Television’s future remains murky as content providers and cable companies get ready for battle, and streaming services continue to gain momentum.
“But change is going to come, and amid news that Google is interested in entering the cable TV business and continued rumors that Apple will be releasing its own branded television set, we also have to wonder what’s going to happen with streaming services like Hulu and Netflix,” reports Digital Trends.
The article suggests it is the cable companies that have the most to worry about (those that control the last model). “Forget applications having a say in all this: The real war is going to be fought between cable networks and the content providers that want to move on to a new format.”
“Farther off, I think [YouTube] will challenge Hulu first. Netflix is more like a library. Google is a beast and you have to keep an eye on those guys,” TalkPoint CEO Nick Balletta says. “They have the muscle and cash to weather the storm.”
Balletta believes adoption of connected TVs will take root by late 2012, and before then we’ll see significant fragmentation before we can truly cut the cord.
The Pew Internet Research Center found that about one-third of adults (18+ with tablets and/or app-enabled phones) use 3 to 5 apps at least once a week.
The new study examines the percentage of consumers who use their downloaded apps on a regular basis and suggests there is a significant range of adoption varying amongst different age groups.
Pew discovered that only 17 percent of phone users and 7 percent of tablet owners indicate they choose not to use apps at all.
“The share of adult cell phone owners who have downloaded an app nearly doubled in the past two years,” reports Lost Remote, “rising from 22 percent in September 2009 to 38 percent in August 2011.”
The most popularly downloaded apps were those that provided updates on news, weather, sports or stocks; helped communication with friends/family; and enabled learning about something users found personally interesting.
“And 43 percent say they’re using apps to watch TV and movies, which is likely dominated by Netflix and Hulu,” indicates the article.
Hollywood studios are starting to use Facebook as a direct-to-consumer platform for streaming films, possibly cutting out services such as Hulu, Netflix and Amazon in the process.
Universal, Lionsgate and Warner Bros. have distributed some 45 films via the Social Cinema app from Milyoni (pronounced million-eye). “What Zynga is to social gaming, Milyoni is to social entertainment,” reads the company’s website.
Miramax and Paramount have used similar apps to offer movies for Facebook credits on fan pages.
Rentals based on credits are running the equivalent of $3-$5. Facebook draws a 30 percent cut of transaction revenues.
Ad Age Digital suggests the studios’ willingness to offer rentals via social network sites “may reflect their desire to foster competition among online distribution platforms,” adding, “Miramax CEO Mike Lang said that digital monopolies were a greater threat to the film industry than piracy and that his studio had been aware of the importance of a competitive marketplace when doing deals with Netflix and Hulu.”
According to the new “Global Internet Phenomena Report” from broadband solutions provider Sandvine, North Americans have officially embraced the “post-PC” era.
The report suggests that for the first time, U.S. consumers are using their gaming consoles, smartphones and tablets more than PCs for entertainment.
“[We have] entered a post-PC era, in which the majority of real-time entertainment traffic on North America’s fixed access networks is destined for devices other than a laptop or desktop computer,” Sandvine reports. “Game consoles, settop boxes, smart TVs, tablets, and mobile devices being used within the home combine to receive 55 percent of all real-time entertainment traffic.”
Interesting stats from the “Beyond Bytes” infographic: 96 percent of broadband subscribers use real-time entertainment each month, 83 percent of broadband users access YouTube videos each month (compared to 20 percent for Netflix), and real-time entertainment as a percentage of peak period downstream traffic has doubled since 2009.
Peter Kafka interviews Peter Chernin in this interesting 11-minute video from the AsiaD conference.
“As News Corp.’s longtime chief operating officer, Chernin was instrumental in developing Hulu,” reports All Things D. “He explained why he wanted to build the video site — in part to compete with Google and YouTube — and why he thinks its studio owners should help it thrive today — in part to compete with Netflix.” Chernin also expresses his thoughts on purchasing Yahoo.
Chernin knew IPTV would be big, but didn’t want one dominant video distributor like YouTube. Thus, the studios got together to create Hulu, which today competes with Netflix.
Chernin believes online viewers will pay $2 per month for premium content. He talks about the future of video and creating something like a digital HBO.
Janus Friis, co-founder of KaZaA, Skype, Joost and Rdio (with partner Niklas Zennstrom) is working on a new online video subscription service that will be available soon in the UK.
According to GigaOM, Friis has been “assembling an A-team of media and Web technology experts to launch a site that seems destined to replicate the model behind their music subscription site Rdio in the video space.” Offices have been set up in Santa Monica and Europe.
From the follow-up Q&A: Vdio (Vee-dee-o) is in closed beta for the UK and is privately funded, while the assembled team’s experience comes from companies such as Netflix, Microsoft, TV Guide and Napster.
A spokesperson for Zennstrom’s VC company Atomico confirmed that Zennstrom is not involved in the project.
