Networks and Studios Against PVRs 616
HiredMan sent in an LA Times story talking about more suits against PVR makers
like Replay and Tivo. The most bizarre quote to me is that the
suit argues that "it's illegal to let consumers record and store shows based on the genre, actors or other words in the program description." Huh?
Huh? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:A Wrench. (Score:2, Interesting)
the real fear (Score:3, Interesting)
The REAL fear is that they failed to forsee where the future was (obviously) heading, and are now suing to stall and slow down developing tech in order to figure out how they can take control of it. Heaven forbid consumers have control over their own entertainment. Just another ploy of the Man to conrol that which shouldn't have been theirs to begin with.
Just my two cents.
Re:When will they learn? (Score:2, Interesting)
Believe it or not, the ads we view in fast forward mode are still effective, according to some studies. I can't recall the details, as it has been 10+ years since I read about this (back in college), but we actually studied some research about "compressed-time" commercials, as they were called. In the compressed-time commercial studies, the researchers analyzed name brand recall and preference after allowing subjects to view TV shows at normal speed and fast-forward through the commercials. Many modern commercials are made based on the results of these studies. Things like long-exposure product placement (to make the name brand stay on long enough to read when you fast-forward), frequent product pop-up (to reinforce a memory imprint of the product), flash/swift change display (to focus your eyes on certain parts of the screen, where the product name or packaging will be placed), and similar things. With PVRs, you can actually completely skip commercials, just like you can with VCRs that have blue-screen commercial skip features. The suits don't like this, because while a time-compressed commercial can still be effective in placing a product name in your brain, a totally skipped commercial cannot.
And before you slam me for being a marketing dweeb - we studied this in my second semester of statistics. I was a computer geek then, just like now.
RagManX
Re:A Wrench. (Score:5, Interesting)
Note that it's different for pay-per-view and other subscription-based channels, where the viewer is actually the customer. However, I hardly see how networks could successfully sue the TiVO while they have allowed people to use their VCRs all this time. Also, someone could conceivably use their TiVO to store video data they have themselves produced (with a camcorder), something the networks would not (and should not) be able to prevent.
I know it sucks for the entire entertainment industry, but the digital revolution is here, and they're going to have to revise their business models. It's no longer feasible to keep copyright laws as we know them - that would require a severe curtailment of basic civil rights. Between my freedom and the industry giants' profit margins, I'll choose the former...
tv networks losing their advantages (Score:3, Interesting)
I think that a lot of the value on TV for advertisers is created by people just turning on the tube when they have no specific plans of what to do. They channel surf here and there, sometimes never pick a show, and as a result, manage to see plenty of ads on plenty of channels.
(And have you ever noticed that when one channel goes to ads, all the other major networks seem to do so as well? I suspect they designed it that way so even though you may switch away, someone else on another channel will switch and see the ad that you missed.)
The ability to pick out what is wanted by category and then circulate such things between friends obsoletes the practice of channel surfing, since the machines do the harvesting of choice shows for you. Since this can already be combined with the ability to strip the ads from the content, the PVR technology could bring channel surfing into obsolescence.
This would be good for us because we spend less time wasted with ads, TV guides and watching things we don't want to see, and more time watching the shows we like (probably saving some time every day to do other things.)
This would be bad from the TV Network and Hollywood's point of view because it devalues regular TV airtime and ad-time, thus earning the networks less ad-revenue. It would also be bad because people would be less likely to get hooked into new shows (thus, Hollywood shudders) since they would not be surfing or seeing the ads.
No wonder the networks are fighting this tooth and nail. They (very rightly) see it as a threat to their survival. Heaven forbid that they be forced to design a new business model. (Hmm ... now what other industry is waking up to the necessity of this kind of change?...)
Re:Explaining the bizzare "illegal" quote (Score:4, Interesting)
Fox can easily prevent X-Files watchers from acquiring copies of the episodes. Just don't broadcast them.
