NBC Chief Slamming Apple 299
On the heels of the beta of NBC's and News Corp.'s less-than-killer Hulu music store, NBC's chief Jeff Zucker is speaking out and saying the darnedest things. First, news.com reports, with derision, that Zucker demanded a cut of Apple's iPod revenue. That'll sure happen. Next, AppleInsider caught Zucker urging colleagues to take a stand against Apple's iTunes, charging that the digital download service was undermining the ability of traditional media companies to set profitable rates for their content online.
hehehe (Score:5, Funny)
Re:hehehe (Score:4, Funny)
Or motherzucker?
NBC has no right to EXIST at all. (Score:3, Interesting)
* producers (the people who actually put the shows together,)
* consumers (the people who want to watch the shows the producers put together) AND
* advertisers, (the people who pony up the cash for access to the process while getting sold on nebulous "audience share" numbers based on the "facts" that people don't have any friggin' lives, families, pets, bladders or colons to distract them.)
NBC and the rest of the broadcasters are entirel
I am a grumpy, bitter old, petulant child. (Score:3, Interesting)
And PBS is not quite the model to do things by.
Its still a network and I can't ignore the hokey cooking shows that take time from K
Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Insightful)
No, seriously. You want a cut of iPod revenues? Do you make hardware? Do you demand a cut of the manufacturers who produce DVD players? Do you demand a cut of the Internet carriers? Come on now. How about sticking to content creation and paying good writers to create quality content?
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Not that I'm saying he shouldn't shit in his hat... I'd glad shit in it myself...
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Deal or no deal twice a week, the biggest loser, 500 versions of law and order. If they do quality content, they might lose their audience.
Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem with NBC is that they drive shows into the ground. They're doing it with Deal or No Deal and Law & Order. They did it with Dateline before.
You can only eat steak so many times...
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Then last night I watched Chuck because I heard good things about it (one mention on
Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:4, Interesting)
Oh well NBC is pissed because their sales have plummeted since they left Itunes. The problem is the people most likely to buy music and TV shows online are those with extra cash and a large piece of those are Mac users. Talk about pissing off the wrong crowd.
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Yet, you don't hear them complaining about DVD box sets!
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Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't understand how TV works. Some smart TV exec long ago noticed that viewers decide IN THIS ORDER (1) "I want to watch TV", (2) "What's on?" So because they operate in this order all you need is to have the show that sucks the least. They have already decided to watch something. it does not need to be good. To make money you want to spend the smallest amount of money and suck the least do that and you can get rich.
Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Now that we have DVRs that can record and store a hundred hours or more of programming, I simply set it to record the best shows and then watch them whenever I feel like watching TV.
Exactly. That old concept of putting a lame-but-expensive show behind a popular one in hopes that people will forget to turn the channel is D-E-A-D dead. I record "Psych" (from USA, I think), "My Name Is Earl" (maybe NBC?), "The Office" (no idea), "House" (Fox) and "Bones" (CBS?). I don't know what night they're on. I don't know what station they're on. I have no freakin' clue what time they're on. All I know is that when I turn on my TV, there's usually something recorded that I want to watch.
I d
Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Insightful)
How dare they make money on something displaying content they don't produce!
In over a year of getting NBC via off-air digital, I just saw my second HD movie.
They were throwing large promo banners for another Universal movie right on top of the one I was watching. I'd planned to go see the advertised movie, but I won't now. They really seem to be trying to piss people off.
About 18 minutes an hour of ads, double what it was in the 60's. And they don't know why people are tuning out.
Try leaving feedback on the NBC website sometime. They want so much info it's obvious they plan to spam you or sell it to someone who will.
They're about as pathetic as the FEMA press conference with FEMA employees posing as reporters.
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They were throwing large promo banners for another Universal movie right on top of the one I was watching.
Ok, this is going to be slightly off-topic, but WTF is the deal with these overlays they use now? It was one thing when they'd put a little semi-transparent logo at the bottom of the screen indicating which channel is was on. I thought that was a little annoying and stupid. But then they started making them less transparent, and then they started making them ads. Now, they overlay big-ass animate
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Sure, very few shows are available on HD DVD, but then I only have analog cable service. Now I can watch unedited shows without commercials or overlays, and the picture quality is better th
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Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Interesting)
Some cleanup is needed in the high-up of media companies, how can these asshats even remotely expect to run a profitable distribution system in the near future.
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Give it to us, precious! We wants it!
