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NBC Chief Slamming Apple
On the heels of the beta of NBC's and News Corp.'s less-than-killer Hulu music store, NBC's chief Jeff Zucker is speaking out and saying the darnedest things. First, news.com reports, with derision, that Zucker demanded a cut of Apple's iPod revenue. That'll sure happen. Next, AppleInsider caught Zucker urging colleagues to take a stand against Apple's iTunes, charging that the digital download service was undermining the ability of traditional media companies to set profitable rates for their content online.
he sees what is happening to the RIAA and is scared. Labels are really no longer necessary for a large number of bands to get their music out, with digital distribution, significantly lower production costs etc. And a lot of bands are dropping their labels as fast as they can. The reason the RIAA hates iTunes is that iTunes isn't controlled by them thus has no qualms about selling independent content. They want to launch their own service that only has bands signed by them to try to force bands to stay signed, but its just not going to happen.
NBC is worried about following in their footsteps. While the bar for TV shows is a bit higher, its certainly not out of reach. For instance, how much would it really cost a group of independent people to make the next Seinfeld? Not a lot, esp. now that good video editing tools are pretty cheap(if not free in some cases). Look at how "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" started, the pilot episode cost them less than $100 to make. Imagine if they promoted that on iTunes instead of selling it to a network? They probably could have got enough money to continue to make more episodes and live comfortably. NBC sees its own irrelevance and is doing everything it can to try to stay relevant, but long term its just not going to happen.
Monstar L
I think each of the versions of Law & Order is a fine show in itself. I do think it's about time to kill the original.
The problem with NBC is that they drive shows into the ground. They're doing it with Deal or No Deal and Law & Order. They did it with Dateline before.
You can only eat steak so many times...
I love the logic in that. If these were the car and oil companies, Shell would be seeking a free revenue stream from Ford because, god damnit, their cars run on Shell's content. Albeit that Shell has already been paid for that content, but anyways. WE WANT MORE MONEY, GIVE IT TO USSSSS!
Some cleanup is needed in the high-up of media companies, how can these asshats even remotely expect to run a profitable distribution system in the near future.
Apple pays the record labels for every download they sell. If they're not paying them enough, the labels have the right to take their business elsewhere but (except for NBC) they don't, so by definition they're making enough money.
The key to understanding his complaint is his phrase "in terms of pricing". What that means is that the labels can no longer monopolistically control the price of recordings any more.
And I think this is a good thing, good for the fans, and good for the people who really deserve to benefit from it: the musicians.
I think such a loss of control is the reason the labels are so opposed to Internet radio: because everyone and his dog can run a streaming radio station from their home, Internet radio takes away from the big labels the ability to decide who the big stars are going to be. Payola just doesn't work anymore when fans have a choice of thousands of streaming music stations to listen to at every computer.
The result of this is that I've noticed artists who were first made popular at places like Radio Paradise getting airplay on traditional broadcast stations. And I can't remember the last time I listened to a ClearChannel station.
Request your free CD of my piano music.
Basically, in other words his statement reads: Competition undermines the ability of the media cartel to engage in price-fixing. Over the last 150 years, America's love of the free market has made America into the most powerful economy on earth. Now the media cartel wants to drag us into the 19th century, and up to now, our politicians are doing their best to help them for the most part.
At least in my country, saying "lets all get together to drive this guy out of business" is criminal, plain and simple. I hope these comments expose the "content industry" for the illegal price-fixing cartel it is. I also hope Steve laughs himself to sleep.
Except that's not what he did. NBC's explained why they left iTunes and how they think the content sales model should be structured. Other companies are free to follow their lead or ignore it; most will probably sit on the side lines and watch how this plays out. If Apple wins they will stay put; if NBC builds a viable and profitable product they will copy it.
The key issues are:
1) How bad does Apple need the content to sell iPods? As a hardware company they seem to view the content as a tool to drive profitable hardware sales and want it to be as cheap as possible to lock people into their hardware. OTOH, they are not stupid and if they can raise prices without significantly impacting sales then probably would do so.
2) How bad does NBC need the iPods to drive content sales? Given they can distribute content in iPod compatible formats independent of Apple not being on iTunes doesn't seem to be that much of an issue; but that means they are at Apple's mercy for compatibility. Apple could "break" something in an iTunes upgrade that makes it impossible to load non-iTunes DRM content onto an iPod, just as they changed the way video out works so that devices need new electronics to still work with iPods (a strange move given how neat the Philip's DVD / iPod player combo is).
3) What level of pricing are consumers willing to pay? NBC could, for example, develop a tiered pricing model - free for ad laden content up to a premium price for an ad free version. In addition, they could do a bundle where the original purchaser of the DVD gets online content as well, such as additional scenes or an iPod ready version of the movie in an attempt to limit the value of used DVDs in the resale market.
In the end, it is not unusual this rift occurred - both sides want to maximize their slice of what the consumer wants to pay. So far Apple has done that better than the content providers; now that the market has matured the content providers will start flexing their muscle and trying to get a bigger slice of the pie.
Personally, I think we will see a resurgence of the subscription based model; with a slightly different look. Consider a content provider / MS / Blockbuster / Tivo alliance - MS produces a player OS (and hardware in conjunction with other manufacturers) with strong DRM; Blockbuster expands it's online offerings to include a subscription to d/l content as well as keeps the DVD by mail/ return to store get a new movie model, Tivo provides the set top box to play d/l content on the TV and the content providers provide content. Getting everyone to play nice will be a challenge but the pieces are already there.
Blockbuster already has the content via subscription model with their Blockbuster Online operation; TIVO has the pieces for d/l and storing content for TV viewing; and MS makes cell phone OS's so they are familiar with the loss leader hardware to sell services model.