The good thing is that in courts, the argument of "if they do this it will hurt our business" doesn't hold up, even for baseball and it's strange exemption from antitrust laws.
Good. Kill it (Score:5, Interesting)
Betamax will kill TV
Cable service will kill (network) TV
Videogames will kill TV
VHS will kill TV
Rentals will kill TV (and movies)
Internet will kill TV (and movies and music and the American way blah blah blah)
Now PVR's will kill TV
OK. So why hasn't TV died yet? We've been TRYING to kill it, but it just won't die. Maybe we're not trying hard enough. Lord knows that if Network TV died, I certainly wouldn't miss it, and I doubt the rest of the world would miss it either.
Just let the model die and a newer more better model will emerge. Guaranteed.
Scares me (Score:4, Interesting)
Not to mention I don't even know where the heck my VCR is. I'm pretty sure it moved across the country with me, but I'm not certain.
BTW, I think its funny that Studios are getting upset about this. How many times have you heard "TiVO" in a show this programming season? I know Fox and NBC have plugged it a couple of times. I know Friends, Will & Grace, and Undeclared have plugged it. AND if you look in the girl's apartment on Friends, you'll see a Silver TiVO sitting next to their TV. Huh.
Re:Explaining the bizzare "illegal" quote (Score:5, Interesting)
If the entertainment industry would just sell me copies of every X-Files or Babylon 5 episode on DVD, rather than making me wait 5 years after the end of the series...
If they'd offer me all the episodes at once, rather than 2 episodes per disc, with me having to "hope they keep producing 2-episode disks, once every month, for the next 8 years, so I can get the complete series rather than just having half the series until they stopped producing 'em"... then maybe I'd buy.
Until they offer me the product I want, I'll continue to get that product the only way I can. The fact that it's free-as-in-beer is only a bonus.
Anyone for South Park episodes? If quality doesn't matter, you can fit an entire season on a CD-R. (And if you want good quality, an entire season on a DVD-ROM.) Or you can go to the store and see a DVD with two episodes on it. 44 whole minutes of video. Whoop-de-fsck.
It is really a matter of money (Score:2, Interesting)
That about sums it up for Napster as well as TiVo. New technology has basically made the old product no longer tenable. The only real complication is that since it removes the potential for the studios to make money at it, then no one will make any new content at all.
END COMMUNICATION
Re:A Wrench. (Score:2, Interesting)
If companies make quality ads, people will watch them, and watch them MORE with tivo. If people don't like the ads they see, they'll automatically filter them out anyway, either with their brain, or a remote, or their tivo. Tivo's just another more advanced tool for the filtering we automatically do anyway
Petition to save Family Guy (OT) (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:A Wrench. (Score:3, Interesting)
How many of you out there use the mute button when the ads come on? Screw listening to the ads, flick it to mute and then flick through the channels, I'm sure there is a large percentage of TV watchers that partake in such behaviour.
So the question should be, where's the lawsuit against the mute button and the ability of remotes to allow you to change the channel more than once every 6 seconds?
Here's the real reason they don't like PVRs. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's called Prime Time. It's what advertisers pay them bigtime for, and when all the most popular shows get scheduled. After all, this is the time the largest target audience is going to be watching.
Now, VCRs aren't such a big deal, because they're clunky and inconvenient. Programming them is a pain. Manually recording defeats most of the point, since you still have to be there.
Throw into the mix PVRs, though, and Prime Time becomes any time. If everyone has a PVR (and they could eventually... they're cheap, and so convenient), there's no reason to schedule a show during any particular hour, since that's probably not when it'll get watched. There will be no time-based competition. Advertisers won't see the point in paying extra for any particular timeslot. By controlling the horizontal and vertical, they're getting more money, and now they see PVRs taking that away.
So everyone go get/build a PVR if you want to stick it to them.
