Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Shooting yourself in the foot
Earlier this week the people behind The Pirate Bay were convicted of piracy crimes in Sweden and sent to jail for a year. Of course, the media industry is calling this a big win over illegal piracy of their precious copyrighted materials. I call it delaying the inevitable.
The RIAA, the MPAA, the whomever thinks they should sue the fuck out of their customers next group, you are all sorely short-sighted.
Bottom line: Piracy will continue until legal alternatives are actually useful.
I could drone on about all the bullshit that has gone on with copyright infringment in the last decade or so, but I think we all know the story by now. Instead, I'll try to offer some insight.
Example of the problem:
One of the few shows I watch regularly on TV is Rescue Me. It is easily one of the most well-written and thoroughly interesting shows to be broadcast in a long time, but I digress. I choose not to pay for cable, so I have to rely on streaming internet sources for my Rescue Me fix since it plays on FX. Turns out that some dumbass at the network decided that the streaming episodes on Hulu should come out eight days after they play on broadcast TV.
Eight days.
Now if I'm an avid fan, and I have friends who are avid fans and I want to discuss episodes with them you have completely broken down my means to do so in a timely manner.
So what do I do? I bit torrent the episodes the next day. It takes about 20 minutes to download and I can watch them in HD without commercial interruption. I'd gladly save myself the hassle and watch them on Hulu with commercials, but they aren't available when I want them. So they lose.
Solution:
Make the episodes available online at the same time it is broadcast. Build in a chat room functionality. Get me engaged with other fans. Maybe get advertisers to sponsor special promotions to engage us during the normal broadcast commercial breaks. Make it a community.
Remember how CNN and Facebook teamed up to stream the inauguration with a live chat with your FB friends next to the streaming video? Bring that sort of engagement to TV shows. Let me crack jokes alongside SNL. Let me use your networks so you can more accurately gather stats about who watches your shows (and make nielsen families a thing of the past.)
The alternative is that the big networks drive more and more fans away in seach of better solutions. There is no reason why the big networks shouldn't implement something like what I'm suggesting. In fact, it's in their favor to capture and grow these online communities now before consumers form habits of getting their media fix from someone else.
Think long term solutions. Offer your fans what they want, when they want it.
Obsolete yourself before someone else does.
From: http://www.justinmccammon.com/2009/04/shooting-yourself-in-foot.html
The RIAA, the MPAA, the whomever thinks they should sue the fuck out of their customers next group, you are all sorely short-sighted.
Bottom line: Piracy will continue until legal alternatives are actually useful.
I could drone on about all the bullshit that has gone on with copyright infringment in the last decade or so, but I think we all know the story by now. Instead, I'll try to offer some insight.
Example of the problem:
One of the few shows I watch regularly on TV is Rescue Me. It is easily one of the most well-written and thoroughly interesting shows to be broadcast in a long time, but I digress. I choose not to pay for cable, so I have to rely on streaming internet sources for my Rescue Me fix since it plays on FX. Turns out that some dumbass at the network decided that the streaming episodes on Hulu should come out eight days after they play on broadcast TV.
Eight days.
Now if I'm an avid fan, and I have friends who are avid fans and I want to discuss episodes with them you have completely broken down my means to do so in a timely manner.
So what do I do? I bit torrent the episodes the next day. It takes about 20 minutes to download and I can watch them in HD without commercial interruption. I'd gladly save myself the hassle and watch them on Hulu with commercials, but they aren't available when I want them. So they lose.
Solution:
Make the episodes available online at the same time it is broadcast. Build in a chat room functionality. Get me engaged with other fans. Maybe get advertisers to sponsor special promotions to engage us during the normal broadcast commercial breaks. Make it a community.
Remember how CNN and Facebook teamed up to stream the inauguration with a live chat with your FB friends next to the streaming video? Bring that sort of engagement to TV shows. Let me crack jokes alongside SNL. Let me use your networks so you can more accurately gather stats about who watches your shows (and make nielsen families a thing of the past.)
The alternative is that the big networks drive more and more fans away in seach of better solutions. There is no reason why the big networks shouldn't implement something like what I'm suggesting. In fact, it's in their favor to capture and grow these online communities now before consumers form habits of getting their media fix from someone else.
Think long term solutions. Offer your fans what they want, when they want it.
Obsolete yourself before someone else does.
From: http://www.justinmccammon.com/2009/04/shooting-yourself-in-foot.html
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