If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
The battle raging between the big Hollywood film studios and the giant of Silicon Valley is probably the most pointless and futile conflict being rage...
If Americans believe the phone company hype -- and are seduced into believing that a slow and expensive wireless infrastructure is better than a fast wireline infrastructure -- the economic consequences could be grave.
A lot has changed since the early days of Internet video. Today's professionally produced content is not only leaps and bounds from early amateur video, it's competing with broadcast television for viewers and ad dollars.
It appears that 2012 will be the first year that sales of flat-panel TVs have declined, and last month it was announced that owners of Microsoft's Xbox console now spend more time watching entertainment content than playing games.
Accessing television shows has never been easier, but this blessing has a lot of consequences. Now that TV-watchers are no longer confined to prime time, the question isn't when are you going to watch your favorite shows, but how?
A better conversation: Inspiration from abroad, harnessing new technologies for practical use, the blurring of media and brands, building a service for what the consumer wants, rather than trying to push them into your model.
The more a firm can flatten this hump, the more it will profit from customers who do not bleed the firm. So the question stands: when should a firm fire a customer?
The story begins as Frankie Tagliano, a mobbed up New York bar owner, becomes a FBI informant and is sent away on the witness protection plan by his own request to Norway.
Over the last ten years technology has changed. The way people want to consume television has changed. And yet Hollywood is moving at a snail's pace when it comes to revolutionizing the business model.
If the movie biz wants to continue a destructive campaign of some sort, it should start by looking in the mirror, and then at the movie theaters and then at the other activities that also compete for the time, attention and money of moviegoers.
Recently, Netflix launched a new app for the iPad. Good news, I suppose, but does that ultimately change the future of the company? I think that a year from now, Netflix as we know it will be no more.
The best way for Netflix to recoup those lost subscribers, and add legions of new ones in the process, is to offer new shows people actually want to watch and can only see on Netflix. And they're trying just that.
Looking back at 2011, I see a year where pragmatism replaced hype, where show beat tell, where consumers, the tech community and the marketing industry stepped away from preconceived notions and toward a new reality.
So what if, with all this talk of deficits and national debt and budget overages, our government takes the unprecedented step of shutting down its mail services? Many small business would worry. But I say to my fellow small business owners: do not fear.
My prediction: You will be able to buy television by the channel. You will be able to watch it live, or watch it from the cloud using live streaming for any channel any program any time slot over the last 30 days.
Dear Netflix, I have found someone else whom I think the world of. I think the only way out is for us to get a divorce. This just isn't working out anymore.
