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ESPN's Play To Make ISPs Pay
lochii sends us to Wired for reporting on ESPN's game plan to extract royalties from all ISPs, for a "license" for their users to view ESPN video. Currently, according to ESPN, 40% of US Internet users connect through ISPs who are paying the (undisclosed) fees; others are unable to view the content. Quoting: "This is a reversal of the model pushed by some major broadband companies that would like to charge content companies for the right to use their pipes. If other full-length video providers like Hulu and HBO get in on the act, the time could be approaching when you'll choose your Internet service based on what selection of content it offers. Eventually, popular non-video websites might follow suit. Imagine a future water cooler conversation over broadband choice: 'I went with Comcast 'cause they get Yahoo.'"
and it was called AOL.
Thats not how Internet work, and how we want internet to work.
Go fuck yourselves
-Woof woof woof!
My business requires that I travel. On a slow week I use two different ISPs. In a busy week, a dozen. And we're not even talking about vacations yet.
If your site isn't available everywhere, I'll find something else. Nobody's content is that valuable.
Although, if I'm wrong and this business model does take off, the back side is even uglier: there will be ISPs that offer their services based on what you can't get. It will cater to employers, libraries, schools and other places that don't want people accessing certain sites.
"lochii sends us to Wired for reporting on ESPN's game plan to extract royalties from all ISPs, for a "license" for their users to view ESPN video. "
And let's extend this to all the other content carried over broadband connections. See the problem now? Sheer bottom line will keep most ISPs from joining this bandwagon.
Shai Schticks:"You don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies"
Freakin idiots. ESPN, a content producer, is using their weight to ruin the internet.
This is so bass ackwards to the way the internet works and will continue to work. My only hope is that this idea fails with gusto, so that it can be used as a warning shot to all others who think they can "OWN" the internet like they owned the captive audiences on cable TV.
TV is a dead business model, and they need to get on the bandwagon. Ever since I got Hulu on my Xbox, I've discovered how much I just don't care, and don't need, cable/satelite tv.
Net neutrality needs to specifically outlaw this sort of thing.
Locking down information on the net is exactly how to ruin the net.
All that being said, we'll just use a proxy and move on.
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
Its bad enough that I have to pay the freaking ESPN Tax added onto my cable bill when I don't even want it. Many I know are fleeing cable so they DO NOT have to pay for things like this.
If everyone could choose between hundreds of ISPs, this would be fine. But that's not the case; most people have only a very few rational options for ISPs (if you want reasonable bandwidth), i.e., monopolies, duopolies, etc. This is absurdly monopolistic.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
While it's fun to sit back and yell "hur, hur, dumb jocks are ruining mah intarwebs!" it needs to be noted at ESPN's parent company is none other than that friend of the little guy, the copyright crusaders themselves, Disney. They are swinging ABC and ESPN around as their entertainment 'killer apps.' They've used their networks as tools like this before, go.com anyone?
I'd be thrilled if ESPN backed away from the amount of video they're using on their site. Call me crazy but I go to a website for an article I can read in peace, not for 30 seconds of commercials followed by whatever annoying, b-team anchor has gotten stuck doing web highlights. They've developed a handful of interesting and entertaining columnists, what they haven't developed are any decent anchors in the past five years.
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This raises two issues for me:
1. I am not a sports fan, and I expect ESPN to issue me a credit if my ISP is paying them for a service I do not use and do not want. Now that I think about it, if I could get a discount for having their channels removed from my TV service that would be great, too.
2. ESPN has just eliminated a huge swath of the Internet-using public from viewing their content. If it's a subscription service, sell it as such. The way they are handling this seems like it would be bad for their business.
If I was a sports fan, and I couldn't view ESPN's content because of my choice of ISP, I think I'd just look elsewhere (ie. another sports news site), rather than go through the hassle of changing ISPs.
Putting moderation advice in your
Ironically, they set up SportsCenter that way to keep people tuned in. Suppose you wanted all of the football scores. They used to have all of the football scores & highlights all in one segment, then went on to, say, all of the basketball scores and highlights. Some marketdroid figured that the fooball people would turn off SC after their football coverage. So now they put a couple of fooball scores, then do a couple of basketball scores to spread them out, figuring that people will watch all of SportsCenter.
Since that is incredibly annoying, I think that has the opposite effect. I avoid SportsCenter altogether.
You're missing the point. Imagine if your cable company FORCED you to buy HBO with their service. Now imagine that they forced you to buy Cinemax, Starz, and a bunch of others. Then, imagine that they forced you to buy all the pay-per-view items, whether or not you watch them.
The point is that ISPs are using their monopoly power to force charges down their customer's throats with no recourse, except to severe the now VITAL service, or go to an unacceptably slow alternative (dial up).
This is what happens when people let their governments grant monopolies. The people get screwed.
Major ISPS: you content providers are making money off our pipes. We are going to charge you for that!
Content Providers: Net Neutrality!!!! Er, wait. Our content is valuable, and you are using your pipes to distribute it. We are going to charge YOU for that!
Major ISPS: Er....Net Neutrality!!!!!
If websites firewall off unsubscribed viewers and large ISPs control these channels, will the democracy of the internet be in peril or will corporate internet be killing itself?
Killing itself. Take your example of Facebook - me and all my friends are on different ISP's. If Facebook was only available on one, we would switch to a site that was available on all of them.
This is a bit like the old "you cant be a member of more than one religion, and more than one religion says if you aren't a member you're going to hell, so you're definitely going to hell either way, so to hell with religion". You can't get all the ISP's everywhere, so if you can't get what you want, to hell with it. Get something else, somewhere else.
I had no idea this was happening until last week I went on ESPN360.com to see if they had any of the Australian Open matches streaming. To my surprise when the website loaded I got a message stating "Congratulations! Your ISP, Cavalier LLC, is part of the ESPN network" or something to that effect. At first I was excited. Free streaming matches! Then I realized "what about everyone else?" This is blatantly a violation of Net Neutrality.
This is just another attempt, IMHO, by Corporate America to turn the internet into a whored-out media wasteland indistinguishable from print, radio, or television. They want to become the gatekeepers of the internet because it drives them batshit insane to know that people can freely access information that hasn't first been filtered by them for content and then distributed at a premium.
Go fuck yourselves, ESPN.
Power does not corrupt - power attracts the corrupt.
So, if an ISP doesn't pay, ESPN won't deliver their content through their system? That is going to bite ESPN in the ass, big time. During the course of a day, I use 3 or 4 different ISPs to access the Interweb. What happens if one of them signs up with ESPN's competitor? Its doubtful that an employer is going to sign up for a service package burdened with hidden costs from various content providers. So, no ESPN at work on my lunch hour. My residential 'broadband' is a municipal WiFi service. It'll be a cold day in hell before the city ever starts writing checks to ESPN/Disney for content.
It appears that ESPN will be shooting themselves in the foot with this one. And you know what they say about the one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest.
Have gnu, will travel.