Digital Desert

Recent reports suggest that Lady Gaga recently received from Spotify her royalty / revenue share cheque for...........$150. Her album has gone Diamond and Spotify is very widely used. A major UK sports event has been unable to justify building a website as the revenues are uncertain and a UK Federation who cannot get a TV deal for a series of live events have decided not to distribute online in the USA as the revenues are not guaranteed to cover technical costs. Airlines and shops are using the web to great effect but for pureplay IP (music, TV, movies etc) the ecosystem seems to be all about free content & piracy and therefore presents no opportunity for distribution of traditional "linear" content on a profitable basis. Services build around interactivity and which deliver an "outcome" to the user may be different but passive lean back experiences are not generally delivering revenues.

To pick up on Iolo's earlier post re; Love Film...... I love the service - no late returns and a pretty wide selection of content. If the above information is correct it suggests that from a economic perspective the consumer is happier to pay for a physical disk in the post than a download via the broadband internet.

Mashing It Up With VidZapper

Over the past few weeks we've been working on extending VidZapper's capabilities ahead of a new release by integrating it with a wide range of great online widgets and applications.

We've added Facebook and Twitter, Disqus for comments, Polldaddy for voting and surveys, Ecwid for ecommerce and OCC for live online support.

Also, the excellent Widgetbox has enabled us to leverage VZplayer to build widgets for all kinds of services, including WordPress, iGoogle, Facebook, Beebo and LinkedIn.

Finally, our colleagues at Viviocom have developed the first iPhone app for VidZapper - and Android version is on the way.

So, if you want to mash up your video, VidZapper's the best way to do it!

Tivo Premiere For Virgin ?

Tivo's new Premiere box seems to be a considerable step forward for those of us who want to combine broadband media seamlessly with traditional broadcasts and is certainly miles ahead of the functionality of boxes who just add iPlayer as a stand alone button. The new Tivo offering allows you to browse other episodes of a programme that might be available online.

However, the box is relatively expensive and seems to be restricted in its social television capabilities.

In the UK it will be only available through Virgin Media, who last year signed an exclusive deal with Tivo, and probably in a highly modified form.

Here's a demo of the interface:

Hate Film

I was long a fan of LoveFilm and what they achieved in launching a UK CinemaNow-like service, but then I subscribed and now this company has overtaken Orange as my most hated corporate ever.

Their website is primitive and stupid. Their delivery is sloooow. At the moment they haven't been bothered to deliver one of the two films they owe me. Their disks are so scratched that they don't work a third of the time.

And, to compound all of this, you cannot cancel the service online. Yes, you can do everything online (as long as you can put up with their crappy website, which proudly seems to use a programming language that was ditched by everyone else over a decade ago), but you can't stop paying them. Then you have to call them.... (** I have subsequently found a way of cancelling online **)

Thankfully they will soon be put out of business by online competitors and fail to achieve the sellout to CinemaNow that should have been their payday.

I am cancelling my subscription.

Will ITV Get Online ?

ITV know that they have to do more online, but their past does not bode well for the new management team taking over. But in my opinion the past failures were due to poor execution or ambition at the highest level, not because of bad ideas.

Imagine combining Friends Reunited with a programme like the BBC's Who Do You Think You Are ? ITV have been notoriously bad at leveraging their programme 'brands' as the BBC has done with Top Gear or Five with The Gadget Show. Indeed, ITV's old guard had a mortal fear of any kind of segmentation or narrowcasting. By the time ITV used on air slots to plug FR it was way too late and the site was in nearly terminal decline.

Another problem is that whereas TV remains parochial and geographically constrained, the internet works best if it is international, this is fine for a huge market like China or the US, but is a serious disadvantage in a relatively small market like the UK.

Then there was ITV Local, a quite brilliant idea by Lindsay Charlton and his team that was probably over-invested in, but was quite capable of generating modest profits in the short term and would have built a powerhouse for the future. There was, perhaps, over emphasis on video content, and I have to take part of the blame for that. But it was sad that ITV lost its bottle on this initiative - it is something that they might do well to revisit, especially with the BBC disadvantaged in the area of local news.

ITV.com meanwhile was the blind leading the blind. Dreadful technical implementation (when there were plenty of great off the shelf platforms available) hampered its development - not least the choice of Silverlight. The situation seems to have improved tremendously, but there is still a lot to do, and the surface of the commercial model for this service has barely been scratched.

So, a new era dawns and we have to see if an ex-grocer and an ex-postman can make a better hand of this internet TV thing than those TV execs did.

Common Sense At The BBC

Common sense seems to have prevailed at the BBC with the looming threat of a post-election world. Every element of their review seem to be steps in the right direction, from a reduction in the Beeb's online empire to more investment in television programmes.

You can read further details here and here.

Bad News Day for BBC

There's been a dreadful earthquake in Chile and the BBC are reporting it by showing pictures from Ustream and reading out Tweets. Nice to know our £3.5bn is being deployed so effectively in the marketplace under the new cost cutting regime. Now here's an idea, why don't we get rid of the smug presenters interviewing each other and just get this news for ourselves ?

Vidi Act It !

