Slashdot Mirror
Mark Cuban Declares War on GooTube
PreacherTom writes "Mark Cuban — the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks, tech entrepreneur, and self-proclaimed 'blog maverick' — has always been outspoken in his ridicule of Google and YouTube. Now, it appears he's willing to put his money where his mouth is. Cuban is so convinced that GooTube will be a failure that he is in the process of acquiring the news agency owned by Robert Tur, currently involved in serious litigation with Google over copyright violations. With billions on both sides, this could be a real clash of the titans."
Jeez, Mark Cuban is a whiney little brat (or substitute your own word that begins with a B here). You guys need to learn that just because you have all the money you don't get to make all of the rules. Most of them, sure, but not all. Go to news.google.com and search for Mark Cuban and see for yourself...
Mark Cuban is a maverick in a lot of ways. I have actually had the pleasure of meeting him several times during the course of my previous job here in Dallas, and in-person and in everday situations (I've spoken with him both in a business and casual setting), he is a cordial, and generally "normal" person. But he is not not stupid. Maverick is a good word for him, as he may not always be diplomatic or smart about his emotional reactions, but he is definitely not dumb when it comes to many business decisions. My question is: what is he getting out of this? Is it a pride thing? So needs to be right he's cast his lot with the opponents? The money motivator is there, but it's not like he needs more. I think he may be bored and just needs something to focus on that he feels is a sure thing.
Touting MyEclipse AJAX Tools
Why you ask would an owner of a sports franchise care? Because he isn't just the owner the the Dallas Mavericks. He is a media guy who owns HD-Net. An broadcasting and media company that creates HD media and of course the last thing he wants is his media to appear on YouTube. He is a wannbe Ted Turner/Rupert Murdoc.
Cuban is also a partner in RedSwoosh[35] -- a company which uses peer-to-peer technology to deliver rich media, including video and software to a user's PC.
commonly known as a PUP (potentially unwanted program)
or as we in the tech industry call it "spyware"
http://www.siteadvisor.com/sites/redswoosh.net
And we know Mark Cuban from where? Oh...thats right, his money, and not from anything really noteworthy that he has done. good, that settles things. Google=innovative technology company that continues to lead, Cuban=Lucky rich guy with sports team and Television channels, and a technology company that no one has heard of. Now I kind of understand why he is upset.
No, not at all (the word you're thinking of is gut, oo is not pronounced like that in German). Maybe it's Dutch. And über is mostly used for locations.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Mark Cuban made his money selling Broadcast.com to Yahoo, so is it possible he still has a stake in Yahoo and this is nothing more than a territorial piss and moan contest at the competition?
Nah, the Dutch word is "goed", so that doesn't fit either.
The guy owns HD Net (and the sister channel, HD Net Movies). When nobody was doing HD Content, he got HD rights to minor college games and NHL games, and built a little network there. He also bought the right to do transfers of old shows. He's an active participant on AVS Forum, explaining what is going on in the HD world. The craziest thing, you could only get HD Net from DirecTV and a local Texas station for its first few years. He bought a local television station just to run HD Net OTA to prove that OTA HD was practical.
When I met him very briefly (like 1 second) at CES some years back, watching him speak was amazing, not for what he said, but to hear the AWE from the representatives of companies like TI that were talking about how nobody did more for their industry than him.
The man has loads of money, and is spending it to push things that he believes will make the world a better place. He also has an ego the size of Texas. He had is own show on HD Net (where he could be a big dork but have his players on), and HD Net's coverage of CES was interviewing him.
The guy made a fortune selling broadcast.com at JUST the right time, and is now pushing technology the way he wants it, where a few gambles can make a difference. HD Net's sports coverage forced ESPN to adopt HD content before they wanted to, and DirecTV used HD Net to anchor HD programming when there was almost no programming. If it wasn't for him, the local affiliates would have gotten their dream of HD being a fig leaf to get public airwaves, where 1/6 of the channel space would carry normal 480i programming, and 5/6s be sold for data services, etc. Instead, HD Net helped force everyone's hand, and HD is here and real.
The guy's hobby appears to be bending public will to his, and he does a good job of it. While these "investments" may not have been profitable in a traditional sense (I doubt that he loses money, but he probably isn't getting a better ROI than having plowed his money into the S&P 500), it seems to have made him happy. He owns a basketball team, and he has a television network that buys the rights to do HD Transfers of whatever shows he wants to watch in HD. While the rest of us are at the mercy of the marketing departments guessing what we want, he can go make it happen. That's a pretty cool hobby.
Alex