On a somewhat on-topic note, it's really easy to build one of these things, too. The software is already there in parts, it just needs a little glue. Check out mp1e [sourceforge.net] for encoding, or anything else you like such as low-bitrate DivX. Combine this with mplayer [mplayerhq.hu] or something and a little at, cron, or various web-based TV recording stuff on freshmeat and there you've got it. I already do this all manually and it works better than TV (skipping ads is really worth it, not to mention not missing shows), and I'm planning on putting together a box with 3-4 TV cards to do this in a dedicated manner. Go PVRs.
The Register (a different one, no goats... lol) (Score:2, Interesting)
The foul addiction to repeat viewers (Score:3, Interesting)
It started with TV. Shows were limited, and viewers often missed them at their first showing. So they started rerunning them so they could catch them later and to fill up time. And that's when they figured out that people would watch these shows more than once, sometimes even over and over. Advertising became deliberately more ambiguous, so people would start watching just to make sure it wasn't a new episode. Pretty soon the whole TV model depended on it. The same happened with the birth of VHS for movies, and with the soaring cost of "blockbuster" movies some first-run releases actually NEEDED people to watch more than once just to turn a profit.
Re:A Wrench. (Score:3, Interesting)
To what extent, though, has this ever been a problem? I used a pair of VCRs for timeshifting long before I bought my TiVo (still use one along with the TiVo because Enterprise and That 80s Show are on at the same time). Do the mental midgets in Hollywood actually think people haven't been skipping commercials on taped content ever since wireless remotes became common in the mid-80s? Do you know anyone who rewinds last night's episode of $TV_SHOW, hits Play, and lets it run through to the end with no interruptions, no fast-forwarding, etc.?
(TiVos are much faster at skipping forward than any VCR I've run across...but that doesn't negate the fact that you can buzz right past the ads with a VCR.)
Re:Sore winners, actually. (Score:4, Interesting)
The heck there's not! If I were running a big broadcasting company, I would cut a deal with Tivo/Replay to put my ads in their devices. There is a lot of ad-ready real estate in those devices' interfaces... pause screens, config screens, choose-your-recording screens... You could even have the ads be contextually relevant; if you pause the show during Friends, you see a still ad from a Friends sponsor.
There are ways to monetize these devices, but Newthink is scary, so the broadcasters are trying to crush the technology.
And if none of those ideas prove to work out, the damn broadcasters will have to find some other way of making money. Poor babies!
Re:Scary but true (Score:2, Interesting)
Was it doing economically poorly? There is a mall near where we live that refuses to allow cameras on the premises because mall management doesn't want proof of how badly their space was being utilized. (Somewhere around 50% of the storefronts were vacant.)
What was sad was that they kept raising the rates to try to make up the loss of revenue, and they kept losing stores because of it.
Re:What's with the stupid analogies? (Score:3, Interesting)
The important difference between this issue and the false analogies you brought up is that of redistribution. I am allowed to record television content for my own use, and I am allowed to make MP3 copies of my own purchased music. What I can't do is then rebroadcast those copies for the whole world. (And nobody here, besides you, is suggesting this)
The problem with Napster was that it made it very easy to redistribute copies of my music, which is not allowed under copyright law. (end of mostly-off-topic napster discussion)
As for your other analogy:
A Christian company copies a few airwaves and edits the shows to remove any 'sinful' content.
That's not a problem. Anyone can copy 'a few airwaves' and even edit them, for personal use. Then you come up with this:
You may subscribe to their service for a low fee of $299.99.
This would be illegal, as it is rebroadcasting of copyrighted materials. The only problem is that no one is doing this. No one has proposed this, and the availability of PVRs has nothing to do with this. If someone did do this, they would be fairly wasy to identify, and would be (rightly) be punished under copyright law, whether they used a PVR or not.
Oh, and BTW, you can't circumvent copyright. You can circumvent a copy-protection mechanism (and incur the wrath of the DMCA if you live in the wrong country,) or you can infringe on copyright (which you do not do by recording something off of your TV).
Mr. Show and Coupon the Movie (Score:2, Interesting)
The settlement is that everyone now has to go out and see the movie. My favorite quote is when they're interviewing people coming out of the theater and the reporter asks one movie-goer, "So what did you think about the movie?"
