ABC To Offer Full Shows Online

vitaly.friedman writes to mention an Ars Technica story on the ABC's newest bid to stay relevant in the Information Age. As of the end of this month the network will be airing certain popular television shows on the ABC website, starting the morning after their first broadcast. From the article: "All programs will be shown in their entirety, including commercials which cannot be avoided. That's a smart move on ABC's part, as it ensures that advertisers will get another shot at hawking their wares to an audience that might otherwise change channels during commercial breaks or fast-forward through them if recorded. Aside from being unable to avoid commercials, watching the programs will be similar to watching timeshifted content in that viewers will be able to pause, fast forward, and rewind."

Comments

Re:Cannot?

[Anonymous Coward]

They tie you to the chair and wire your eyelids open.

After all the customer is always right, and with all media (google included) you have to remember that the advertiser is the customer t and you the viewer is the product being sold.

No Commercial Skipping?

[JonTurner]

>>viewers will be able to pause, fast forward, and rewind

What's this about not being able to skip commercials? Any commercials?

Say I want to watch just the final ten minutes of something, does that mean I must sit through SEVENTEEN minutes of commercials first before I'm "allowed" to view the ending?

No thanks. I (and everyone else, I suspect) will just wait for the Torrent.

DING DING DING! About bloody time!

[sgant]

Forget the morons above when they complain about "oh, it's the day after? WAH WAH WAH" or "Can't skip the commercials WAH WAH WAH".

They're trying to embrace a new delivery medium and you these idiots are fricken complaining about it. Come on, ABC should be congratulated for thinking outside the standard line that RIAA and the MPAA have been harping on. The net will make a great delivery service and they're heading out into it full steam ahead.

But no, months ago people were saying this is what they should do, and now that they're doing it, it's not enough. Give them what they want, and you get a big "fuck you" in return.

I welcome this.

Re:DING DING DING! About bloody time!

[Digital Vomit]

They're not quite doing what we said they should do. Here's what we said they should do:

- Offer television programs as downloadable files (e.g. a nice XviD or something) with no restrictions that can be archived, traded, and/or watched at your leisure.

Here's what they did do:

- Offer televesion programs in a restricted format watchable online only as streaming videos with no opportunity to record or, apparently, skip commercials (or so it would seem from the article).

You, like the TV studios, still apparently don't "get it".

Currently the P2P networks are providing exactly what we want. That's the target the networks need to aim for. Nothing less will succeed to any significant degree.

The networks need to provide the shows (with or without commercials) at varying levels of quality (for higher or lower bandwidth users) for download (preferably as torrents) with no strings attached before they air. That would work. Anything less is like aiming for failure.

They have to take a psychological approach to this one. People like shiny and official. Package the TV shows as something you'll want to collect and archive. That will get people downloading them.

And they need to ignore the fact that there are some people who would strip out the commercials and re-share them. This is unavoidable and proven not to have a significant negative impact (e.g. music, movies).

As for commercials, here's an idea: maybe they'll have to start making commercials with the actors in the show hawking the wares. You could make mini, thirty second skits that advertize big name products like they used to do when TV was in its infancy. It could be presented as a little "slice of life" of the characters in the show. "OMG! Jack Bauer uses Crest! I should, too!"

You probably couldn't do all commercials on a network like that, but maybe for certain downloadable shows you could. People would want to watch and re-watch that because it is entertaining.

Re:DING DING DING! About bloody time!

[utexaspunk]

They're not quite doing what we said they should do. Here's what we said they should do:

Offer television programs as downloadable files (e.g. a nice XviD or something) with no restrictions that can be archived, traded, and/or watched at your leisure.

Who the hell was saying that? That would be suicide for them if they did that.

Free on iTMS, too?

[ZombieRoboNinja]

I wonder if Apple will still be charging a couple bucks an episode when viewers now have the choice of getting a commercial-loaded copy for free instead.

It'd be nice if the ad-supported version were available for free through iTMS, but that would probably require ABC to actually pay APPLE per download to cover bandwidth costs and overhead, which might be problematic.

Anyway, if Apple doesn't work out SOME kind of new deal, it seems safe to say their $2 iTMS episodes aren't gonna be selling very well anymore, except among the video iPod loyalists.

Re:Free on iTMS, too?

[Daniel_Staal]

But the versions on iTunes don't have commercials, and can be played away from the computer. Depending on quality and useablity, it may well be true that both versions have value to consumers. I'd guess they may well be able to co-exist, serving different consumers.

