Thanks for the comment and ideas, Lawrence. I'm not very excited about the prospect of ISPs and content providers hatching deals that will likely tend to be predatory and anti-competitive. Hulu and JibJab have a revenue model, but not one that begins to address the issue of the giant amount of bandwidth their customers suck up in posting or viewing content on their sites, which I think is what you're also suggesting in your comment.
And rather than charge users extra for downloading pirated content, why not just block it (as I believe Comcast did with P2P traffic on its network recently)? Leaving it up to the ISP to decide what's legal or legitimate content makes me just a little nervous, but if not the ISP, then who? The FCC? The local school board? As Comcast demonstrated, these passive purveyors of high bandwidth pipes can make their networks run quite efficiently with a few simple tweaks.
How about a system were the consumer gets what he wants, at 'gold' level. But The cost of access goes up to distribute media.
So the kid who wants to watch Jib Jab- or something even from pirate bay. downloads a certain amount and pays a rate appropriate for the normal consumer. The fellow who wants to publish- his content or somebody Else's via bit torrent- must pay.
So Hulu, YouTube, and Jib Jab must find a revenue model. Free ride is over. But the consumer is untouched.
What I like about this is the rules do not have to differentiate pirate or non pirate content. IF we wanted, the distribution cost could be set high enough to included some measure of license and royalty, ASCAP/BMI like, something like the charge levied on media.
Oh dear. I think it's easy for groups to confuse issues of unfair treatment with issues of adequate bandwidth. The irony is that the economy and all of us who rely on it will pay the price.
Thanks for the feedback, Mary -- just this morning I received an email from the U.S Industry Internet Association with testimonials (and a veiled threat to the Democrats) from the Broadband Opportunities Coalition (Asian American Justice Center, League of United Latin American Citizens, National Council of La Raza, National Urban League); the Left of Center Coalition (National Disability Institute, National Puerto Rican Coalition, US Hispanic Leadership Institute, Labor Council on Latin American Advancement, Leadership Education for Asian Pacifics, Inc., League of United Latin American Citizens, MANA: A National Latina Organization, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Association of Neighborhoods, National Coalition of Black Civic Participation, Black College Communications Association, Dominican American National Roundtable, Hispanic Institute, Hispanic Technology and Telecommunications Partnership, Japanese American Citizens League, Latinos in Information Sciences and Technology Association, 100 Black Men of America, Asian American Justice Center, Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies, ASPIRA); Black Elected Officials (National Conference of Black Mayors, National Organization of Black Elected Legislative Women, National Black Caucus of Local Elected Officials, National Association of Black County Officials, National Black Caucus of State Legislators); Southern Christian Leadership Conference; National Black Caucus of State Legislators; The National Black Chamber Commerce; National Black Caucus of State Legislators; National Foundation for Woman Legislators Inc.; National Hispanic Council on Aging; American Academy of Nursing; American Association of People with Disabilities; Asian Women In Business; Dominican American National Roundtable; The National Grange; Latino Coalition; Native American TV, and several state chapters of the NAACP.
The upshot? These groups say the FCC must do everything to avoid deepening the Digital Divide and protect affordable access for all Americans. So this highly politicized issue has become even moreso.
Thanks, Paul... I'm not certain the end of Net Neutrality will mean a new golden age for video on the Web but I do think a little looser controls on how traffic types like streaming video can be handled would make a huge difference. And having watched the FCC bumble its way through the introduction of new technologies and regulatory regimes to handle HDTV and assorted wireless technologies, I am not hopeful.
Well said, Terry! I'm in agreement that the idea of "net neutrality" is great in the abstract, but in the real world, it just doesn't work. It's not that I don't favor access for all --I certainly do -- but the reality is that throwing more significant funding in that direction is really like reciting an incantation to ideals that are misplaced in this context.
I really enjoyed how you paused with a 'quirky" smile when you mentioned to you agreeing with Senator John MCcain!!!! So are you saying that the end of Net Neutrality will usher in a an era of better videos on the web? I think the bottom line is that innovation has to be rewarded and as such ambitious programs like Net Neutrality will lead us into a dead end. People may make all the noise for Net Neutrality but even the FCC knows very well that is not the way to go hence the reason for its dithering on this subject.
Mobile TV is everywhere, and yet, nowhere. Nobody uses it – because the handsets aren't good, the pricing is too high, and the coverage is not good enough. But Qualcomm's FloTV Personal TV aims to change all of that.
Netflix seemed to be a threat to all of TV, but with the current quarterly earnings report, it sure doesn't look as if that's true now. Netflix really proves that even Internet viewing of video isn't immune to profit and other business issues. This is a lesson we need to learn if we want a viable online video model.
Some say that exposure to violence in gaming, online video, etc., is creating a violent culture. Tom says it's not that straightforward. Rather than regulate violence, we should understand it better.
MySpace is reinventing itself by focusing on content, but it's too late, and other social networks should learn from its example by looking toward a telco payment model if they want to sustain user commitment and their own revenue.
Free online video was supposed to kill cable. But research shows most people are getting less interested in replacing cable with online video – not more. There are three reasons why, says Tom Nolle.
Ushering in a new era of cognitive computing systems, IBM announced today the IBM Watson Engagement Advisor, a technology breakthrough that allows brands to crunch big data in record time to transform the way they engage clients in key functions such as customer service, marketing, and sales.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
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M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
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M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
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