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Regarding "profit" I guess he can start his own 5 dollar per tune music store and he will be rich I tell you!! Everyone will buy his music!
All I want is almost free infinite download of all music and all movies where all the money goes to the producers.
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There are three groups of people:
1. People who will never steal content
2. People who will if they think it's worth it
3. People who always will.
You can tell when something is over-priced when group 2 chooses to steal rather than to buy. It means that the market's price is not in line with the market's perceived value.
I find Zucker's comments hilarious. He acts as though they have a right to make a profit. He's basically lamenting that we live in a capi
Re:Hey Zucker, go $#!^ in your own hat. (Score:5, Insightful)
Meanwhile, the media companies have invested absolutely zero money and effort into providing their content in a form desired by consumers. While I like the iPod, I'm not expecting to always want one, or willing to buy any media that will only play on an iPod. That has ruled me out of buying anything from iTunes (until the DRM free stuff which is now out). I've got used to the hassle of ripping CDs now, but it's not an ideal solution. This is entirely the media companies fault.
I'm happy for Apple to profit - the media companies need to look at their own actions.
Yeah, except iTunes != iPod (Score:2)
I don't even have iTunes installed, no version for linux, so how exactly does your logic work?
My content of the iPod comes in the form of Mp3's which I can pretend I got legally (fair use is still firmly enshrined in dutch laws, for now) but won't.
But really all you need to do to see how insane this guy is, is to translate it to other situations. Should brewers get a cut from the glass industry? Even if people are brewing their own?
Should cable tv get money from say Sony to make up for people having ille
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What format that supports DRM do you propose? If you want DRM, I think Apple has the strings on that one. It's either iTunes or no DRM.
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What format that supports DRM do you propose? If you want DRM, I think Apple has the strings on that one. It's either iTunes or no DRM.
Re:Yeah, except iTunes != iPod (Score:5, Insightful)
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Wants wrong with "overcharging" on the iPod? Apple can set whatever price they want for all I care, I won't buy that either. And it's not overcharged considering how many they sell, obviously it has a good price for what is offered
He doesn't create content (Score:2)
Actually, he's not. He's in charge of getting content from TV production companies and then figuring out a way to get people to watch it and make money on it.
Jay Leno aside, of course.
Re:He doesn't create content (Score:4, Informative)
From Jeff Zucker's bio at Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Zucker [wikipedia.org]):
"Chief Executive Officer of NBC
On December 15, 2005, Zucker was again promoted by NBC, to Chief Executive Officer of NBC Universal Television Group behind Robert Charles Wright, vice chairman of General Electric and chairman & CEO of NBC Universal. Zucker was responsible for all programming across the company's television properties, including network, news, cable, and Sports and Olympics. His responsibilities also include the company's studio operations and global distribution efforts [emphasis mine]. Zucker reports to Bob Wright."
I bet you drink a lot of Maalox in a job like that.
In the "old days" the FCC's "financial interest and syndication rules" (quick history [museum.tv]) made it unprofitable for the big-three networks to own the content-production side of the business as well. The rules prohibited the networks from selling "reruns" of programs they produced (e.g, The Johnny Carson Show) to local television stations, a practice called "program syndication." Since all the risk capital in program development is upfront, a program's profits are not made on its initial showing but in "reruns" to cable networks, local television stations, and overseas distributors. By prohibiting the networks from profiting in this aftermarket, the "fin-syn" rules made owning the production studios uneconomical.
Nowadays, anything goes. CBS created Viacom and sold it off to comply with the FCC. Now Viacom owns CBS. NBC has merged with Universal Studios, and Disney bought ABC/ESPN by first buying a multi-market TV station owner. Australian-owned Fox has interests in newspapers, movies, satellite TV, US local television stations in the US, and many more outlets I'm sure. What were once strict divisions between media production and distribution have long since fallen by the wayside. In large part these pro-business changes reflected the opinions of new FCC commissioners appointed by Republican administrations. They also represented a change in the structure of television from a world where three networks commanded 90% or more of the viewers to one where they fewer than half that number. (http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2007/10/16/cbs_network_scores_another_ratings_win/ [boston.com])
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"The difference with DVD's is that the content providers can charge what they want. They can charge according to their and the market's needs."
Ok...I'm confused here. Why is it a good thing that content providers can sell DVD's at what price they want to charge (what the market will bear), but, Apple is bad for selling their devices for what they can charge (what the market will bear)?
