BigBrainBoy

The Line Between Content & Advertising is Officially Gone

You will have probably noted by now our frequent tolling of the death bell for the advertising/content firewall. 2008 has turned into an interesting TV year since the writers strike (which put BBB into silence along with all your favorite TV shows) has precipitated the 52-week TV season and the death of the TV “Pilot.” The Networks, desperate to find funding to stay afloat have gone back in time and pulled a page from the birth-of-TV playbook: Just have your advertiser pay for the show, oh and let them come up with the content too:

Slowing Demand for TVs

As we approach D-day of the great 2009 digital TV switchover, it looks like shoppers are actually not buying up a bunch of new TVs as expected:

Twentieth, Yahoo! Plan Joint Show

When are TV people going to learn that no one online is going to watch a TV-style “clipshow” of popular web videos? Those who hang out online have already seen them. As for syndicating the same content to be broadcast on television, TV-watchers don’t like watching a bunch of low-res, compressed web videos interrupted by 30-second advertisements.

No one likes clipshows. This isn’t “content creation,” its just exploiting the amateur public videos that don’t require any union staff.

Think of this as “reality tv” for the ‘net from the ‘net.

Fourth BarcampLA this weekend

The TV-ocalypse is upon us, Part 2

First, CBS boss Les Moonves admits: ”I’m a bit concerned about the state of network television generally.” Then NBC-Universal Chief Jeff Zucker admits that the last two years were ”more difficult.” And to add insult to injury, advertisers are convinced that the looming writers strike will permanently harm TV viewership:

Are the Rumors of the Death of TV Greatly Exaggerated?

This opening salvo, quoting the enormity of TV watching as part of America’s media landscape, is a typical tactic for those who are rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

What they fail to realize is that we are now at the peak of TV. If Americans are already watching eight (!) hours a day, can anyone realistically believe that it will go up to nine hours a day? People are completely maxed out on TV. There is nowhere to go but down.

Microsoft Finally Copying Apple’s Set-Top Box

The problem with “convergence” technologies is that while more of our media are becoming trapped on our computers, do people like grandma really want to spend the time to hook up the finicky things to their TV set? Perhaps one day when computers are as reliable as VCRs (Tivo anyone?) they will. But in an age when you can hook your iPod or even iPhone up to the TV to watch video, why spend so much effort trying to hook up a Windows computer?

Dedicated hardware always wins in the end (even if that dedicated hardware is just a software computer in disguise).

The Unions are Coming

There is no surer sign in the death-of-TV than the fact that unions will cease to allow pay/benefit distinctions that give favorable (i.e. cheaper) rates to web content. Makes one wonder what the looming Hollywood strikes are really all about, doesn’t it?

The TV-ocalypse is upon us!

Seems like everyone is hating TV these days. If the advertisers are upset, the networks try to please them but then the viewers get upset. The problem here is that at the end of the day, advertisers and audiences are always going to be in conflict: auds want free content and advertisers won’t pay for it if they can’t get their messages in everyone’s face.

The TV-ocalypse is upon us!

Your Computer is the TV… or is Your TV the Computer?

What revelations!

1. People prefer high-resolution, high quality video rather than tiny, blurry, postage stamp sized videos.

2. People prefer big-budget, high-production-value content rather than home videos.

3. Computers are just as capable of playing video in a TV-like fashion.

Sounds like they took a time machine into the future! What fucking year is it again? Where are our rocketpacks?

TV’s Last Gasp: 2008

TV will have its peak in 2008 as the elections will force politicians to spend billions on advertising (not to mention the Olympics):

BigBrainBoy

The Line Between Content & Advertising is Officially Gone

Slowing Demand for TVs

Twentieth, Yahoo! Plan Joint Show

Fourth BarcampLA this weekend

The TV-ocalypse is upon us, Part 2

Are the Rumors of the Death of TV Greatly Exaggerated?

Microsoft Finally Copying Apple’s Set-Top Box

The Unions are Coming

The TV-ocalypse is upon us!

Your Computer is the TV… or is Your TV the Computer?

TV’s Last Gasp: 2008

Adobe Adopts h.264 for Flash

Casual Gaming Surpasses Online Videos?

Is Web Video a Threat to TV?

Google Enters the Wireless Fray?

Let the Net Video Advertising Wars Begin!

TV Still Dominant

Television Showing It’s Gray Hair

Internet Video Brings You Cutting Edge Re-Runs!

Apple’s “Hobby” Looks Like a new Career