Geek.com writer Will Shanklin believes Siri’s capabilities would be enormously expanded with access to third party apps. Currently, “Yelp and Wolfram Alpha appear to be the only ones in that elite group.”
Third party apps could enable users to play music among different streaming services, quickly use music ID, combine data from multiple services (“How about a combination of Netflix and IMDb data?”), get real-time navigation and a range of other convenient possibilities.
Siri access to Facebook could expedite posts, messages and notifications and quickly get information from friends’ profiles.
“As much as you might be blown away by Siri’s capabilities now, we will likely look back at this as ‘Siri 1.0’ five years from now,” writes Shanklin. “In much the same way that the first iPhone’s single-paged homescreen – with no third-party apps – looks primitive now, this introductory version of Siri will pale in comparison to where ‘she’ will be then.”
Netflix returned from MIPCOM last week with several new foreign TV shows it hopes will draw interest from its 25 million subscribers.
Programs include Norwegian gangster drama “Lilyhammer” starring Steve Van Zandt, French/German co-production “Borgia,” and the British supernatural drama “Being Human.”
The slate of foreign programming will join the remake of BBC drama “House of Cards” as Netflix turns to original, first-run drama series.
“Netflix has already committed to a second season of both ‘Borgia’ and ‘Lilyhammer,’ suggesting its taste for original and foreign-made fare is no passing fancy,” according to The Hollywood Reporter. “The company is also in a bidding war with Showtime and Hulu for the rights for the relaunch of cult comedy series ‘Arrested Development.'”
Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos points out the strategy is in response to customer demand, since TV shows account for 50-60 percent of total viewing on Netflix.
“We’ve moved very aggressively into this space,” Sarandos said. “The growing audience for these 1 hour serialized dramas is typically on pay TV: Showtime, HBO or Starz, those ones who are least likely to want to sell their shows to me on our (second-run) season-after model. So we have to develop the muscle to create and distributing these shows ourselves.”
Netflix has announced it will drop its controversial plan to split its streaming and DVD businesses, taking recent public outcry (and negative Wall Street reaction) into consideration.
“This means no change: one website, one account, one password…in other words, no Qwikster,” wrote CEO Reed Hastings on the company blog and via email to subscribers. Hastings also explained that the company is “now done with price changes.”
Ted Sarandos, chief content officer for Netflix, told an industry crowd at MIPCOM in early October that he was “very convinced” the proposed split was “good for the long-term health of the business. And the long-term clarity of the brand.” Hastings had also been quoted as saying the split would be necessary for improving the services in moving forward. “But,” added Sarandos, “we also hear our customers, and we want to make sure we react to that.”
Netflix’s stock was up 6.8 percent yesterday following the announcement, giving it a market value of $6.57 billion.
A comprehensive comparison between Netflix and other streaming services shows that, even after the recent criticism regarding the split of its businesses, “Netflix is still the champ, but only if you count both its the streaming and DVD mailing services.”
In his evaluation of current offerings, David Strom of ReadWriteWeb examined services such as Amazon Prime, Hulu Plus, Vudu.com and Justin.tv.
“Overall, once you leave Netflix you will find fewer choices and searching won’t be as easy to find something to watch,” he writes. “Netflix has a great search engine that won’t just look for movie titles but also check for actors and other principals involved in the movie itself, something the other services don’t do as well at.”
Another upside to Netflix is the ability to use devices such as the iPad or TiVo box to stream movies. While of the services enable streaming to your Windows or Mac Web browser, they’re not all compatible with other devices.
“So while you might be upset about paying for two bills for your video rentals from Netflix, unless you are willing to spend more time searching for content, you are probably better off sticking with the service for the time being, at least until the others catch up with their content licenses,” Strom concludes. “Or if you already have a cable TV subscription, investigate whether it offers something similar to Comcast’s Xfinity and see what their coverage is there. Ironically, that might be your best alternative to Netflix after all.”
Amazon’s launch of the Kindle Fire tablet may have an impact on Netflix, since the new tablet will make it easier for users to watch streaming video content via Amazon.
“With its $199 price point the tablet could sell like crazy this Christmas,” reports Forbes. “Users will be encouraged to buy Amazon Prime in order to speed their Amazon purchases and Prime just happens to come complete with Amazon’s streaming video service.”
The decision for consumers between Amazon Prime and Netflix will likely be based on pricing and variety of content offerings.
Amazon Prime beats Netflix on price, set at $80 a year ($6.67 per month), while Netflix streaming costs $8 a month.
Netflix, however, has more variety of content with 51,000 titles currently available for streaming, compared to Amazon’s 11,000.
Amazon may soon be able to compete in this regard with added content from Fox and CBS deals. Netflix has similar deals with Fox and CBS and a new DreamWorks Animation deal, but it will lose movies from Sony and Disney with the loss of Starz.