So you're saying it is o
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Microsoft are giving evil money grubbing corporations like themselves the wrong idea
Happened before (Score:4, Funny)
media execs try to kill the Golden Goose, (Score:4, Insightful)
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Still stuck in the past.. (Score:5, Insightful)
it's complete rhetoric, but I believe networks like NBC have lost their usefulness in light of real choice based network (ie internet).
The true face of media industry. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Except, Apple doesn't have a monopoly. In anything.
They have a music player like a dozen others (except more expensive). They have a phone/player like half a dozen others (except more expensive). They have a PC like a hundred others (I won't say it lest I start a flamewar).
And they have an OS. Not a bad OS, mind you, but since it only (officially) runs on their version of a PC, they've rather severely limited their cust
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You know you're doing something right (Score:5, Insightful)
As children, these folks were the ones who stood alone on the playground at recess, holding the ball, because for all intents and purposes, they believed the entire world belonged to them. And they haven't grown up since then. The only reason why they've gotten as far as they have in life is because their limitless greed and egotism is repeatedly mistaken for ambition and confidence. The sad truth is that they only have as much power as others are willing to concede to them, and so their existence is more a reflection of the inability of our society to stand up and refuse to reward such psychopathy.
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The fact is that if they execs didn't manage to get their way, they did manage to get a cut of hardware sales, they would make a huge amount of money from it. It is almost immoral of them not to try, which usually doesn't go beyond a lot of words said frankly.
It is similar to the way soccer players play. It makes such a huge difference if they get a penalty, it is almost immora
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Good thing your world and the real world are two different things.
a little late (Score:5, Insightful)
The simple fact is Apple stepped into what was in effect an empty playing field while everyone else was still arguing over lockers in the changing room.
Far too late (Score:2, Insightful)
What should have happened was this
1)Record companies seen this coming.
2)They should have developed a file format of their own and licensed it to Apple and M$ and Zen and iRiver. It might have DRM, it might not. As it would work with all the players out there it doesn't really matter. This is in
Re:Far too late (Score:4, Informative)
1)Record companies seen this coming.
Unfortunately they didn't see it coming. They thought they owned all music and so any MP3 was illegal. There will be no online stores simply because they will have no legal product.
This is the exact mistake George Lucas made with the original Star Wars. It was never going to be released to the home video market. You could only see it in theaters. They wanted to do the Disney Bambi stunt. Release it every 7 years to a new generation of kids. The pirates showed them that was a mistake. The statute of limitations has run out, but I had my copy of Star Wars 4 years before it was released to the home market.
The record industry is in the same boat for the same reasons.
1 High price on the authorised format
2 Limited Distribution in authorized channels
3 Effecient peer to peer network (Sneakernet and Internet) with low duplication costs.
The music industry didn't learn from the mistakes of Lucas and Disney
To be fair to traditional media companies... (Score:5, Funny)
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They should all switch to meth. That will fix ALL the problems.
Apple isn't his problem (Score:5, Insightful)
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In the movie industry and the television
Really worried about losing his stranglehold (Score:5, Interesting)
NBC is worried about following in their footsteps. While the bar for TV shows is a bit higher, its certainly not out of reach. For instance, how much would it really cost a group of independent people to make the next Seinfeld? Not a lot, esp. now that good video editing tools are pretty cheap(if not free in some cases). Look at how "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" started, the pilot episode cost them less than $100 to make. Imagine if they promoted that on iTunes instead of selling it to a network? They probably could have got enough money to continue to make more episodes and live comfortably. NBC sees its own irrelevance and is doing everything it can to try to stay relevant, but long term its just not going to happen.
Re:Really worried about losing his stranglehold (Score:5, Interesting)
Robert
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Ha Ha Ha...no. It's a nice idea but not at all true. Popular music continues to be dominated by RIAA bands [billboard.com], and the only major band I can think of to buck the trend is Radiohead with its current release. Anyway that's not a fair example, as the band built up its currently following
Why not Microsoft? (Score:2)
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The real reason the media corps hate Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
Which is it? (Score:4, Funny)
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"Destroyed the Music Business?" WTF??! OMG Ponies! (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple pays the record labels for every download they sell. If they're not paying them enough, the labels have the right to take their business elsewhere but (except for NBC) they don't, so by definition they're making enough money.
The key to understanding his complaint is his phrase "in terms of pricing". What that means is that the labels can no longer monopolistically control the price of recordings any more.
