Media Scribbler

As people stay in more to watch TV because they aren’t going out as much as budget crunches hit the wallet, could Americans build a new, unconnected video network that replaces shows with podcasts or digital downloads and leaving traditional cable-based companies to maybe, possibly, lower rates?

A column in TVWeek.com seems to think so. Daisy Whitley said since she can now download shows on Netflix on her XBox 360, she can now live a cable-free life.

That would be a credit to NBC Entertainment’s unprecedented attempts to offer all their content for free on their own platform (try searching for SNL on YouTube and you’ll see how hard they protect their brand), including news shows. And if you’re willing to shill out for iTunes copies for almost every show aired in the U.S. (could you please add UK ones next, Apple? Some of us fans of ITV reality shows which will never re-air here would be so pleased.)

It’s a shame that there’s not a really great P2P site where you could pay license fees to networks you wanted to see. That might mean the end of waiting till the DVD’s are out to have movie content downloadable, but would people still go to movies instead of watching from laptops?

However, this Christmas season has shown that box office numbers are surprisingly normal for the hit movies (“Twilight” ended up using social networking and fan sites to draw buzz weeks before it came out.) And in England, there’s a huge movement for artists to get their own song copyrights back from the labels, so they can have more control over what they can do with it online. So possibly there will be changes…and a lot of traditional media outlets struggling to cope.

Comments Off