Both companies may press Hollywood to license more content for streaming, but continuing to pay more for films could potentially break Netflix, while Amazon has other sources of revenue to cover costs.
Farhad Manjoo, writing for Slate, offers a compelling counterpoint to Facebook’s updated “share everything with everyone” philosophy.
The article suggests that Mark Zuckerberg’s vision for Facebook’s newly-designed profile feature (“it’s called Timeline, and it’s beautiful”) involves encouraging sites to develop social apps within Facebook, a grand vision that could dramatically change our digital lives. On the surface, this sounds like a fascinating idea, but there may be problems that evolve from too much sharing.
“If Facebook’s CEO has his way, everything you do online will be shared by default,” explains the Slate article. “You read, you watch, you listen, you buy — and everyone you know will hear all about it on Facebook.”
The article uses Spotify, Netflix and Hulu to illustrate Zuckerberg’s concept of “frictionless” sharing: “What he means is that I don’t have to bother with the ‘friction’ of choosing to tell you that I like something. On Facebook, now, merely experiencing something is enough to trigger sharing.”
Manjoo does not have privacy concerns or hesitation regarding Facebook’s financial gain based on his personal information. However, the author believes that the “nightmare” of “frictionless sharing” is more about Facebook killing taste. He believes that Zuckerberg is essentially lowering the bar by providing an all-access pass to things we don’t necessarily share with everything because they aren’t worth mentioning in the first place (read: boring).
While Manjoo enjoys sharing and discovering new media via Facebook and Twitter, he fears the day these services no longer serve as tools for navigating recommendations once they are bogged down in minutiae.
“That’s why I welcome any method that makes it easier for people to share stuff,” he writes. “If you like this article, you should Like this article. And even if you hate this article, you should Like this article (add a comment telling your friends why I’m a moron). But if you’re just reading this article — if you have no strong feelings about it either way, and if you suspect that your friends will consider it just another bit of noise in their already noisy world — please, do everyone a favor and don’t say anything about it all.”
Dish Networks has announced its Blockbuster Movie Pass service that will offer streaming video; DVDs, Blu-ray discs and games by mail; and a satellite subscription service with on-demand movie channels.
Launching October 1, the service will initially be available to Dish subscribers and offered to others at a later date.
Movie Pass will include more than 100,000 movies and TV shows by mail, 5,000 streamed movies to TV and 10,000 to computer, and 3,000 games by mail. Users will have access to 20 premium Dish movie channels and the ability to exchange discs in-store at Blockbuster locations.
Current Dish Network subscribers will pay $10 per month for the service, while new Dish subscribers will have an opportunity for a free introductory year.
While the streaming capacity of the Blockbuster Movie Pass is not yet that of Netflix or Amazon, users will have access to movie offerings through Dish movie channels about a month earlier than other services. Also, Movie Pass touts “one company, one bill and one connection,” something that Netflix no longer has after splitting its streaming and mail-in services.
Netflix announced a partnership with Facebook to allow members to share what they are watching on Netflix with their family, friends and associates via the social networking site. However, this feature will NOT be available in the U.S. (only in Canada and Latin America) due to a 1988 law that makes sharing that information illegal.
The Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) was created to prevent “wrongful disclosure of video tape rental or sale records (or similar audio visual materials, to cover items such as video games and the future DVD format).” Congress passed the law after Robert Bork’s video rental history was published during his Supreme Court nomination.
“Unfortunately, we will not be offering this feature in the U.S. because a 1980’s law creates some confusion over our ability to let U.S. members automatically share the television shows and movies they watch with their friends on Facebook,” explains Netflix Director of Government Relations Michael Drobac. “The good news, however, is that some forward-thinking members of Congress have introduced legislation, H.R. 2471, that would allow you to make this choice… If you want the choice to share with your friends, please email Congress to urge them to pass this modernizing legislation.”
According to Wired, Netflix currently has 24 million subscribers inside the U.S. and only a million subscribers internationally.
Microsoft confirmed it will launch Xbox TV this holiday season. CNNMoney reports that the service will be similar to services offered in other countries which allow Xbox users to stream Sky TV in the UK, Canal Plus in France, and FoxTel in Australia.
At Microsoft’s recent financial analyst meeting in Anaheim, CEO Steve Balmer confirmed the company is working with “dozens or hundreds of additional content suppliers.”
Xbox TV will use Bing to search for content and use Kinect for voice or motion commands. Microsoft will also seek to create a social experience for TV shows and movies around its 35 million Xbox Live community.
In related news, Comcast and Verizon are reportedly in talks with Microsoft to enable cable subscriptions through the Xbox 360. “The tech giant’s gaming console, which already streams content from sources like Netflix, Hulu Plus and others, could in effect become a cable box if Microsoft manages to strike a deal ahead of its upcoming release of Xbox TV,” suggests ReadWriteWeb.
