Are Cable Operators non-Competitive?

Say it isn't so!

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-12/time-warner-cable-content-incentives-thwart-new-web-tv.html

I'm a believer in property rights, but not when you view the market itself as your property.

linkedin graph

A few thoughts about the Olympics, Cord Cutting and #nbcfail

I've been trying to parse out some of the different factors in the #nbcfail discussion on Twitter and in other public forums.  As an experimenting cord-cutter, of course I'm interested in streamed content that appeals to my family and I.  Lets be clear, we're happy to pay for it, we're not looking to free-ride. 

warning, perhaps tl;dr-ish

Seems like NBC is not just here to bring the Olympics to an interested audience, it needs to leverage the Olympics to earn a return on its significant payment for the rights. And they do this by bringing a mass audience to global brands for lucrative advertising. We're the product.

Internet streaming without tape-delay surely fragments the audience, reducing its size and impacting the magnitude of advertising sales. Also,  NBC is owned by a cable provider, which probably sees unbundled internet streaming as a threat to its legacy cable cash-cow. Tying live internet streaming to the requirement that I have a cable subscription seems like buggy-whip manufacturers requiring automobile purchasers to also buy a big box of buggy-whips. But I suspect that the more the cable providers can convince people that internet access is just an add-on feature to cable the longer they can hang on to their legacy cash-cow business. However it seems that inexorably the technology is marching in the direction of content provisioning directly over internet. I suppose the cable vendors will fight this, but the cost advantages of the new technology may be difficult to fend off forever.

(Note: Any wonder we should be worried about mega-bundling: http://technicallybca.wordpress.com/2012/05/01/comcastverizon-soon-to-offer-4-play-deals/)

Seems to me the requirements of delivering a mass audience suitably prepared for a advertising consumption experience requires over production, and elimination of tidbits that might discomfort the audience and impact their advertising experience, thus: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/28/nbc-victims-tribute_n_1713527.html

Which is why the following is a surprise: http://globalgrind.com/news/nbc-apologizes-airing-monkey-gymnastics-commercial-after-gabby-douglas-win-details How did that slip through the sanitizing cracks?

Anyway, the average jamoke looking to watch the athletes and events he is interested in real time using the awesome power of the intertubes is not the target market here. As a result, his experience isn't optimized. I think I'll go watch more of the Curiosity coverage, thanks, that seems plenty authentic.

Rep. Markey's net neutrality legislation

A post from Google Public Policy discusses new legislation from Markey on net neutrality.

Here is the money quote, as far as I'm concerned:

"Net neutrality is too often painted as just about particular companies' competing interests, but that's missing the point. Rather, net neutrality and broadband policy are -- and should be -- about what's ultimately best for people, in terms of economic growth as well as the social benefit of empowering individuals to speak, create, and engage one another online using the wide panoply of innovations available to them. In other words, broadband policy should come from the bottom up."

To my eye - the legislation sets a good course. It could be stronger with respect to ensuring the providers don't clip the Internet's wings while its still developing. For me, the fear is crystallizing the Internet/Web too soon - solidifying the existing framework so that the ISPs can introduce bottlenecks they can monetize. ISPs can exploit the conflict of interest they enjoy when they provide both content and access. My perhaps impractical ideal is to fully separate provision of broadband connectivity from provision of content.

google views network neutrality

The new Google Public Policy blog posts their view of network neutrality. For me, the main points of whatever network neutrality may mean should include: that the Internet remain open to innovation, that the end-to-end principle should remain a key foundation, and that access to the Internet is fairly available to all.

network neutrality

From isen.blog, one of the more articulate posts on network neutrality that I've read, Making Network Neutrality Sustainable: SMART Letter #100.