His response: "I saw the shit out of it!" We laugh but who knows... it might get to that point.
Ivan
Banner Ads for TV? (Score:2, Interesting)
VCR+/GuidePlus et al Illegal? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Scary but true (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Here's the real reason they don't like PVRs. (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, this of course assumes they can collect this information. With a homebrew PVR (which costs a bit more, but does more, too), they can't. Even if they are getting the information, I'm not terribly concerned. Let them. I think I'm with CmdrTaco on this one; if they want to show me commercials I like to watch (amusing ones, cool ones, etc.), more power to them. I like watching commercials that are (truly) humorous, or use cool technology, or play music I like. Heck, if they instituted a commercial rating system, I'd probably use it, and they'd get even more valuable information.
(As I said in my initial post, I encode TV and watch it already. Skipping commercials is great. However, I don't always skip all commercials. Ones that catch my eye, I rewind and watch. Movie previews, etc. With mpeg, I can even catch informational details I'd otherwise miss.)
The technology really could benefit both sides. Networks just need to figure this out, and figure it out now, as I said in another post. If they can't, they'll suffer. If they can, we'll all be a little happier.
New Paradigm (Score:2, Interesting)
And recomended reading for this topic would be chaper 3 of "NEXT"
Inefficiencies of Scale (Score:4, Interesting)
Looked at a certain way, the whole edifice of network television along with "branding" is a device for delivering entertainment, and it's a remarkably inefficient device. You buy products, for which a sizable chunk of the price is advertising, which is allocated by highly paid marketing drones to highly paid advertising agencies, who buy airtime from TV networks, who buy programming from producers, who pay cast and crew to make the show.
Doesn't this strike anyone else as incredibly wasteful? How much inefficiency and featherbedding are we supporting by buying products we see advertised on TV?
I mean, come on, the shows I like to watch mostly cost less than $200,000 an episode, and have an audience of around half a million weekly. I'd pay dime, or even a quarter, per episode of Farscape, which would be far cheaper for me than paying $2 more for a box of Tide, *and* would be more lucrative for the producers.
The reason why the networks are scared is because this whole house of cards is built on their being the only conduit between the talent (the production companies) and the money (the advertisers).
Okay, let's get off our "Content control is evil" mindset, and imagine a world where strict copyright controls apply. Someone can charge you money, and send you via broadband a TV program you can only watch *once*. Why do you need anyone between you and the creators of the show taking a cut? Where does the existing (incredibly inefficient) business model fit?
These poor bastards are doomed, they just don't know it. With shows amounting to only 44 minutes of a TV hour (including credits) when it isn't worse (taking 4 hours to play a one hour football game), they are killing the geese that lays the golden eggs. Even if they win, they lose. Strict content controls could be the worst thing to ever happen to them.
--Dave
Re:Well.. (Score:1, Interesting)
the true power of PVR right under their noses (Score:4, Interesting)
Starting to get the picture? The PVR and thus ReplayTV and Tivo know what you watch, when you watch it, whether you skip commercials, what commercials you do in fact watch, etc., etc., etc. How is that information not a boon to advertisers?
If the networks and advertisers would pull their heads out of their hottubs, they'd realize that there is a huge potential for targetting ads. They could partner with the PVR companies (or buy them outright) and build an ad system that is based on actual viewer data. Instead of having to sit through 30% worth of commercials per network show, you could watch your favorite half-hour show along with 1 ad that is targeted specifically to you. I'd wager most people would actually watch this commercial, too, if only to see what the advertisers think they want!
I realize it isn't an easy or overnight process, but it seems to me to be a worthwhile endeavour, especially considering the pitiful ROI of today's ad-blast paradigm.
My $0.02.
-Scott
(Yes, I have read "Next" by Michael Lewis)
Re:A Wrench. (Score:1, Interesting)
The root of the problem (Score:3, Interesting)
NOBODY LIKES ADVERTISEMENTS!
