Startup Diaries

The Future of TV Part 2

People who know me here know that I'm very interested in how the world of TV and media s we know it change around us.
As part of my exploration of this change, I got a new Media Center PC to my living room. Although there is still a lot of work to do on it, the experience of using it is the closest I've seen to how the future of TV consumption should look like.
I can talk a lot about the DVR capabilities or the great user interface, but the two things that really surprised me were actually different things:

The first is actually a small add name MyNetFlix in written by a private programmer. In essence it gives you a great way to explore NetFlix and watch all the streaming movies there straight from the Media Center UI.
I got to say that the experience of MyNetFlix is even better than the NetFlix site itself.
My only question now, is why I don't see the same thing from Amazon and Apple for their rental movie service.

The second feature is an option called InternetTV.
Basically it allows you to get immediate access to great web video from the Media Center interface (and use the remote control to control it).
For example, while writing this I'm watching a great Riahna concert directly on my 50 inch TV. No, it's still not HD quality, but it's not far from it.
The monetization model is also very clear. Before the show I actually watched some ads that were loaded dynamically.

Now I have to ask again - how come I can't get access to all the studios TV series in the same way?

One thing that the new media center does is to completely eliminate the line between TV broadcasting and web streaming. You get both from the same menus on the same machine. In the end, you really don't care where it comes from, and this is the future of TV.

A new era? Simultaneous TV broadcast on the net and TV

It's hard to keep up with the news about Media companies who state their plans to offer their TV series for view on the net a day after they were broadcast on TV. From NBC, ABC, FOX to CBS, everyone finally decided to get a piece of the Internet advertising budgets.

But yesterday PaidContent.org reported that CBS will also start broadcasting some of its TV shows simultaneously on TV and the Internet.
Finally a media network with some brains!
Think about it... do you really think that a person that can choose between watching a TV series on his small computer screen or his big living room TV set will go for the net broadcast? Of course not. The two audiences are completely different.
The people who are going to watch the Internet broadcasts are probably the ones who got stuck late at work, people on the move using their PDA or Laptops, or just the ones out of the country who can't get the broadcast on TV.
Why not enjoy the advertise revenues from the TV and also from the net?

Until recently most of the networks feared that online broadcast will grow the video piracy numbers. Of course this is also complete nonsense. In order to save and distribute an online streaming session you need to be a more sophisticated user, and if you are - hell, it will be much easier for you simply to save it directly from your cables or satellite dish.

People who want to watch/distribute videos on the net will always find ways to do it. The question is just where all the money is going to go and if the media networks want a piece of it.

The Internet comes out of the closet

Business Week just released an article covering the huge success of everyone favorite YouTube.
It's amazing to see a web site with 19.6 million monthly unique users with a business model still in question. Everyone is trying to guess from where YouTube will "show us the money".
Most analysts speculate it will come from showing short ads before each video (like competitor metacafe). This sound like an obvious choice but the real question is how will people react to the sudden addition of ads. Will they still flow to the site at the same rate?

There are many talks those days about how the big old media companies are jumping into the Internet wagon. Everyone is looking to see how they will use the Internet to distribute their movies and TV series.
But what if the future is actually going to take us on the opposite way?
What if instead of seeing the media companies goes into the Internet, the real revolution will come when the Internet will go into the media companies court - Radio, newspapers and of course the TV?

I think we can all agree that there is huge amount of quality content around the net. from blogs to podcasts to videos, it's all there.
Imagine yourself opening Financial Times business section and reading the best blog post of the week, chosen by professional editors. Wouldn't you want to open the technology section and read Engadget review of the latest gadgets?
And what about broadcasting the best podcast over the radio. Wouldn't it be cool to hear Gillmore Gang on the car radio on your way to work?

And now think of a TV series featuring the most favorites YouTube videos... Now you are talking about reaching many more households, about advertising budgets much bigger than any web site can dream of. Now,  this is a way to really "Show me the money".