Posts Tagged ‘Online TV’
Netflix hints at Watch Instantly integration on ‘already-popular device’
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Gadget News on October 24th, 2009
[Via Joystiq]
Filed under: Home Entertainment
Netflix hints at Watch Instantly integration on 'already-popular device' originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 24 Oct 2009 17:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsEngland qualifier could be shown pay-per-view on newspaper websites
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Technology on September 11th, 2009
Rights-holder for England-Ukraine World Cup qualifier wants to stream match live via 'coalition' of websites
The England football team's next World Cup qualifying game against the Ukraine could be streamed live on national newspapers' websites on a pay-per-view basis, with a potential audience of more than 20 million internet users - the first time a match of such magnitude has been broadcast exclusively over the internet.
Kentaro, the sports rights company, which owns the rights to England's away qualifier in the Ukraine on 10 October, is understood to have held talks with all UK national newspaper publishers except the Financial Times about the landmark online content deal.
Under the proposal put forward by Kentaro and Perform, which specialises in making sports and entertainment content available online, newspaper websites would be able to stream the live coverage free of charge. They would also receive a share of the revenue generated from the event. It is not clear how much viewers will be charged and Kentaro declined to comment on the pricing model.
Talks with newspaper groups are well advanced and a deal is likely to be announced next week. The rights holder is understood to have talked to Sun and Sunday Times publisher News International, Daily Mail & General Trust, Telegraph Media Group, Mirror Group Newspapers, Express Newspapers, Independent News & Media, and Guardian News & Media, which publishes MediaGuardian.co.uk.
Kentaro and Perform are aiming to build a "coalition" of websites to screen the game, which would also be available on specialist sports websites.
Simon Denyer, chief executive of Perform, pointed out that the biggest UK newspaper websites have a combined audience of around 24 million users. Specialist sports websites that may stream the match reach a further 20 million users and Kentaro is also in talks with a leading cinema chain about screening the game in theatres across the country.
Perform already supplies highlights packages of several sports, including cricket and football, to newspaper websites on behalf of its clients, who include the Football League and Cricket Australia.
The rights to the Ukraine game reverted to Kentaro when the previous owner, pay-TV broadcaster Setanta's UK business, went into administration in June. Kentaro acquired the rights from the Ukranian FA.
Kentaro has had no offers from UK free to air or pay-TV broadcasters and has decided to seek the widest possible online audience.
"The strategy is to have around 10 big publishers with [sites] which have between 2 and 5 million unique users in the UK," Denyer said.
He added that the game is being offered on a pay-per-view basis, partly because the company does not believe it is commercially viable to make it available free of charge online and generate a profit by selling advertising around the event.
Peter Silverstone, managing director of Kentaro UK, said that the highlights of the game could still be made available to TV companies even if a series of online deals are signed. But he added that no negotiations were taking place.
The Ukraine game is less significant that it might have been because England qualified for next year's World Cup in South Africa on Wednesday night, when they beat Croatia 5-1 with two qualifying games to spare.
The experiment will be closely watched by industry observers, however, since newspapers rarely charge for online content.
There is currently an industry-wide debate about how much, if anything, readers might be prepared to pay for content on newspapers websites. Rupert Murdoch, the News Corporation chairman and chief executive, said last month that the group's newspapers, including UK subsidiary News International's Sun, Times, News of the World and Sunday Times, are examining how best to generate revenue from their online offerings.
If a deal is done and viewing figures for the Ukraine game are reasonable, it might demonstrate that there is an audience willing to pay for premium content online.
If so, the experiment is likely to be repeated in the future, according to Silverstone. "There is potentially the appetite to do this going forward," he said.
He added that Germany, France and the Scandinavian countries also have big enough broadband networks to make screening games online a realistic possibility.
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BlinkBox signs deal with BBC Worldwide
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Technology on August 20th, 2009
Online Video-on-demand service Blinkbox aims to strike more deals with UK broadcasters after signing up BBC Worldwide
BBC Worldwide has struck a deal to make hundreds of hours of content from shows including Top Gear and Doctor Who available via the UK online video service Blinkbox.
Popular titles on DVD, such as Top Gear, Gavin & Stacey, Spooks and Planet Earth, will cost users £1.89 an episode to download from Blinkbox, which is still finalising what it will charge for a full series.
Other BBC shows, including Hustle, Hotel Babylon and older series of Doctor Who, can be downloaded free but will carry ads.
BBC Worldwide content will only be made available on Blinkbox a minimum of 180 days after airing on TV.
The deal between BBC Worldwide and Blinkbox comes weeks after the corporation's commercial arm reached an agreement to provide content to Microsoft's new online TV pilot.