Many readers of this blog have been intrigued by what we're up to at Vidiactive. Now I can reveal a little more about how this exciting company is changing the way we will consume television:

The Future Of Broadcasting Event

An interesting and convivial discussion occurred at the Future of Broadcasting event this evening. The subject was, perhaps, unrealistically broad and many of the usual themes appeared: business models, social television, discovery, regulation and rights.

Perhaps the most interesting change that I've seen from similar events five or six years ago is how accepting and comfortable everyone in the industry now is with the changes going on.

Perhaps the most revealing and shocking admission was from Ofcom on why they treat scheduled, on demand and online content differently. Apparently what it comes down to is whether someone chooses to access content or might 'happen' upon it. A truly mindblowing way of thinking, especially after what happened to Google execs in the Italian courts this week. The Ofcom representative was very game and eloquent, but I would argue that a service like YouTube needs more regulation than services like ITV, not less.

For my part, I rather brazenly took the opportunity to plug the companies that I'm involved with, but for a reason: I would not have invested money and time into these companies if I did not believe that they represented key technological pieces in the future of television.

VidZapper is a video management platform, like many others, but it has hooks, bells and whistles at a price that no other professional system can match. It deals with delivery.

Rights Tracker represents the big missing link in the whole online video ecosystem and the company is about to announce a number of new initiatives that will take online rights management to a new level. It deals with rights.

Vidiactive is a company that changes the way television is produced and consumed so radically, but so seamlessly that it's difficult to describe. Think of it as the ability to find any video content that's available on the web and watch it on your big screen, and then to share it with your friends and contacts. It deals with the social and delivery aspects of future TV.

Finally, TV Everywhere is currently investing in a 'discovery' company, which will be another key piece in the the TV landscape of the future.

So, these, I believe are some of the key elements that will define television in the future.

Key ruling against Google - execs do time (if they visit Italy)

Italian courts yesterday found 3 Google executives criminally responsible for breaking anti-privacy laws and they were sentenced, in their absence, to 6 months in prison. The offending piece of material was a video of teenage boys harassing an autistic boy.

Google have always argued that they are in no way responsible for any content published across their network.......which is pretty thin given that they are actively working with channel partners and have a variety of take down tools they can deploy if they wish. They are a digital content channel.

Italian judges, perhaps with the beady eye of Mr. Berlusconi on them, have ruled that Google and YouTube are to be treated as any other content provider / network and are thus reponsible for content published on their network via YouTube.

The example given by Google is that postmen should not be held liable for what they deliver. However, this does not seem quite right as Google (via adwords) have a direct financial interest in what is delivered across their network, which a postman does not, and a postman would not deliver a smoking, ticking parcel through a letterbox as he owes a duty of care.

European legislation appears to offer ISP's safe harbour - but this is not definitive and with the Digital Economy Bill waiting in the wings it seems that tide may be turning against the copyright infringers.

X-factor stars back Digital Economy Bill

Cheryl Cole's co-star on the X-factor, Simon Cowell, has backed a letter send to MP's urging them to pass the Digital Economy Bill and include a three strikes and you're out rule against persistent IP pirates. Other signatories included Sir Terry Pratchett, Tim Bevan, Paul Greengrass and Stephen Garret.



The text of the letter is below

Britain is admired for its creativity and its sense of fair play. British musicians, singers, actors, writers and directors are known and loved around the world and create some of our greatest assets. Together they contribute more than 7% to the UK economy.

The Digital Economy Bill brings both of these together. It will ensure that British creators, entertainment companies, and the 1.8 million people who work in and around the cultural sector are respected and rewarded in the future as they have been in the past, and that they are fairly paid when they put their work online.

Digital entertainment services are really beginning to take off: fans have never had so much choice as to how to enjoy their music, books, TV and films online. But for these new business models to develop, it is critical that more is done to prevent the illegal services providing easy access to free content.

We urge Parliament to pass this bill as a matter of urgency in order to secure the future of its creative talent and industries.

The Future Of Broadcasting

On Thursday evening I'll be taking part in a panel discussion on the rather heady subject of The Future of Broadcasting arranged by Intellect and chaired by Ved Sen of ThinkPlank. Anyone who is around in London is more than welcome and can register here.

Australian Rules

The recent case in Australia of Roadshow Films Pty Ltd v iiNet Ltd (No.3) brings into focus the challenges of policing the internet and the challenges involved in the forthcoming Digital Economy Bill.

Basically the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft had notified iiNet that their subscribers had been repeatedly illegally downloading Hollywood movies using illegal sites and iiNet had taken no steps to prevent this. iiNet were successfull in arguing that they had safe harbour as they had not "authorised" this infringement. Clearly they were aware of the infringement but had not authorised it.

From a commercial perspective the rights holders and their representatives realise that it is very difficult to chase down hundreds of individuals and would much rather go after a corporation who might be able to pay damages (and legal fees) such as an ISP. From the ISP's perspective they don't really want the overhead of shutting down users and also the lost revenue........cutting off your own customers is never appealing.

Someone is going to have to pay for an anti-piracy service to avoid meltdown in this area but the tough question is who ? The content owners have the most to lose so they should pay something but at the same time there needs to be the ability to shut down the internet connections of repeat offenders as well as remove the ability of the pirates to make money via AdSense.

Policing Piracy is a cost to all in the internet value chain that is not going away - the difficult question is how to fairly allocate that cost.