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ABC, CBS, and NBC Block Google TV
markjhood2003 writes "The Wall Street Journal reports that 'ABC, CBS and NBC are blocking TV programming on their websites from being viewable on Google Inc.'s new Web-TV service. ... Spokespeople for the three networks confirmed that they are blocking the episodes on their websites from playing on Google TV, although both ABC and NBC allow promotional clips to work using the service.' Google has responded, 'Google TV enables access to all the Web content you already get today on your phone and PC, but it is ultimately the content owners' choice to restrict their fans from accessing their content on the platform.'"
That is a lot of crappy television shows I have to boycott now.
I was just thinking that all the t.v. shows on right now suck because of the writers strike a while back.
It turns out the executives are just insane.
ABC, NBC, et al. could claim Google is spoofing its useragent to circumvent the ban on Google TV. That means they could sue Google under the provisions of DMCA. Blame your legislators for passing idiotic laws that forbid gaining "unauthorized" access through spoofing.
Anything Google changes it to will be blocked, most likely. Unless it happened to be the exact UA of - say - IE6, and then these companies would probably start blocking based on other bits of availaible information(like flash version, browser accept string, platform etc).
If users change it themselves, different strings will be used and thus the problem will be avoided - You would end up blocking a lot of legit users to try to block all GoogleTVs.
Also, Google is trying to provide a platform, and most likely wants these companies to be able to tailor content to it - This little "issue" is most likely just one move in a game of chess between Google and these content producers.
The traditional TV networks, recording companies, movie producers, etc. are *never* going to give up their business model. EVER. They are dinosaurs and simply will not change. It's futile to think that they will. The only option is for them to go out of business. They will, of course, but it's going to be a long wait, unfortunately. They will continue to fight us at every turn, but eventually, they will be gone. Until then, our job is to hang in there, continue to support independent projects, use torrents so that they lose advertising revenue, and teach as many people as we know to do the same.
As you said, they are terrified that people will stop watching regular TV. Not only do most networks get paid by cable companies per customer (rather than based on viewership numbers), they also get much higher advertising rates on regular TV.
They started putting content online for a variety of reasons:
1) Because some people have switched permanently and they can't afford to miss out on that revenue
2) Because they don't want to get left behind their competitors
3) Because if they can increase online viewership sufficiently and/or prove to advertisers through metrics that internet ads yield a similar or greater return than traditional tv, they can up their online advertising prices.
If ESPN3.com and similar sites succeed, expect all the major content providers to do the same thing. Charging an ISP per customer to let them have access to a website is what most TV companies (and even sites like NYTimes) want the most. Reliable baseline income + bonus from advertising is how these companies like to operate.
There is a reason why very few companies last over 100 years, the longer it exists the harder it is to change. Right now network execs are still thinking in terms of time slots, competing with the other guy, and other outmoded concepts. The internet does scare them, that's why many shows are unavailable until a few days after airing. If consumers stop watching when the show is on the air they might be watching something else! The silly thing about this is DVRs have made timeslots meaningless, and have also made commercials easy to skip through. If they really wanted to profit they would embrace the internet and start showing all their programing online with ads so that the viewer can decide what he or she wants to watch and when.
Everyone seems to think that the networks don't know what they're doing. They're banning Google TV, when anyone with half a brain knows this sort of thing is the wave of the future. I'm willing to bet that the network execs do, in fact, have at least one half of a brain between them.
It makes perfect sense if you think, well, maybe they don't really want to ban Google TV. More likely, they want to make a deal with Google, whereby Google pays them for the privilege of using their content.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
That one's easy. They're terrified of losing control of your big TV with a remote in the living room. Ordinary viewers do not have a computer hooked up the TV, and a laptop is just too inconvenient to use for most.
The internet viewing streams are there to use hunched over your laptop or sat at your desk. It's not the 'premium' experience of the family sat on the sofa with an easy to use remote. The internet streams are based on that, and the revenue from that is relatively low.
Remember, you are not the customer - the advertiser is the customer, you're the product, and the TV program is just there to get your eyeballs on the adverts. Google TV threatens to bring the internet streaming model to the comfy sofa TV viewing for the masses, and is a direct threat to their broadcast business model.
Apple TV is a little different, as they get paid directly per episode 'bought' through itunes, and I imagine the profit margin on that is considerably higher than the adverts on the web-streaming model. It may even be higher than the traditional broadcast-advert model, and it works as apple users are used to paying through the nose for a slick experience. Ordinary users with a google box (or boxee box) streaming off of hulu etc? Not so much.
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
Yeah, that's the *other* problem... the networks have so far treated Internet streaming of shows as an oddity that they need to get involved in to be relevant. But now that they think people may actually use it as their *primary* source of content, they are confused and terrified.
As for integrating into DVRs - that would be interesting. But the DVR industry is basically made up of 2 camps today - the innovative, struggling companies (Tivo, Moxi, etc) relying on govt regulations like CableCard to survive at all. And the big, bloated cable hardware suppliers (General Instruments aka Motorola, and Scientific Atlanta aka Cisco) that have no concept of user interface or quality control, but have enough influence to dominate the OEM cable box market.
In the end, though, content availability is all about the providers/owners feeling comfortable with the (revenue from the) distribution model. Can they make a profit with free online content with ads? Do they get enough share from an iTunes transaction? Will they get enough of a cut from a monthly fee in a subscription service? It's going to be an interesting battle...
It might be a losing battle, but I understand why companies would fight it for as long as possible. It certainly seems better to be a good TV channel than to be one of the random websites where people land if they want to watch a TV show that has significant brand recognition and for that reason cost a lot of money for the channel to have the right to broadcast it.
There's something sinister about blocking display of content on a platform that otherwise supports the tech needed for viewing. It certainly looks to be anti-competitive behavior worthy of examination by the F.C.C. or whoever.
I wonder what else they're doing.