Curiouser and Curiouser! on big-media

A solution to big media

Tue, 26 Nov 2002 11:45:12 +0000

What happens when you blog a Fox executive? Blox

Jonathan Peterson deconstructs the comments of Fox CEO Peter Chernin in a Comdex keynote. Great stuff. Thanks for the link to David Weinberger, who adds his own astute comments.

It all comes down to the notion that programming is scarce or, at least, needs to retain the appearance of scarcity to sustain its value. In fact, if you make connections and let value flow, the investment in programming made today can be much more profitable than it is in the broadcast model.

[RatcliffeBlog: Business, Technology & Investing]

» Folks the solution is simple:

Stop watching TV.

Stop going to the Movies.

Don't buy Music, Videos, Games, Books or Magazines.

Don't by a Tivo, DVD player, stereo, WEGA tv, PlayStation

In a couple of years all the media-related companies (and their dependents) will be bankrupt. It might teach these guys that they need to treat us with a little respect if they want to survive.

We won't do it of course...

Rip off Music Industry

Fri, 21 Feb 2003 10:00:28 +0000

Real Numbers From Music Industry. More evidence that looking at real financial numbers for the music industry is key to gutting their entire position on digital music sharing. We should not begrudge publishers legitimate fees for legitimate services, but we should never have let them recast the file sharing argument as one of protecting artists. It's a patently bullshit argument and will continue to fall under close scrutiny.

Who Gets Hurt When You Pirate Music?.
There's a case study in the NYDaily News -- apparently a propos nothing but this Sunday's Grammy Awards -- that breaks down the cash flow of a hypothetical hit album by a hypothetical rock quartet. It illustrates all the people that get paid along the food chain, including some odd recoupable record company expenses, like a 25 percent "packaging deduction" and a 15 percent "free goods charge," off the top, most of which the label keeps.

The bottom line is that a gold record (500,000 copies) selling at $16.98 will gross roughly $8.5 million, of which each member of the hypothetical quartet will pocket about $40,000. (The case study doesn't take songwriting royalties into account.)

So for every $16.98 album you rip, you're costing a performing artist about 34 cents, and the lawyers, producers and labels about $16.64. [Over the Edge]

[b.cognosco]

If some kind soul would just setup a service where I could mail the $0.34 to the artist then I think everyone would be happy. Heck I'd even be prepared to go as far as $0.68... that's a whopping 100% profit! :)

We'll remainder it for you - Wholesale!

Tue, 04 Mar 2003 15:20:23 +0000

Declaration of Content. Dan Gillmor writes:

"U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, has a strikingly simple idea to bolster customers' rights to freely use software, movies and music that they've paid for: Force the sellers of such products to tell the truth about the restrictions they're imposing on users.When customers know, for example, that the compact disc they're buying is technologically rigged so they can't rip MP3 files from it for use on a portable player, they won't buy it. Eventually, these informed customers will demand change in the copyright laws..."

Yep, simple and elegant. Force the manufacturers to clearly, in proper English, explain what you're buying, including the features they have painstakingly built in to make the product LESS useful to you. And the market will decide what people really want.If the truth were always clearly visible, market economics alone would transform the world. The only reason that large numbers of people are choosing that which they don't really want is that they're being deceived. [Ming the Mechanic]

(With apologies to PKD for the Title)

I like this idea. I like it a lot.

Shit on a stick

Wed, 12 Mar 2003 21:23:29 +0000

A fantastic article by Matt Taibbi about how the White House press core and the mainstream media no longer serve a useful function. (My spin in italics).

Here are my highlights, but read the whole thing:

After watching George W. Bush's press conference last Thursday night, I'm more convinced than ever: The entire White House press corps should be herded into a cargo plane, flown to an altitude of 30,000 feet, and pushed out, kicking and screaming, over the North Atlantic.
Particularly revolting was the spectacle of the cream of the national press corps submitting politely to the indignity of obviously pre-approved questions, with Bush not even bothering to conceal that the affair was scripted.
Abandoning the time-honored pretense of spontaneity, Bush chose the order of questioners not by scanning the room and picking out raised hands, but by looking down and reading from a predetermined list.
In other words, not only were reporters going out of their way to make sure their softballs were pre-approved, but they even went so far as to act on Bush's behalf, raising their hands and jockeying in their seats in order to better give the appearance of a spontaneous news conference.
In his best moments Bush was deranged and uncommunicative, and in his worst moments, which were most of the press conference, he was swaying side to side like a punch-drunk fighter, at times slurring his words and seemingly clinging for dear life to the verbal oases of phrases like "total disarmament," "regime change," and "mass destruction."
Moments later, the camera angle of the conference shifted to a side shot, revealing a ring of potted plants around the presidential podium.
It would be hard to imagine an image that more perfectly describes American political journalism today: George Bush, surrounded by a row of potted plants, in turn surrounded by the White House press corps.
This was just Bush's eighth press conference since taking office, and each one of them has been a travesty.
But the White House press corps' idea of "taking a shot" is David Sanger asking Bush what he thinks of British foreign minister Jack Straw saying that regime change was not necessarily a war goal.
And then meekly sitting his ass back down when Bush ignores the question.
They can't write what they think, and can't ask real questions.
What the hell are they doing there?

