brand. It's yet another realization that advertising is content and content is advertising. The key point, that many say they realize (and hopefully they live up to it) is that none of this works if the content itself sucks. So they're working on these shows with a focus on making them good and enjoyable to watch first, and including the sponsorship as a secondary part of the effort. I'm sure there may be some backlash over this idea, but it actually makes quite a lot of sense. It gets more good content out there, and helps brands get themselves noticed and remembered not for intrusive and annoying advertising, but for sponsoring something cool.

Filed Under: advertising, brands, content, webisodes

Sneaky Way To Get Past Section 230 Safe Harbors To Force Content Offline

from the this-should-be-watched dept

We all know the importance of Section 230 safe harbors that protect a service provider from actions done by its users. While there have been a few cases that chipped away at those protections, on the whole, they're quite solid. However, Eric Goldman brings us the story of how some lawyers seem to be dealing with this. They've stopped suing the sites directly, but they then file a lawsuit against the party who actually created the content they want taken down -- but if that person does not show up in court, then the suing party can get a default judgment, and then use that default judgment to get the content taken offline -- since the default judgment can be used to enforce injunctions against third parties. From the perspective of the suing party, then, they have every incentive in the world to try to get a default judgment, rather than even fighting with the real person in court. Then, with the default judgment, they can force a site to take down the content. As Goldman notes:

For the price of a complaint and a defendant's default (which can be engineered by targeting a phantom author), plaintiffs obtain an effective cudgel to excise unwanted content throughout the web.

That's not a good thing.

Filed Under: content, default judgment, section 230, takedowns

Content Is Advertising: Free Local Commercials, Sponsored By Another Company

from the get-yourself-a-home.-or-don't.-i-don't-care. dept

Via Adam Savage, I heard about a fun project that highlights the advertising is content, content is advertising concept in multiple ways. It's a site called ILoveLocalCommercials.com, which features two filmmakers going around the country making (free -- and awesome) TV commercials for local businesses that are nominated on the site. As mentioned, the commercials are really quite impressive, such as the "brutally honest" commercial for Cullman Liquidation ("get yourself a home, or don't, I don't care") or for Ray's Midbell Music that involves a rap about how being in the school band is cool:

The commercials are really entertaining in their own way, and have garnered hundreds of thousands of views -- again, demonstrating how good advertising is content. The guys making the videos also put up a short "behind the scenes" version of each video as well, to explain the backstory a bit more. The backstory on Cullman Liquidation is pretty entertaining as well.

But why are these guys doing this? Well, the whole thing is actually part of a promotion from another company, MicroBilt, that's trying to promote its own line of small business services. So it's paying for the whole thing -- showing how content is advertising. None of the videos are actually about MicroBilt, but in sponsoring the entire site and the whole process, it's helping to get its name out there in a fun (non-intrusive, non-annoying, non-sneaky) manner. It's not about product placement or trying to "sneak" a brand into something. Everything's totally upfront. But it's a fun project, with highly entertaining content that shows both how advertising is content and how content is advertising.

Oh yeah, and it appears that Cullman Liquidation has also picked up on the whole "looooooooooots of t-shirts" concept. On the Cullman Liquidation website, the company is selling t-shirts based on the commercial...

Filed Under: advertising, commercials, content, local comercials
Companies: cullman liquidation, microbilt, ray's midbell music