Blinkbox, which was launched with venture-capital backing last April by the former Channel 4 executive Michael Comish, already has a deal with Shameless producer All3Media, and is trying to position itself as a one-stop shop for UK and US TV and films online.
Comish said he felt that Blinkbox had successfully tapped a catalogue of US shows – Warner Bros' Gossip Girl and ER are two of the most viewed on the service – but he believed that, until the BBC Worldwide deal, UK content could do with a boost. He is hopeful of striking deals with other UK broadcasters now BBC Worldwide has signed up.
Blinkbox and Microsoft's MSN Video Player are both attempting to fill a void left in the market for online TV beyond the initial catch-up TV window following the collapse of the Project Kangaroo joint venture.
"There's been a lot of hype around foreign companies coming to the UK to fill the void left by Kangaroo," said Comish. "The reality is the void has already been filled."
Blinkbox, which also has deals with big US film studios such as Paramount, Universal and 20th Century Fox, claims it has about 750,000 unique users and 1.5m streams of TV and film content a month.
In its first 11 days of operation MSN Video Player managed to notch up 170,000 views of video content.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.
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Survey: Faster net won’t make us watch more TV online
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Technology on August 10th, 2009
Hopes for online TV boom fuelled by superfast broadband dampened by survey for Edinburgh TV Festival
Faster internet would make no difference to most people's online viewing habits, a survey has found.
The result calls into question hopes of an online TV boom fuelled by superfast broadband.
The survey, commissioned from Deloitte and YouGov by the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, found that 53% of people would not watch more online TV or video clips even with a faster, more reliable broadband connection.
Some 29% of the 2,123 viewers surveyed felt that there was "little importance" in being able to watch TV using an online service.
Younger respondents, aged 18 to 24, were more likely to already watch TV online, but 43% still said that a faster broadband connection would not increase their internet viewing habits.
The most viewed genres of online video were news and comedy, which 34% said they watched. Music ranked second, watched by 30%, with sport and documentaries/factual programming ranked third equal with 23% each.
Reality TV programmes and factual entertainment shows ranked bottom, with just 7% of respondents admitting watching such content online.
"Stimulating investment in a next-generation broadband infrastructure for Britain has been at the heart of the Digital Britain debate," said James Bates, media and telecoms partner at Deloitte. "However, making high speed broadband access widely available to consumers is no guarantee that it will be taken up."
The good news for traditional broadcasters is that their online video services are now gaining widespread recognition with the public, according to the survey results.
Of those surveyed, 83% were aware of the TV catchup services offered by the main players, such as the BBC's iPlayer, ITV.com and Channel 4's 4oD.
"In an ironic twist to earlier expectations, broadcasters and independent producers may, in the medium term, be those that benefit most from online television," said Bates. "Broadcasters may increasingly use online television to support their core, traditional objective of maximising broadcast audience size and quality."
The full Deloitte/YouGov report, Television's Got Talent, will be published later this month. The 2009 MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival takes place between Friday 28 and Sunday 30 August.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.
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Arqiva appoints online TV chief
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Technology on July 31st, 2009
Former British Eurosport MD Pierre-Jean Sebert expected to be chief of online TV venture based on Project Kangaroo assets
Arqiva is understood to have hired Pierre-Jean Sebert, former managing director of British Eurosport, as chief executive of its proposed online TV venture.
The broadcast transmission company paid about £8m earlier this month to buy the assets of Project Kangaroo, the defunct video-on-demand venture developed by ITV, Channel Four and BBC Worldwide, and has plans over the coming months to launch its own online TV aggregation service in conjunction with broadcasters.
Arqiva will face competition from Microsoft, which yesterday announced it was launching a pilot online TV service, initially showing programmes from BBC Worldwide and All3Media.
Sebert has most recently spent several years working for Reel Enterprises, the rights negotiation and multimedia channel development company founded by former Reuters, Granada and GMTV executive David Kogan.
He left British Eurosport in September 2005 after four years and was then drafted in by UKTV; according to a report at the time, he was to work on projects including a possible sports channel.
Arqiva is understood to have also been in talks with Project Kangaroo's senior management about whether they will move to the new venture.
Project Kangaroo's chief financial officer, Christine Mulling, and its chief executive, Rod Henwood, are thought to have decided against this.
It is not known what has been decided by the commercial director, Cosmo Lush, the chief technical officer, Lee Morgenroth, or the product director, Richard Dines.
Arqiva had not responded to a request for a comment on the appointment of Sebert at the time of publication.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.
• If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".