And I think this is a good thing, good for the fans, and good for the people who really deserve to benefit from it: the musicians.
I think such a loss of control is the reason the labels are so opposed to Internet radio: because everyone and his dog can run a streaming radio station from their home, Internet radio takes away from the big labels the ability to decide who the big stars are going to be. Payola just doesn't work anymore when fans have a choice of thousands of streaming music stations to listen to at every computer.
The result of this is that I've noticed artists who were first made popular at places like Radio Paradise [radioparadise.com] getting airplay on traditional broadcast stations. And I can't remember the last time I listened to a ClearChannel station.
Re:"Destroyed the Music Business?" WTF??! OMG Poni (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, in other words his statement reads: Competition undermines the ability of the media cartel to engage in price-fixing. Over the last 150 years, America's love of the free market has made America into the most powerful economy on earth. Now the media cartel wants to drag us into the 19th century, and up to now, our politicians are doing their best to help them for the most part.
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Hmmm. I thought it was mostly FDR and WWII which achieved that.
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You're an idiot if you think people wouldn't grow food, or engage in any business activity whatsoever, if it wasn't for government mandated direction.
Nice strawman, because I never said anything like that. The country was facing crisis, people were starving in the streets. There were very few jobs. The social programs changed that, and allowed us to get back to a point where economic wellbeing was possible. How do you think those starving people would have started their own business in those consditions?
Forcing others to spend money on things they are not voluntarily willing to choose makes them worse off then when people voluntarily spend money on things they voluntarily willingly choose.
Who said anything about forcing people to do things? They voted for FDR, didn't they? And his measures were very popular. Personally, I think lettin
Re:"Destroyed the Music Business?" WTF??! OMG Poni (Score:4, Insightful)
They haven't destroyed the music business (yet), but there's a lot of ambiguity about what's on those iPods. Less than 4% of the content was sold by iTunes, something like an average of 20 tracks per iPod were sold. We don't know how much of the rest was legally obtained or not. My sister builds her collection by borrowing CDs from the library.
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In the early 80s I used to occasionally make mix tapes for friends overseas so they could hear what was new in the U.S. I don't know if this is legal. Then again, George W. Bush stated on the record that he received a mix tape from one of his daughters, and he hasn't been sued yet. My thought is that this falls under fair use.
Libraries are great resources for all types of med
Apple must be doing something right (Score:2)
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People say "things have gotten better" all the time in the Windows and Linux camps, just like people say those things about American cars -
Macintoshes pass the "Mom Test". Aunt Peggy too (Score:2)
It happens that, while my wife knows how to use a Mac, for reasons I find hard to understand, she prefers the Windows user interface, so she has an XP laptop. I have spent a great deal of time fixing problems with it, or explaining to her how to do things. It took several hours for her and one of her university's IT people to get her configured to use their wireless network for example; on Macs, you just turn the Airpor
Undermining Profits (Score:2)
Twisting in the wind (Score:3, Insightful)
An appropriate Halloween metaphor for the media middleman industry.
You media conglomerate networks and telecom provider companies don't seem to get it. We (the viewers) want you (the companies in control of the wires and the infrastructure) to simply deliver to us what we like. Without a hassle. That means that until I can get my Bill Maher every Friday night, until I can grab my Jon Stewart and Bear Grylls and Stephen Colbert and Ellen Degeneres and Charlie Rose and Bill Moyers and Alton Brown and Mike Rowe and Keith Olbermann, on demand, by paying something to you for it, I'll get what I want for free, via torrents or video blogs or other means.
As it stands right now, I would have to subscribe to a cable company's entire digital cable lineup to get all of these stations, and I'd be subsidizing Fox News, CNN, ABC, CBS, Home Shopping Network, Lifetime, Hallmark, and who knows what other garbage.
I'm not doing that anymore. I've nearly convinced my mom to drop her cable along with me. That's $55 something per month each, $110 * 12 = $1320 per year, we're paying for 100 ad-drenched channels, most of which we never watch anyway. Do you see how useless you've become in the internet age? Wake up and fix your problems, or you'll be gone in less than a decade.
Ah, (Score:4, Insightful)
Welcome to capitalism... (Score:2, Insightful)
A few screws loose (Score:2)
However, this guy's comments strike me as being completely deranged. Even if NBC's executives really are opposed to online distribution, having such a loose cannon on board could become a huge liability to them. In other words, I wouldn't be at all surprised if he gets fired in the next few months.