The question is will Apple do this with the content providers or will someone else?
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Heroes is the only thing I watch on NBC. I used to but the episodes missed on iTunes but now there service is windows only and twice the price so I have set up a DVr on my Mac to record them.
Oh well NBC is pissed because their sales have plummeted since they left Itunes. The problem is the people most likely to buy music and TV shows online are those with extra cash and a large piece of those are Mac users. Talk about pissing off the wrong crowd.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
They've already gotten rid of me. A couple years ago, I decided to watch TV shows only on DVD. At first, it was inconvenient, because the shows I wanted to watch weren't available on DVD. But after a couple years, they started appearing, and now my Netflix queue for TV shows is growing faster than I can watch them.
Sure, very few shows are available on HD DVD, but then I only have analog cable service. Now I can watch unedited shows without commercials or overlays, and the picture quality is better than cable.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
They make their money by controlling access to TRANSMITTERS and screwing:
* producers (the people who actually put the shows together,)
* consumers (the people who want to watch the shows the producers put together) AND
* advertisers, (the people who pony up the cash for access to the process while getting sold on nebulous "audience share" numbers based on the "facts" that people don't have any friggin' lives, families, pets, bladders or colons to distract them.)
NBC and the rest of the broadcasters are entirely UNNECESSARY on the internet.
No wonder they're running around like buggy whip makers after Henry Ford.
They're all going to get KILLED (and the world will go on fine after they're gone.)
They first show that gets to solicit money directly from the audience is going to slaughter them; absolutely slaughter them.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
What I can't get is that they complain about only making $15 million off of the iTMS store, while the per-episode price of their content remains ~30% higher than buying the series on DVD. When they sell a DVD, there are a lot more people taking cuts, such as the DVD content creators, mastering studio, replication, shipping, and retail.
Yet, you don't hear them complaining about DVD box sets!
This is where I get my recommended daily allowance of "Foot in Mouth."
Exactly. That old concept of putting a lame-but-expensive show behind a popular one in hopes that people will forget to turn the channel is D-E-A-D dead. I record "Psych" (from USA, I think), "My Name Is Earl" (maybe NBC?), "The Office" (no idea), "House" (Fox) and "Bones" (CBS?). I don't know what night they're on. I don't know what station they're on. I have no freakin' clue what time they're on. All I know is that when I turn on my TV, there's usually something recorded that I want to watch.
I don't have an magical ideas about how Zucker et al can profit off that, but I honestly don't care. I'm not going back.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Everybody I hear lately (including some other 'younger than me' forty year olds) waxes nostalgic for TV that they gave a damn about, (way back in the nineties. :-) I. gave up on TV as a medium about then anyway. (Now I'm doing podcasting, instead of sucking on the glass teat. [And no, you're not welcome to listen unless you have MS too, {in which case: "Welcome to the 'cast!"}])
And PBS is not quite the model to do things by.
Its still a network and I can't ignore the hokey cooking shows that take time from Ken Burns documentaries, and vice versa.
Its still a *broadcast network* and if I'm not there at 11:00 PM to watch Charlie Rose, well then I pick up whatever episode I want whenever I want off the web.
So who needs PBS? Charlie Rose certainly doesn't.
The *broadcast model* is BROKEN and the internet model WORKS.
NBC has total control over transmitters.
"We doan need no stinkin transmittters."
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
*Why* do people act? You need lessons on economics.
FDR made the country *worse* off. This is economically indisputable. Forcing others to spend money on things they are not voluntarily willing to choose makes them worse off then when people voluntarily spend money on things they voluntarily willingly choose. You or nobody knows the complete constantly changing ordinal set of subjective valuations of others. Pretending people who are robbed are better off from being robbed is pure fantasy. When you force anyone to do something they do not want to do they are worse off. Preventing free trade, inflating the fiat money supply, hiring with stolen money day shift workers to dig ditches, and hiring with stolen money night shift workers to fill in those ditches, does not make a country better off, let alone "save" it. Economics is not a science. If anything is "tripe," it's most economic textbooks. Well, no knowledge whatsoever is "science". All knowledge, in so far as it exists, is absolutely known. There's certainly no "science" in computer science, no "science" in mathematics, no "science" in epistemology, no "science" in philosophy, no "science" in biology, no "science" in physics, no "science" in medicine, no "science" in geology,no "science" in astronomy. The validity of the "scientific method" is not established by "science". The underlying epistemological and methodological methods of all disciplinary branches of knowledge are all not established by "science". That 2 is less than 3 is not scientifically established. All the so-called "scientific" branches merely pretend they are not operating upon ultimate a priori true givens. The economics field is just generally more cognizant of this fact than other "scientific" disciplines. "Science" is just a misnomer for "best guess at present" given unknown variables which may or may not exist. Far too many "scientists" tend to forget that.
As a GE shareholder, I want Chief Zucker out.
Nice strawman, because I never said anything like that. The country was facing crisis, people were starving in the streets. There were very few jobs. The social programs changed that, and allowed us to get back to a point where economic wellbeing was possible. How do you think those starving people would have started their own business in those consditions?
Forcing others to spend money on things they are not voluntarily willing to choose makes them worse off then when people voluntarily spend money on things they voluntarily willingly choose.Who said anything about forcing people to do things? They voted for FDR, didn't they? And his measures were very popular. Personally, I think letting people starve in the streets is much worse.
Pretending people who are robbed are better off from being robbed is pure fantasy.What's with you and the crazy strawmen? When did I ever imply that people being robbed is good or better than anything?
."Science" is just a misnomer for "best guess at present" given unknown variables which may or may not exist.Wheras "economics" is just making shit up in an attempt to get rich and manipulate others.
... and then they built the supercollider.