Watch at work?

[Brit_in_the_USA]

I see a huge backlash from companies when they start catching their employees watching these shows at work.

An easy to use access system (a web page) will mean anyone will be able to find and watch them with no software install (p2p etc.). This could be hard for IT administrators to stamp out.

I gaze into my crystal ball....
....and see Slashdot headlines of "Study claims Billions of lost revenue weekly from staff watching streaming TV at work"

Geeze louise

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

I don't know how many times I have heard people complaining about iTunes selling television shows. How many people are in an uproar because ABC is making money first from commericals aired during their shows on television AND by selling the show on iTMS. Guess what, they also sell their shows on DVD AND make money off syndication.

What is the purpose of your complaining?

First, you don't have to buy the shows on iTMS, most of you complaining probably don't even own an iPod let alone the iPod that works with this service.

Second, many people actually enjoy the shows that are being sold on iTMS, that is, they want to watch it more then once. I would jump on the bandwagon with you if iTMS sold shows for $1.99 per view, but you are buying a video file you can watch over again. It may not be within the same month, or year, but many people do enjoy watching a full season of TV over a few days or weeks.

Why is it that some people are so jealous or fanatical about companies that make money? Why bother to complain. If a company or entity forced you to contribute to their profit, then that is reason for complaining (i.e. the government and taxes or gas companies). But some corporation that sells television shows is really no target for the kind of criticism and whining people are doing. Your just wasting your breath and straining your fingers.

When someone complains about a product or service they have no intention of buying or participating in, then that is just moronic. It is a classic definition of an idiot.

please. stfu

[aixou]

Maybe if advertisers stopped making commercials that are crap, they wouldn't need to lock us out of fast forward during commercials.

You whiny bastard. Seriously. These companies can't do anything right, can they?
All I see here is people complaining and getting modded up for it. As far as I'm concerned this is a great step in a great direction.

I think what it boils down to is that most people here just want shit for free, and will say anything to pretend that they have some valid objection with the system and that it warrants theft (or "copyright infringement" for the pedants).

Free/opensource software falls victim to the same tripe -- people pretend that they stand by the ideologies but really just want stuff for free -- and use the ideology as a guise to pirate non-free software like photoshop or Windows.

bleh.

Re:Cannot?

[Elladan]

This is a good point, but I think you're failing to see the incredible horribleness of corporate video offerings from an ease of use standpoint.

For example, I won't even consider touching the video on commercial web sites (except google). Why? Well, it's not because I'm morally opposed to downloading a video from ABC or CNN. No... it's because their video always sucks to an unbelievable degree, to the point where watching it is a nightmare. Let's consider:

• Video is invariably hidden in some retarded web site which opens a window to try to force me to play the video in a thumbnail. Thus, I have to use firefox to tear their HTML apart to find a real link to the video. This is an extreme hassle - I hate having to debug other peoples' web sites just to use them.
• Must have Microsoft Winfuck XP SP3 XXX mega pr0n MAX version 10 to install the player. Therefore, there is no chance I will ever consider watching this video. Use a generic video format + player, or game over.
• Must install their software. BZZZT forget it. Too hard. Won't work. Will have a virus.
• Must watch the video live on the network. I used to work at a company that wrote software to do this. It never worked well. Still doesn't. If I can't download it first, forget it.
• Their software has a 100% chance of sucking. Case in point: Quicktime. My girlfriend has a Mac iBook with Quicktime on it. Does it suck? Yes, unbelievably so. The video is crappy and jittery, and the full screen button (get this) is greyed out and has a buy a non-crippled player ad next to it.
• I can't skip commercials? That means the player doesn't work right. Hello, fast-forward? This thing is inferior to a VCR from 1982. Forget it.

... etc. The point is, the reason Bittorrent is so incredibly popular isn't because people are so excited that they can get an episode of Lost without commercials for free. They could already do that -- VCRs are old hat. The great thing about Bittorrent is that it's incredibly convenient compared to any of these pile-of-garbage corporate offerings.

And that's the problem with this ABC thing. It, like all the garbage before it, sucks. The network that created the show is going to offer a vastly inferior experience, with more hassle, than some random guys using bittorrent.

If they wanted to do something innovative, and better, they would simply have placed MPEG4 files (or torrents to keep their costs down) on their web site, with the commercials. This would have been much cheaper and easier to develop for them, and would be a better experience for their users. But of course, they never will do this, because the industry is insane.