I paid 99 cents for a comcast ppv NBC show (Score:5, Informative)
I got lazy last week and just paid the 99 cents to watch an episode of The Office that I missed on Comcast's "On Demand" service.
IT HAD COMMERCIAL INTERRUPTIONS
At each normal commercial point they showed a 30 second ad for some NBC show.
Never again. I was steaming.
Re:I paid 99 cents for a comcast ppv NBC show (Score:5, Funny)
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Great marketing speak translator (Score:4, Funny)
grunka-lunka-dunkity-dahfitable,
we don't care if your service is profitable!
$1.99 per ep? (Score:3, Insightful)
Honestly, these hippies and their money, give it to me if you're having problems spending it.
B-b-b-but... (Score:2)
All is lost! Lost, I say!
Apple has destroyed the honorable profession of making buggy-whips!
Eat your own dogfood, Zucker! (Score:5, Insightful)
Zucker whines
but unfortunately (for him and his ilk), he's fighting against both the inevitability of technological change and the just rewards (poetic justice, karma, payback, what-goes-around-comes-around,
As an amateur calligrapher with family members who are performers, I can confidently assert that:
Let's see NBC sharing a cut of their profits with a health insurance fund for performers. Then maybe I'll start listening to anything he has to say about being on the receiving end of a revenue-sharing proposal. Maybe.
And a new character is born..... (Score:3, Funny)
[hip charismatic kid]: Hi, I'm a Mac....
[middle-aged, sorta nerdy guy]: And I'm a P.C......
[insane looking creature who appears to be made from a conglomeration of movie monster parts]: And I'm the Entertainment Industry.....GIVE ME YOUR WALLETS YOU THIEVING BASTARDS!
My, he's the quick one. (Score:3, Insightful)
The big media companies do not create anything. In one of their business practices, they do enable the creation of content by providing the up-front capital. But because of their lock on distribution, they can extract completely unreasonable terms from anybody who wants to get paid for producing that content. With the way that the business is structured, there's only one game in town - it just has many faces. It's highway robbery in the classic sense - they control a critical piece of the road from creation to the consumer and get to take away as much as they can carry.
That is, there was only one game in town. Now comes the Internet - you don't need a network of affiliates all over the country, you don't need to buy into a basic cable distribution package, you don't need to grovel at whatever deals the incompetent cartel executives tell you are in your best interests and ultimately you don't have to just swallow it when they tell you to dumb it down and add more tits and action. If you can get it created, the Internet will take care of the distribution for what is essentially free (at least, if you can figure out a way to make money, it'll be a tiny fraction of what people will pay).
The content cartels' days are numbered, and they're going to blame everybody they can for the extinction of their business model when it's really just the march of technology that has finally obsoleted their highway robbery.
We're not there yet but Apple, and anybody else who can figure out how to cut the cartels out of the decision making process while still allowing content creators to make money, is going to put these dinosaurs in the ground. And not a minute too soon.
Isn't economically healthy for media corps? (Score:2)
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Now, if you make the argument that y
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Re:Cut of iPod revenue... (Score:5, Insightful)
Likewise, NBC is not helping Apple sell iPods/iPhones with their content. Ask anyone who owns an iPod/iPhone; NONE will tell you that they got it to watch officially sanctioned NBC/big time media corporation content on their devices. Most of them can get their media through other means (and these means are more likely than not illegal). If anything, Apple is doing these companies a favor by presenting the media in a highly accessible/available/cheap format for the more conscientious consumer. If anything, Apple is helping them sell content that would otherwise be pirated.
Now, it can be argued that the conscientious are provided more incentive to buy an Apple media device with the availability of officially sanctioned content. But I highly doubt that the content would draw significant numbers to warrant Apple giving up revenue. I feel that having video playback capability in the media players is enough to draw customers, even without the availability of actual content, especially when content can be user generated.
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If anything, Apple is helping them sell content that would otherwise be pirated.
For me, this is certainly true. For all the music industry's complaining about Apple ruining their business, iTunes brought me back to buying music. I stopped buying music because Napster was easier and more convenient than buying. I stopped pirating because iTunes was easier and more convenient than P2P.
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Look at this database: http://www.1212.com/labels/usa/home.html [1212.com]
How many labels are there in the US? Thousands... So what is your problem? Is there price fixing? Maybe, but then again thousands of labels seem to be going along with it. Sure some charge less, some charge more.