What indeed?

You are about to go to war. A war which the secretary general of the UN has stated publicly could be an illegal act. And the best your ace reporter can do is ask Shrub "How is your faith holding together?" Shit!

Have any of you guys looked at Afghanistan lately?

It's not Iraq you should be torching.

Farscape no more

Thu, 13 Mar 2003 09:53:36 +0000

To Be Continued. Ive just watched the final episode of Farscape (recorded from last night on BBC2) Oh my god! Not content with... [From The Orient]

I had exactly the same experience.

I read that the stated reason for the axing was how much the show cost to produce. All I can say is that nothing good comes without cost and producing good shows is why you make television.

This reminds me of something Greg Costikan said yesterday. He was talking about games design and the way publishers will, by and large, only fund sequels to successful games & spinoffs of already successful licenses and how this leads to a dearth of innovative games.

To quote from that piece:

I'm fairly friendly with Tom Doherty, who built Tor Books from a start-up to the single largest publisher of science fiction and fantasy in the world. He has an attitude I like: There's crap you just have to publish. There's stuff that allows you to stay in business. You publish it, and you sell the hell out of it, because you know it can, and will, sell. But fundamentally, that's not why you work in publishing; there are easier ways to make a living. You stay in publishing because you sometimes get to publish books you really like.

Tom Peters, the business guru, echoes the sentiment: No successful business exists to produce a profit. Yes, you need to produce a profit; in a capitalist system (and thank god we have one), profit is the condition of survival. But profit isn't the goal; no one other than the stockholders get excited at that. A corporation is one way or organizating a group of people to strive toward an objective--but that objective, the vision they share, is always, for successful businesses, something other than mere profit.

A game publisher exists to publish games. If its managers and employees are decent human beings, a game publisher exists to publish cool games. And if they aren't decent human beings, they should go out of business instantly; there are far better and easier ways to earn a decent return on investment.

In the same way a TV publisher exists, or should exist, to publish cool TV programmes. But Sci-Fi and it's owners Universal Television Networks are just out to make a buck. Profit is the be-all and end-all of their existance. Cancelling Farscape (without a better show to replace it) proves that they don't give a rats ass about the shows themselves.

A movie? I've heard it too often.

Goodbye Farscape, you will be sorely missed.

Don't waste your breath

Mon, 17 Mar 2003 16:44:22 +0000

Israel carries out deadly Gaza raid. At least nine Palestinians are reported killed during an Israeli operation in a central Gaza refugee camp. [BBC News | World | UK Edition]

I don't know why the BBC bother to keep mentioning dead Palestinians. Don't they realise that they are wasting valuable space that could be taken up with news about celebrities or adverts for hair products?

Arthur Kent: Journalist for our times

Tue, 18 Mar 2003 10:54:08 +0000

Scud Stud lobs a missile at Bush. During the Gulf War, NBC reporter Arthur Kent was famed for his boyish good looks. Today, liberated from the network, he's free to say that Bush is out of control. [Salon.com]

I don't remember Arthur Kent from the first Gulf War. Perhaps because I quickly grew sick of being spoon fed the "ra ra" news coverage and turned it off. However I wish I had caught his pieces.

His is a very thoughtful point of view that we should be hearing more of. The following is just a sample that resonated with me. I'd encourage anyone to read the whole article.

I'm still trying to shake from my mind the disbelief that a modern American administration can be as clumsy, as brusque and as crude as this one. Think back to Sept. 12, 2001: Kids in Paris were wearing American flags out of solidarity with the American people. Countries were lining up, tripping over one another, to come and touch the hem of the cloak of power in Washington D.C. The Bush administration had allies and support and emotional empathy from people around the world. It's gone. Where has it gone? It hasn't disappeared by Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein pouring a potion over people. It's gone because the administration has so offended the sensibilities of peace-loving, democracy-loving people that they simply have to take to the streets, or demand of their leaders to tell the Bush administration to stop and to think.

I don't want to see a "coalition of the willing." We need a coalition of the thinking. We need countries and leaders to get together and think. The campaign against terror is a battle of ideas. We have better ideas; we have better societies. You outthink terrorists and you outmaneuver them, economically, socially, politically, diplomatically, as well as militarily. We have got to get into the Muslim world and the Third World in a nonviolent fashion and outperform the al-Qaidas and Saddam Husseins of the world with the promise of a better tomorrow for those people, as well as our own. Otherwise, we lose.

