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How Battlestar Galactica Killed TV
Don Melanson writes "Following up on the MPAA going after torrent sites, you may be interested in Mindjack's latest feature - Piracy is Good? How Battlestar Galactica Killed Broadcast TV by Mark Pesce. It includes a post-script written in reponse to the recent Torrent site shutdowns." From the article: "While you might assume the SciFi Channel saw a significant drop-off in viewership as a result of this piracy, it appears to have had the reverse effect: the series is so good that the few tens of thousands of people who watched downloaded versions told their friends to tune in on January 14th, and see for themselves. From its premiere, Battlestar Galactica has been the most popular program ever to air on the SciFi Channel, and its audiences have only grown throughout the first series. Piracy made it possible for 'word-of-mouth' to spread about Battlestar Galactica."
I don't see how this could be... The new Battlestar Galactica is terrible, absolutely terrible. Now if they were showing reruns of the old series, maybe, but I want my 40 minutes back from even watching the torrent of the new one.
Did you just watch the pilot, or the actual episodes?
I *hated* the pilot, but after seeing the first season I went back and watched it again, and I can totally see why they made all the changes they did, other than the stupid glowing spine thing.
I'm a big fan of the original series (fond memories of when I was = 5), I own the DVDs, etc etc, but the new one is great too in its own way. They even gave Richard Hatch a recurring guest role.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
Before southpark went big it was thrown around the net in RM format. Everyone loved it, and a lot of its popularity was attributed to that burst of exposure, I know I sure wouldn't have cared because, who has time to check out all the esoteric shit on basic cable? It's sad that as soon as the show was popular enough they cracked down on the sites hosting the rm's.
Seriously, without that exposure theyd just be another gay comedy central abortion nobody heard about, fans went crazy getting them publicity.
$50 at 20:1 odds BSG does the same thing when dvd time comes around.
The first rule of USENET is you do not talk about USENET.
Hmm. I agree downloading isn't bad for series TV. I see your point, afterall TFA was about a series. For series shows with an established viewer base, I can totally see Internet distribution as a supplemental method of getting the show out (pirated or authorized) but I can't see torrents or P2P replacing or, frankly, even harming broadcast TV.
98% of all households in America have a TV, 64% have cable, another 24% have satellite or a combination while only 31%-50% (depending on your source) have a computer and only 13% of those hooked up to the Internet have broadband access- a pre-requisite for downloading or streaming TV with any kind of qaulity.
DVDs are a different thing altogether, I love the extras (one of the reasons I buy them anyway) but I also have Starz from Real, and there are extras for movies also. The major difference though, is that I can not select at will WHAT part of the extras I want to watch. The same is true for a download, you can sure skip through, but you can't select a scene like you could with a DVD. Plus, if your DVD player stops working, your DVD is still good. The same is not true for downloaded shows.
R(k)
Actually, in the UK (where we saw the ending first) Galactica is already on DVD, both the pilot and series 1.
It went arount the net in Quicktime format.
soxmas.mov
It was an story about Santa fighting Jesus over the spirit of Christmas.
It was due to this clip and Georgy Clooney's forwarding tapes around Hollywood that South Park got made into a show.
But this all doesn't mean you can steal anything you want. If the creator of the content wants to send out the content for free to create publicity, that is his/her prerogative. You don't get to take it upon yourself to "do them a favor".
Well, technically, that wasn't legal either. But the **AA didn't care (much) because:
1) You still had a physical medium, so if you give your copy to your friend, you don' have it. Unles...
2) You made copies, which wasn't as common as it is now. And then, everything was analog and still required a physical media, so making copies wasn't as easy as click & save.
It's sort of a slippery slope argument, I guess. Making those early copies wasn't a huge deal (although the **AA companies fought against them back in the day, I believe), but now with the technology we have those same old practices are really causing problems for content producers & broadcasters that expect the old business models to continue to function.
Bottom line is... Limiting DVD releases geographically is almost as dumb as trying not to exploit the exposure of an internet release, and getting the big bucks out of the premiere. Keeping people all over the world on hold might not work as well as feeding them what they want at an acceptable cost. I definitely would pay for it.
There was an interview with the article's author on the media report last week. You can listen to the audio or read the transcript here
For people who think that's wrong: It's not.
To steal something you have to intend to deprive the owner of it.
While this obviously means you can't accidently steal something (Which is true for a lot of crimes. You can't accidently trespass, either.), it also means it's not theft if you honestly were borrowing something with the intent to return it before the owner wanted it.
Of course, the problem is proving, in court, that you intended to return it. That really only works if there was no logical way for you to have kept it. Maybe if you walked off down the street with someone's pet elephant or something, but normally that doesn't work.
And you have to demonstrate you intended to return it before they would have wanted it back, which basically means 'before they noticed it missing'. Note 'intended'...you don't have to really get it back, just intend to. If you get hit by a car while returning it, you're covered.
This is also why walking up and destroying something of someone else's is called 'theft'. You're intending to deprive them of their property, even though you, yourself, are not intending to keep it.
However, as copyright infringement is not theft, there is no exception with 'I intended to delete it' or whatever the analogy would be.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
ACNielsen is the ratings service that advertisers use to gauge how many people watch a particular show. They then go to what is called the upfront market where media buying companies buy commercial space in bulk from channels. The prices set are based on ACNielsen's numbers and the market - it's a bit like an auction. If advertisers do not buy ads for a particular show that covers the costs and the channel it is on is supported by advertising, it goes away and is replaced by a new show that advertisers will buy advertising for so it covers costs.
As to why it is your problem, it means if you don't watch the show in a way ACNielsen tracks it, the show is more likely to go away. It's not about legality - although I think if you live in the U.S., there are a lot of nuances in IP law and I don't know if your particular line of argumentation would work in a court of law - might also depend on your court.
As for your other comments, you don't need to care. However, you should understand that there is a causal relationship between not watching it on TV and the show not lasting. Personally, I don't watch TV, so it doesn't make a difference to me. I'm just pointing out how the system works so you can make choices to your advantage.
And to think, about 20+ years ago, Metallica credited their rise to success mainly in part to the bootleggers who copied their shows and albums, and distributed them. Then, come the Napster era, Metallica turned right around on the very same thing that brought them to fame to begin with. I wonder how long it's going to take before the exact same thing happens in this case?
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
I have an extensive DVD libary that proves that he's a cretin. Next.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
AC Nielsen makes their money by alleging that their sample set is representative of the entire tv-viewing population.
Actually, TV commercial-viewing population, since the advertisers are who ultimately who pays Nielson. The objective popularity of the show is immaterial, except to the extent it sells commercial time.
If you're watching the commercial-free version on your computer, you've effectively dropped out of the people who "count", and Nielsen is going to exclude your group from the reporting even if they could track you. They've done this with VCRs for years.
Not that this should concern you because there's not really anything you could do about it unless Nielson asks you to use their box.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
The truth is that in 2002, Turner CEO Jamie Kellner said that editing out commercials entirely with special software in DVRs is stealing. Nobody cares if you hit the fast-forward button. The networks care if you use software to automatically edit the commercials out entirely.
I usually agree with your posts, but in this case you are wrong.
"Turner Broadcasting CEO Jamie Kellner is quoted in the trade journal 'Cableworld' saying, 'Your contract with the network when you get the show is you're going to watch the spots. Any time you skip a commercial you're actually stealing the programming.'"
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.