11 ms·
You're right, better and more convenient service would erode piracy, but it would also erode profits and destroy the core business. The core business of a media
by colmmacc 15y ago
You're right, better and more convenient service would erode piracy, but it would also erode profits and destroy the core business. The core business of a media company isn't simply to deliver content, but rather it is to leverage that content as a mediation tool.
Media companies mediate; they push consumer convenience just as far as they can in return for advertising and distribution dollars.
Examples;
* Cable companies know just how much money the market will bear for channels they don't even want, for the ones that they do.
* Television companies know just how many ads you can tolerate, before time-shifting dominates.
* Hollywood knows just how long it can make international markets wait for releases, in return for cheaper distribution and marketing (a global launch would make a publicity tour very hard).
* The music industry knows how to set prices so that you'll buy the same piece of music over and over again in different formats.
* TV and Movie content gets sold 4 or 5 times over, in theaters, on television, DVDs/blu-ray, online rental, subscription streaming. Only delays and segmentation (both inconvenient for consumers) make this possible.
Media companies are the middle-men, the grand-bargain makers, with their desirable content on one side of the scales, and inconveniences like ads, delays, prices and draconian punitive laws on the other side. Media companies don't mind being hated, that usually means they're doing a good job, as long as you love some of their content - the system still works.
This is why the convenience represented by technology presents such a threat, it dramatically alters the bargaining positions of both the content owners and the distributors.
That middle-man business must be nearing its end, so the question is; can consumer convenient technological distribution get more return for the content creators, the financiers and backers?