Hulu Speaks On PS3 Blocking: It’s the Content Providers [Hulu]
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Gadget News on July 16th, 2009
A few weeks ago, Hulu silently blocked access through the PS3's web browser. Customers who bothered to ask the company what was going on just got a response, which fingers an entirely predictable culprit: Reluctant content providers!
The semi-apology came in the form of an email, in which a Hulu rep told users that the move was a compromise:
Everything we do is with an eye toward achieving our long-term goal of maximizing the content you can access as conveniently as possible in a way that 'works' for the content owner. In the short-term that may require us to make some tough decisions...
Hulu won't go so far as to directly blame specific companies, but it sounds like one—or a few—of their many partners signaled that PS3 streaming was a threat to their relationship, somehow. But yeah, how?
Distribution availability across platforms — theaters vs. TV vs. recorded media like DVDs vs. online streaming vs. mobile phones — was always implicitly or explicitly controlled in that world... the windowing strategy is still dominant in the business. Billions of dollars flow in across these different windows, and entire companies are organized around them.
This is actually pretty clear cut. Content providers are uncomfortable with the concept of video streaming on the PS3, because the console is typically connected to a television. This content delivery gray area is enough to somehow screw with, or simply muddy, their licensing arrangements or somesuch, so they're exercising caution.
As frustrating as that is, it's also a bit reassuring; far from a sign of a concert rollback of digital streaming rights, this is just a minor hiccup during a long, still-advancing transition. As Señor Hulu said, upstarts like Hulu need to be sensitive to media companies' old-fashioned sensibilities in order to change them. Full letter is reprinted below. —Thanks, Kip!
Thanks for writing. In order to answer your question, some context might be
helpful.For decades, the TV/movie industry has built its business model on a windowing
strategy. Content rights are granted for limited time periods across specific
distribution channels. For example, a movie starts in theaters, then moves to
pay-per-view and DVD, then to pay-cable channels, later to broadcast, and so on
down the line. Similarly, TV shows are available on TV first, then in repeats,
then to DVD and possibly syndication, etc.Distribution availability across platforms — theaters vs. TV vs. recorded media
like DVDs vs. online streaming vs. mobile phones — was always implicitly or
explicitly controlled in that world. But a few factors have made the barriers
between those platforms more permeable: the rise of the web, increased broadband
availability, the ease of digitizing video, and the increase in the computing
power of devices like gaming consoles, set-top boxes, and mobile phones.However, in the near-term, the windowing strategy is still dominant in the
business. Billions of dollars flow in across these different windows, and entire
companies are organized around them. Nothing productive comes from flouting that
reality (except to law firms who work on the occasional lawsuit).We do, however, expect these windows to converge over time. There's no
way around
that, and we're working hard with all of our partners to guide and
participate in
this important transition in the business. Everything we do is with an
eye toward
achieving our long-term goal of maximizing the content you can access as
conveniently as possible in a way that "works" for the content owner. In the
short-term that may require us to make some tough decisions, but we only do so
when we believe it improves our long-term prospects to build a more enduring,
legal solution to that same problem.We hear your frustration, and solving it remains our full-time job.
Boost for YouTube in copyright case
Posted by: Gadget Boy in Technology on July 8th, 2009
If Google's video site YouTube loses its copyright infringement case in court, a recent ruling means the bill will be lower, reports paidContent's Staci Kramer
The latest ruling in a copyright case brought against Google (NSDQ: GOOG) and its YouTube subsidiary doesn't move the needle much on the core issue but it means the bill should be lower if—and that's still a big if—the company loses in court. The English Premier League started a class-action suit against Google and YouTube back in May 2007, a few months after Viacom (NYSE: VIA) sued for $1 billion; it was joined by music publishers and the case now has 15 plaintiffs. The sports and music companies claim that sports and concert material was being posted on YouTube without permission and that the foreign material was governed by U.S. copyright law without registration.
U.S. District Judge Louis Stanton ruled late last week, though, that claims for statutory damages on unregistered material would be limited to works that qualify under the Copyright Act's "live broadcast exemption" and dismissed any call for punitive damages under the Copyright Act. (Just to give a sense of how arcane this can get, the ruling doesn't cover pre-1972 sound recordings under state law or infringements covered by foreign law—that's been deferred.)
But the judge allowed the inclusion of hundreds of examples the Premier League offered of instances where it had served the kind of advance notice required to YouTube that could be covered under the "live broadcast exemption." Judge Stanton already had ruled last year that Viacom can't get punitive damages because the Copyright Act of 1976 doesn't include that as an option.
The plaintiffs are trying to position this as a win, since it allows for the registration exemption in certain cases.