BUT, maybe, just MAYBE.... The price that you are charged is the optimium price? Maybe it does cos
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How good are those top ones doing? Just fine. How are the others doing (it is far less than a 1000; it appears to be less than 500)? Well, we do not know. I am guessing about half of those are just name companies. How much do they charge? Presumably the rest are running the gamut. Now, how are the artists doing? If they are in the top 100 groups, they are doing great. Otherwise, they are doing lousy, EXCEPT where
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With that
Re:Content industry = criminal price fixing cartel (Score:5, Interesting)
Except that's not what he did. NBC's explained why they left iTunes and how they think the content sales model should be structured. Other companies are free to follow their lead or ignore it; most will probably sit on the side lines and watch how this plays out. If Apple wins they will stay put; if NBC builds a viable and profitable product they will copy it.
The key issues are:
1) How bad does Apple need the content to sell iPods? As a hardware company they seem to view the content as a tool to drive profitable hardware sales and want it to be as cheap as possible to lock people into their hardware. OTOH, they are not stupid and if they can raise prices without significantly impacting sales then probably would do so.
2) How bad does NBC need the iPods to drive content sales? Given they can distribute content in iPod compatible formats independent of Apple not being on iTunes doesn't seem to be that much of an issue; but that means they are at Apple's mercy for compatibility. Apple could "break" something in an iTunes upgrade that makes it impossible to load non-iTunes DRM content onto an iPod, just as they changed the way video out works so that devices need new electronics to still work with iPods (a strange move given how neat the Philip's DVD / iPod player combo is).
3) What level of pricing are consumers willing to pay? NBC could, for example, develop a tiered pricing model - free for ad laden content up to a premium price for an ad free version. In addition, they could do a bundle where the original purchaser of the DVD gets online content as well, such as additional scenes or an iPod ready version of the movie in an attempt to limit the value of used DVDs in the resale market.
In the end, it is not unusual this rift occurred - both sides want to maximize their slice of what the consumer wants to pay. So far Apple has done that better than the content providers; now that the market has matured the content providers will start flexing their muscle and trying to get a bigger slice of the pie.
Personally, I think we will see a resurgence of the subscription based model; with a slightly different look. Consider a content provider / MS / Blockbuster / Tivo alliance - MS produces a player OS (and hardware in conjunction with other manufacturers) with strong DRM; Blockbuster expands it's online offerings to include a subscription to d/l content as well as keeps the DVD by mail/ return to store get a new movie model, Tivo provides the set top box to play d/l content on the TV and the content providers provide content. Getting everyone to play nice will be a challenge but the pieces are already there.
Blockbuster already has the content via subscription model with their Blockbuster Online operation; TIVO has the pieces for d/l and storing content for TV viewing; and MS makes cell phone OS's so they are familiar with the loss leader hardware to sell services model.
The question is will Apple do this with the content providers or will someone else?
Re:Content industry = criminal price fixing cartel (Score:4, Insightful)
The whole idea of a subscription means you amortize the money you pay across the amount of content you use. Use lots of content, and you only pay a little bit per item. That sounds great when you first start out, because whoever offers the subscription has a huge library of stuff you've never seen before, so the idea of searching cheaply has an obvious appeal.
Thing is, people tend to re-use music and video. I can read a newspaper or magazine, throw it away, and never want to look at it again. If I hear a song I like, I want to hear it again later.
That's where the problem starts. When I build a library of items I want to use again, every item in that library competes with the others for my time and attention. If "really liking" a song means I want to hear it at least once a week, and I spend about 2 hours per day listening to music, I can only have about 350 songs in my "really like" playlist. Adding more songs means I'll hear less of the stuff I already "really like." The time each new item takes away from stuff already in my library has to be subtracted from the value of adding the song.
Eventually, the cost of adding another song balances the value of having it, at which point the song is basically worthless to me. Having a million songs to explore means I could spend a three years, twelve hours a day, doing nothing but listening to tracks I haven't heard yet, and never listening to anything that I already knew I liked. Very few people want to do that.
Once you start using content more than once, the idea of amortizing the cost over the number of plays starts to make sense. If I spend $0.99 for an iTunes track and play it 99 times, I've paid a penny per play, and the cost just keeps getting lower the more I play the thing.
So subscription models are good for people who want to explore a large body of stuff, and outright purchase is good for people who want to build a library of stuff they'll use frequently.