The Podium
Blog posts tagged with 'Television'
Monday, May 06
By Brad
According to Steven Musil of CNet, YouTube may be getting into the paid subscription game:
YouTube reportedly could launch its paid subscription service for some of its specialist video channels as early as this week.
The a la carte service, which could involve as many as 50 video channels, would allow single channel subscriptions for as little as $1.99 a month, people familiar with the plan tell The Financial Times. YouTube confirmed to CNET in February that it was developing such a service but did not indicate when it would be ready for subscribers.
A paid content platform could give the Google-owned video site another revenue stream while allowing channel operators to finance different content production, such as TV shows and movies, a source said.
The future of TV is online.
Thursday, February 25
By Brad
The New York Times looks at the positive effect the Internet is having on television:
The Nielsen Company, which measures television viewership and Web traffic, noticed this month that one in seven people who were watching the Super Bowl and the Olympics opening ceremony were surfing the Web at the same time.
“The Internet is our friend, not our enemy,” said Leslie Moonves, chief executive of the CBS Corporation, which broadcast both the Super Bowl and the Grammy Awards this year. “People want to be attached to each other.”
Seeking to capitalize on the online water-cooler effect, NBC showed the Golden Globes live on both coasts for the first time this year, and the network reportedly wants to do the same for the Emmy Awards this fall, so the entire country can watch (and chat online) simultaneously.
Wednesday, February 03
By Brad
Today’s Wall Street Journal profiles start-up Move Networks Inc., which is hoping to create a full-on television network online:
If the company is able to launch the service it is now pitching to broadcasters—tentatively dubbed Move TV—viewers could watch programs in one of three ways: via a computer’s Web browser; on a television that is either equipped with a built-in Internet jack or connected to a set-top converter box; or on a wireless, Internet-connected device like an iPhone or iPad.
Because Move isn’t laying cable or launching satellites, the company’s executives argue they can charge consumers far less than traditional pay-television operators for a comparable suite of channels. Move hopes to undercut those operators further by offering a pared-down lineup—perhaps as few as 80 to 100 channels.
So far Move Networks has received funding from the likes of Microsoft, Comcast, and Disney. But whether consumers — not to mention America’s broadband infrastructure — are ready for a fully online TV network remains to be seen.
Elsewhere in the online TV landscape, USA Today reports that popular video site Hulu is flirting with the idea of charging for some content.
Wednesday, September 09
By Brad
Though online television viewing still trails far behind traditional tube viewership, there are now enough people watching shows via computer that Nielsen — the long-standing TV ratings group — announced it will start measuring online viewership.
Monday, August 31
By Brad
Here’s an innovative new way to increase viewership of television repeats: Using popular micro-blogging service Twitter to entice eyeballs. Via PC World:
Fox is juicing its repeats of the TV series Fringe with a new Twitter twist. The network will introduce this week “tweet-peats”—an on-screen scroll of Twitter messages from cast and producers that will appear during the episodes.
This has the potential to be insanely popular—not to mention a nice source of revenue for TV networks.
Thursday, May 21
By Brad
Via Ars Technica comes the latest results from Nielsen on American viewing habits. For online and mobile video, the news is good:
About 131 million people are watching an average of three hours of video per month via the Internet, according to Nielsen’s data. That’s up from 116 million watching a monthly average of two hours this same time last year. Additionally, about 13 million mobile phone subscribers—up 52 percent from nearly 9 million last year—report watching an average of 3.5 hours of video a month on a mobile phone (time measurements are not available from Q1 last year).
But while online viewing is up, it turns out traditional TV has nothing to worry about—at least not yet:
But those increases pale in comparison to television, which Americans watch more than ever, averaging about 153.5 hours in front of the boob tube in a month. “Television is still the dominant choice for Americans who watch video,” according to Nielsen’s report. “Almost 99 percent of the video watched in the US is still done on television.” You can see how the amount of TV watched by Americans dwarfs the small amount viewed online and the even smaller amount viewed via a mobile phone in the chart below.
Monday, March 16
By Brad
Though Internet video is certainly growing in popularity, it’s not close to toppling traditional TV. The Wall Street Journal reports from a recent panel discussion at the South by Southwest Festival, where comedians and technology executives opined on the state of web vs. tube:
The panel — which highlighted the role comedy plays in driving Web hits — quickly expanded to assess the success and influence of online-only content in general.
B.J. Novak, a producer of “The Office” who also plays temp worker Ryan Howard, said NBC’s hit show spends reasonably big bucks investing in shorter online-only “webisodes”, in part to experiment with what works and what doesn’t online. “Everyone is still trying to figure them out,” he said, adding that he thinks the term “webisode” will disappear in the future as people watch more TV content online and vice versa.
But until that behavior changes more dramatically, original Web content won’t draw the same dollars as TV. “There’s not the same amount of respect for the advertising community and the audience” online, said Keith Richman, chief executive of video site Break Media.
Tuesday, February 24
By Brad
Last January, social media giant Facebook reached 150 million users—and they did it in just five years. That’s certainly impressive, but as Fortune points out, the milestone is even more impressive when you take into account that it took television 38 years to reach that number.
Rick Boucher
Bruce P. Mehlman
Jamal Simmons
Featured Members
Broadband Fact Book
Start-Up Savings
10 Benefits of Health IT
How Broadband Helps Rural Communities
10 Ways Being Online Saves You Money
Achieving Universal Broadband
The National Broadband Plan
The Digital Divide
Jobs and Investment
March Madness in Bytes
Sign the Petition
Internet Past & Future
Back to School Webinar
Telepsychiatry Webinar
IIA Broadband Symposium
IIA Internet Academy
Press Releases
Most Recent Posts