Americans should ask themselves: Whose agenda, besides the Bush administration's, is served by a rush to war? The answer is Osama bin Laden's and those of the people like him. They don't care about the Iraqi people, or Saddam Hussein, but they are confident a deployment of raw, American military power in the Middle East will create more anti-American sentiment, which will help them. If you're falling into your enemy's trap, what's the hurry? Why aren't there smarter solutions? As journalists, these are the questions that we should be prompting the public to ask. Instead, I see coverage about the inevitability of war and the deployment.

News you can trust

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 12:21:54 +0100

Tech writer iced for expressing opinion. Not 'objective' [The Register]

The story is probably going to become typical as the days go by. Corporate ownership of the press is an ugly business only overshadowed by state ownership of the press.

I found the Reporters sans frontières worldwide press freedom index quite interesting. The USA languishing at #17 didn't surprise me but the UK being at #21 did. I hadn't realised that things were actually worse here! I doubt anyone in Italy will be surprised by their showing at #40. Thank you signor Berlusconi!

Whose screwing who..?

Fri, 02 May 2003 07:44:00 +0100

Ben Shiller.

"Nothing makes someone more unlikable than their unawareness of what makes them unlikable. That's the main reason why people don't like Los Angeles. It's not surprising, then, that Hollywood's answer to the advent of DVD burners and Internet piracy is a clueless public service announcement in which Ben Affleck, Lucy Liu, and 'Titanic' director James Cameron ask you not to steal from them. Next they'll produce a PSA about how small trailers can cause claustrophobia.

In May, Affleck's 1-minute-12-second plea will unspool on movie screens nationwide; it'll be the Will Rogers Institute can-rattle of our time. But this appeal is for the fair treatment of movie stars, not the compassionate support of sick kids -- or sick horses, or sick kids who ride horses....

But Affleck's point, on second viewing, wasn't that he's Benny from the Block and in need of scratch. It's that the less well-paid are in jeopardy if piracy blunts studios' profits. 'The movie you're about to see is the work of hundreds of people,' says Affleck in the PSA. 'Not just the stars you see on screen,' but writers, cameramen, costumers, and countless others. Apparently, there is a world in which the proletariat includes the guy who penned 'Point Break....'

Also, I can't figure out why they would show this PSA to people who've just paid full price for admission, instead of shoving it at the front end of a DVD, where actual criminals might see it, since the only people Internet pirates truly put out of business are the in-theater camcorder crooks.

When I asked Motion Picture Association of America president Jack Valenti whether the director of the highest-grossing movie of all time was the ideal spokesperson against petty theft, he tap-danced. 'I found the most convincing part to be the working stiffs,' said Valenti of the PSA, 'the guys who have a modest home and kids who go to public schools. They make $75,000 to $100,000 a year. That's not much to live on. I don't have to tell you that,' he said, vastly overestimating the U.S. poverty level and what I get paid for this column. I vowed right then not only to pirate a movie but also to find a way to use the Internet to steal directly from Jack Valenti's home....

I'll still rent DVDs and see movies in theaters. But I'll download them too. And after watching that PSA, I'm especially going to steal Affleck flicks. As soon as he makes one worth stealing." [Entertainment Weekly, available to subscribers only]

[The Shifted Librarian]

LOL

Of course Valenti doesn't seem to appreciate the irony that it is he and his buddies that ensure that the "working stiffs" make only $75-$100K of the vast fortunes that get made from these movies. The words "That's not much to live on" should choke him but like all these poisonous bastards he is immune. Probably Afflecks too busy being rich & famous to worry about that either.

Remind me again, Whose screwing who..?

Counting the days

Sat, 22 Nov 2003 10:43:19 +0000

The media octopus loses a tentacle. Congress has dealt Bush a stinging defeat on the FCC's relaxed new ownership rules -- and is threatening to strike a fatal blow.

[Salon.com]

This Salon piece was just so interesting in so many ways. Foremost was a little education about the way bills in the US are so multi-faceted. I'd never quite understood why totally unrelated legislation could be tacked onto a bill as it went through the houses.

What are the odds of Bush now following through on a threatened administration veto? Most Beltway observers today think the 60 percent chance Murdoch gave has dwindled to 1 or 2 percent, that there's virtually no chance Bush will veto the $280 billion spending bill in order to make a stand on behalf of media behemoths like the networks, Viacom and Fox that would be allowed to expand their TV empires under the new rules.

Is this is? To allow unpopular (to one side or the other) legislation to pass by threat of blocking other, less controversial, legislation? It's an interesting situation. Are there rules about what can be attached? And by whom?