It doesn't matter whether they put the ads in between scenes in the show or the use glaringly obvious product placement or anything of the sort. Time and time again the consumers have said "We don't like advertising." Hell, 99% of the advertising industry is trying to find new ways of advertising that the consumer literally cannot avoid, because even they know...
NOBODY LIKES AdVERTISEMENTS!
Do you think the anti-spam group would be so vocal if the content of these bulk e-mails wasn't advertising? Would various groups be unhappy with the way they're portrayed in commercials if their portrayals weren't used in order to sell something?
Now I admit that there's always a time and a place to inform potential customers about a product. But we have systems that allow business to do this that nobody minds. The phone book. Signs near the point-of-sale (soda fountains with "Coca-Cola" written on them). Hell, even QVC can be considered in this light.
If you're going to insist on putting advertising into a medium where the consumer does not want to see it, they will always find a way to avoid it, even if it means simply not paying attention to them. And frankly I don't understand how such advertisers are able to say that they earn their customers a profit with this.
If the broadcast networks insist on using intrusive advertising like this as their only means of income, then they deserve exactly what they get when, lo and behold, people avoid those advertisements. Hell, I wonder how many network execs own a PVR, because (lest we forget)...
NOBODY LIKES ADVERTISEMENTS!
Re:and then there was Advertising WITHIN programs. (Score:2, Interesting)
Integrating ads isn't the only way to make money. Better advertising sometimes works, too. Make ads into stories. Make them funny and entertaining. Other countries do this, and enjoy a much higher viewer enjoyment of ads. I doubt this would seriously increase ad costs... but it might require a different sort of advertising industry. American TV advertising has been made sluggish by American's addiction to TV and our willingness to sit through anything in order to get to the next plot installment.
SOMEBODY has to pay for your content... if it's not the advertisers, it's gonna be you, directly out of your pocket. What's the worst of these two evils?
I might be willing to pay not to watch ads, but it depends how much it'd cost. I'm curious how much an average viewer would have to pay in order to compensate the networks for the ability to skip their share of the advertising.
Sony decision in more peril than you think (Score:3, Interesting)
But that is all it said. Most notably, the court ruled that based on the time of the suit, studies showed that few people were fast forwarding over commercials when they time-shifted, because it was a pain to do. (Back then all you could do was go into FF with big mechanical buttons) and try to aim for the end of commercial. There was no on-screen scan, no commercial skip, no 30 second advance button.
The court used this to conclude that the time-shifters weren't taking money from the studios pockets, in fact they were giving them more because more people could watch a show thanks to their betamax.
Unfortunately, this logic is all but gone. Everbody commercial skips now because it's easy, and on a PVR it's really, really easy, and so you always do it. I see 1 commercial out of 100, if that, thanks to my Tivo. The court, looking at that, could rule quite differently.
This wasn't all the ruling, however. One other important part was that because there were free programs on TV like PBS shows (today they would also talk about C-SPAN) that clearly vcrs should be legal for people who want to tape those and do whatever they want (including make libraries.)
But that doesn't bear on commercial elimination, just on the recoder's right to exist as a linear recorder.
The studios will argue that the 1982 Betamax court did not know about 2002 technology, and would not have come to the same conclusion about how today's recorders are not hurting the commercial prospects of studios.
It was a 5-4 decision, and the chief justice was on the minority side, by the way.
It's important as well to understand what the time-shifting ruling meant.
Copying a tv show off the air is copying in the sense that copyright law defines it. It is an infringement under normal analysis of the studio's exclusive right to make such copies.
What the court did was say that "If the reason you're making the copy is just to watch it later -- including probably watching the commercials too -- then this copy is a fair use, not an infringement.
If, for example, you were taping off the air to sell the copies, that would not be a fair use, it would be a very clear infringement.
And if you tape off the air to build a library -- well, the court never said that was OK. People just took the time-shifting logic to imply this. We don't really know what the court felt about that.
So this is a complex issue with much left to resolve.