Having written just a few weeks ago that there is little value in anything which can be digitally reproduced and copied it was very kind of Radiohead to illustrate the point by releasing their new album free for digital download.
They are relying on a voluntary payment system, which recognises that there is no intrinsic value in the file other than what the user places on it.
Value lies in the brand and the advertising and community opportunities it generates and no doubt Radiohead will benefit hugely from continued fan support and concert attendance. A large number of fans have even paid for a special box set including other non-digital material.
However I don't get too carried away with this. I'm a great believer that it's pretty hard to invent something really new.
What Radiohead and other musicians who follow are doing is adopting the model on which television has been successfully based for 50 years. The content creator and broadcaster has to take some risk that people will want the content, and then they rely on advertising to recoup their risk. Digital delivery of music issimply an imitation of free-to-air television so it is hardly surprising that it should follow similar business models.
It is of course a very welcome development and hopefully will help chip away at the Vinyl Curtain of rights and distribution which the music industry has built to keep its content behind walls.
Showing posts with label online. Show all posts
Showing posts with label online. Show all posts
Saturday, 13 October 2007
Thursday, 6 September 2007
Application Wars
Fans of sci-fi will be familiar with the genre that starts in a post-apocalyptic scenario sometime in the future. Terminator and the Rise of the Machines for example, or take your pick of various nuclear meltdown aftermaths.
In my brave attempts to look at the future of content I would base my hit screenplay after the Application Wars.
It seems that there's a new platform - application - client - service every week at the moment. Joost, Babelgum, Veoh, Zattoo, Hulu, iPlayer, 4OD and I'm sure there'll be another by the time I finish this blog.
OK you could download them all and not miss a few gigabytes but experience suggests that people - as in the mass audience everyone is chasing - are not going to download and install more than one or two applications designed to do the same thing.
So there are two scenarios.
Either one application is dominant - the iTunes scenario. That looks unlikely. Major video content owners like NBC, Fox, BBC and others show willingness to distribute widely but also seem keen to avoid a situation where they are dependent on a dominant platform. They are developing their own and supporting others.
The other scenario is that there is a proliferation for some time but eventually the whole idea of a proprietary platform goes the way of the Cold War. Let's call that the MP3 scenario. The barriers to this scenario are that proprietary systems have better control and security but if someone can address those problems then it is undoubtedly the best solution for both content owners and users.
In my brave attempts to look at the future of content I would base my hit screenplay after the Application Wars.
It seems that there's a new platform - application - client - service every week at the moment. Joost, Babelgum, Veoh, Zattoo, Hulu, iPlayer, 4OD and I'm sure there'll be another by the time I finish this blog.
OK you could download them all and not miss a few gigabytes but experience suggests that people - as in the mass audience everyone is chasing - are not going to download and install more than one or two applications designed to do the same thing.
So there are two scenarios.
Either one application is dominant - the iTunes scenario. That looks unlikely. Major video content owners like NBC, Fox, BBC and others show willingness to distribute widely but also seem keen to avoid a situation where they are dependent on a dominant platform. They are developing their own and supporting others.
The other scenario is that there is a proliferation for some time but eventually the whole idea of a proprietary platform goes the way of the Cold War. Let's call that the MP3 scenario. The barriers to this scenario are that proprietary systems have better control and security but if someone can address those problems then it is undoubtedly the best solution for both content owners and users.
Monday, 13 August 2007
Cycling TV - a niche model ?
Everyone has their own niche, or several, and Cycling is one of mine.
So I have mixed feelings about Cycling.tv which has just been sold to JumpTV for more than US$4 million, as reported on DTG.
On the one hand it is a model niche play. A strong and loyal interest group, poorly served in traditional media (outside Europe anyway) and a large industry of potential advertisers. It is often held up as a great success story for Narrowstep, the distribution platform.
But I've never subscribed to it, and nor have all but a tiny handful of my cycling friends - people who seem to spend most of their time either on-bike or on-line.
It's the subscription model that I have trouble with. I know it is nice to have a reliable income, especially as they have to acquire rights from sports organisers. But I'm just not going to part with $30 on the off chance I might have time to watch a live stream of Paris-Roubaix next summer. On the other hand I can think of half a dozen times I might have watched a report or a race and been exposed to advertising.
On some rough calculations Cycling.tv would have needed 40 million views in a year at a CPM of $40 to cover their costs, and that's not easy. On the subscription model they would have needed nearly 50,000 subscribers, and they had just under 20,000, so that wasn't a no-brainer either.
Maybe there's room for a mixture of subscriber and open content as there is in traditional television but I hope the steady increase in online advertising revenue will see more niche players able to support free access.
So I have mixed feelings about Cycling.tv which has just been sold to JumpTV for more than US$4 million, as reported on DTG.
On the one hand it is a model niche play. A strong and loyal interest group, poorly served in traditional media (outside Europe anyway) and a large industry of potential advertisers. It is often held up as a great success story for Narrowstep, the distribution platform.
But I've never subscribed to it, and nor have all but a tiny handful of my cycling friends - people who seem to spend most of their time either on-bike or on-line.
It's the subscription model that I have trouble with. I know it is nice to have a reliable income, especially as they have to acquire rights from sports organisers. But I'm just not going to part with $30 on the off chance I might have time to watch a live stream of Paris-Roubaix next summer. On the other hand I can think of half a dozen times I might have watched a report or a race and been exposed to advertising.
On some rough calculations Cycling.tv would have needed 40 million views in a year at a CPM of $40 to cover their costs, and that's not easy. On the subscription model they would have needed nearly 50,000 subscribers, and they had just under 20,000, so that wasn't a no-brainer either.
Maybe there's room for a mixture of subscriber and open content as there is in traditional television but I hope the steady increase in online advertising revenue will see more niche players able to support free access.
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