I also found it interesting to hear about the people pushing conservatives into supporting media restrictions:

That, plus the fact that Bush has never issued a veto before, and would be unlikely to use his first on an issue that does nothing to energize his political base. In fact, active conservative Christian groups, along with NRA members, have been among the 2 million Americans who contacted the FCC complaining about further media consolidation. The conservative groups are opposed to expanding the power of Big Media because they regard it as too liberal; they regard TV in particular as drenched in immoral sex and violence.

Christians & the gun lobby do make kind of strange bed-follows with the anti-corporatist liberals, anti-monopolist conservatives, and free-speech advocates.

But if, as the article proposes, the reason these groups are banding together to defeat Big Media is a growing awareness of their power in society, and the harm they can cause, then what I wonder what this says about things like the Broadcast flag.

Big Media's days have been numbered for a while. Can we count them now?

The poor bastards who will impeach Clinton but cling to Bush

Sat, 22 Nov 2003 11:11:04 +0000

"The president ought to be ashamed". Former Sen. Max Cleland blasts Bush's "Nixonian" stonewalling of the 9/11 commission, his "lies" about Iraq, and his flight-suit photo op on the USS Lincoln after "hiding out" during Vietnam. [Salon.com]

There are two US national scandals in this piece:

The president and his administrations handling of 9/11 and the war in Iraq.
The big media companies spinning things for their pals in the administration.

For Iraqi's wondering about an American style democracy handed to them, at gun-point, by America I can't help but think they are sceptical. And who could blame them for voting for an Islamic state?

I also think it is shameful that Clinton can be impeached for lying about having sex with an aide whilst Bush and his cronies lie & disemble daily, imprison without trial, dismantle America & sell it (where do you think all this money is coming from to fund your war?) and reap the profits.

"For shame!" It makes me angry to think about it.

How DRM makes life better!

Mon, 12 Jan 2004 09:13:13 +0000

HP declares war on sharing culture. CES The open everything is dead [The Register]

HP stands up for it's pals in the media industry and tells us we are all thieves who won't be trusted.

In a sense I almost look forward to the day when all digital content is locked up behind it's DRM firewalls and user-hostile operating systems. It might galvanise me to read more books, go to the theatre, and so on. I'll also have more cash because I won't be buying all this expensive content.

So, DRM could actually improve my life.

Catalyzes recurring revenue model, it says here.

Tue, 04 May 2004 19:09:23 +0100

Here's locking down you, kid - MS hawks vision of DRM future. Catalyzes recurring revenue model, it says here By John Lettice . [The Register]

Needless to say I won't be buying one of these devices, nor will I be licensing the legitimate content to go on them. I intend to boycott all such things until the industry takes a serious approach to consumer rights, i.e. forever.

iTunes: no thank you

Mon, 14 Jun 2004 09:15:50 +0100

Apple readies European iTunes launch. Excitement reaches fever pitch By John Oates . [The Register]

I think there is something wrong with the system when an olympic standard consumer such as myself says "no thanks." However I appear to be out of step with the market who either don't realise, don't care, or, don't agree that they're being screwed.

Continuing on the path of divergence

Thu, 25 May 2006 12:20:40 +0100

It's not that I was really looking forward to buying a Playstation 3 but if the news that Sony are moving to individuals licensing, not buying, games (to stamp out the aftermarket we're told) is true then it will be enough to stop me buying one. BTW: Even if they do this I don't think it will be a technical solution, I think it will be a legal solution to stop public trading.

In the 4 years I've owned a PS2 I've never sold a game and I've bought 4 so my problem isn't my love of the aftermarket. The reason I don't like this is that it's yet another thin end of the wedge about the way content owners are trying to redefine their relationship with us would be consumers (or the enemy as they like to call us).

We must remember that this move is being taken by Sony who recently got into hot water (but not hot enough IMO) by secretly adding RootKit based DRM to their media products. We should consider very carefully the motives behind what they do and what they think they can get away with. Or, rather, you should if you plan to give them your money.

To be very clear I am not in favour of trying to stop Sony closing down the PS3 aftermarket. As long as they are up front and open about what they are doing and how it will be achieved then I think they have a perfect right to put whatever walls around their content will make them happy. I just won't go along with it as long as I have a choice and it will ultimately self correct as the network effects hurt their business.

What is Nintendo's attitude towards it's customers? Maybe I need to switch platforms.

Boycott

Tue, 06 Jun 2006 09:19:47 +0100

So I just read about the SIRA bill going through the US congress:

Simply put, SIRA fundamentally redefines copyright and fair use in the digital world. It would require all incidental copies of music to be licensed separately from the originating copy. Even copies of songs that are cached in your computer's memory or buffered over a network would need yet another license. Once again, Big Copyright is looking for a way to double-dip into your wallet, extracting payment for the same content at multiple levels.

Yet another reason not to use products from big media companies.