Well, it changes everything for me, and for anyone else who was briefly considering abandoning a cable TV subscription in favor of sites like Hulu LLC .
To be sure, television doesn't factor into my life a whole lot. I actually didn't turn mine on last week at all. But it is one of those things I want to know is available -- and of course I need Internet access.
Nevertheless, living in one of the most expensive cities in the country and getting a near-$90 bill for cable and Internet service each month is unappealing. Considering how much content is available online for free, I thought about losing cable until the free lunch on the Web officially ran out.
But if this Comcast/NBC Universal deal gets approved by the government, the free-TV-on-the-Web days may be over way sooner than we'd planned. Comcast is eager to get people to start paying for content on the Web, and NBC, after all, is part owner of Hulu.com -- which airs television shows and movies from several major stations, attracting 40 million unpaying visitors per month, according to comScore.
At the Web 2.0 Summit in October, Comcast's CEO Brian Roberts previewed additions to the company's Fancast streaming video hub, one of Comcast's impending methods for keeping its cable subscribers. With what Comcast is calling "On Demand Online," set to roll out at the end of this year, Comcast subscribers who also pay for HBO will be able to access new types of on-demand programming online. Roberts noted at the Summit that two dozen content providers signed up and that the service had already indexed 1,000 movies. The new site will also integrate with DVR boxes. Users will only be able to access it on their home computers, and -- in the beginning -- only if they get their Internet access from Comcast.
It's clear where Comcast's focus is, and authentication systems -- like "On Demand Online" -- could be the key to ensuring people (like me) don't drop their cable subscriptions. Comcast seems to have little intention of letting the free days of the Web carry on unfettered and has made a resulting move to acquire a company which both owns and creates a ton of content and has also been in the business of giving it away for free online for the past two years. Apart from Comcast's influence on NBC, Hulu is also owned by News Corp. (NYSE: NWS), and executives there have discussed adding a subscription service next year.
Of course, the buck doesn't stop with NBC and Comcast. For now, individual stations like ABC still host their own ad-supported sites, and finding HD-quality, streaming content from premium channels like HBO isn't very difficult. But if scrounging around on the Internet for limited bits of free content isn't your thing, you may want to hold onto your cable service.
As I was setting up a new Dell laptop I noticed I had a free year of Napster access courtesy of Dell and Best Buy - that was a stark reminder that the days of "free" music are over.
There are cycles in business and the Internet cycle appears to be
Get traffic! Which often translates into something for free.
Monetize the traffic which often means advertising.
Try and stay in business which often means charging for the service or selling out and letting the new corporate owners charge for the service
At the end of the day - there is no free lunch. Granted, the term "day" has been stretched out by Napster, Hulu, Pirate Bay and others - but at the end of the proverbial day - employees and vendors and stock holders want to be paid.
Either way, over-the-air brocadcasting is not going away, Michael -- the FCC and the White House would have a fit if this possibility was even being talked about as part of this deal. You and your analog ways are safe for at least another 10 years.
I guess, I wasn't thinking about that aspect. I just cannot justify the expense of cable or satellite. My son and I are setting up a media system for Internet viewing. I was surprised at the amount of material that is available. I need to get out more, I guess.
I was going to sign up for NetFlix, until I read they allow third party developers to use portions of their user database for testing.
Will over-the-air programming go away? Not as long as there are national advertisters willing to pay six figures or more for 30-second spots and lucrative syndication deals beckoning from a distant horizon. These are two revenue sources Comcast would be foolish to tamper with.
I do not have cable or satellite, since I watch very little television. My IT friends can't believe it, but I still have an analog TV with a converter box.
What does this deal mean for NBC's over-the-air programming? Is there a good chance that it will go away?
regardless of what he said and then redacted Hulu is a disaster in its current form for all of its current and soon to be future owners. The only reason they woulnd't convert it to a pay to view model is that it's going to piss off 40M people. But in the end financial desperation will trump that position. The future of broadcast boradband is paid. Hulu is becoming more than a common video platform, it's becoming a common cause for broadcast and cable companies to agree on a paid for model and implement it.
This will be bad for viewers in all media. Everyone needs to just grow up and realise this.
Not to be contrarian, but the message that's being sent by Comcast is that it believes NBCU is handling its content in the appropriate way -- that is, making broadcast (NBC) content available for free online in an ad-supported fashion, while being a lot stingier with long-form cable content. The company has said multiple times that it foresees broadcast TV continuing to be available on sites like Hulu, while cable programming will slip behind the TV Everywhere pay wall.
In fact, during the initial investor call announcing the deal, Comcast COO Steve Burke made the mistake of saying that he didn't believe a subscription-based Hulu was "in the cards." He's since backpedaled from that statement, but it seems clear that Comcast doesn't want to take your Hulu from you. And besides, even if it did -- it still would only own a minority stake of Hulu through the combined entity.
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We're live on IE Radio with Naomi Baron, author of Always On: Language in an Online and Mobile World, and professor of linguistics and language at American University.
Hey, IE Radio fans! We hope you're ready for another exciting interview. Today we're welcoming Naomi Baron, author of Always On: Language in an Online and Mobile World, and professor of linguistics and language at American University. Baron is joining us at 2:00 p.m. ET.
The Internet is making us stupid. No wait, the Internet is making us smart. Multi-tasking helps us consume more information... orrrr it reduces the amount of knowledge we can retain.
The Web has become the preferred spot for documenting personal flaws. With every online confession, Web users are crafting their detailed autobiographies and setting them free for the public's consuming pleasure.
Earlier this week, Facebook made a big fuss over the fact that it has allegedly registered its 500 millionth user. In an effort to celebrate, we here at Internet Evolution called for your Facebook Horror Stories. Hoo boy, was this going to be fun!
Getting to Work on Smart Work: How IT Is Transforming the Implementation of the 'Internet of Things' Organizations in all industry sectors are becoming more instrumented, interconnected, and intelligent -- and that's changing the way they approach virtually every facet of their operations. It's up to IT to help organizations adopt a "Three I's" approach that leverages the emerging Internet of Things and enables them to work smarter. READ THIS eBOOK
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AT&T showed off lots of improvements to its IPTV service this week. The overall message: IP, Good! Cable, Bad! Phil predicts what it all means for the broadcast proletariat.
Ireland has joined two other countries in enacting a three-strikes disconnect rule for folk caught file sharing. But 80% of perps don’t even know they are doing it!
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There's a public-policy war on copyright that nobody is winning, and inconsistencies in viewpoint and interpretation seem to be multiplying. We need to step back and think our policies over again, or we risk having a strategy that fails everyone.
Ultraviolet is an industry-wide attempt to standardize video content delivery across multiple platforms. Apart from the fact that it’s based in the cloud, relies on the DRM system, and isn’t backed by Apple… it sounds great!
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