John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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Anybody in Hong Kong has been witnessing an unaccustomed high profile for copyright issues this week: the Legislative Council is taking up copyright amendments which would extend copyright for the first time into the digital realm, and bring the laws into conformity with the WIPO Internet Treaties. Unfortunately, there have been some snafus along the way. And there was even an explosion (the real kind, not the verbal kind) on Wednesday. The anti-copyright forces are composed of lots of young citizens who don’t understand copyright law but want to retain their freedom to post whatever they want online, egged on by internet companies who love traffic, traffic and more traffic, no matter what the origin. The copyright industries are trying to make a reasoned case, helped out by a handful of legal professionals and academics. but it’s uphill going against hordes of “netizens” who repeat scare scenarios to each other. Not for nothing is the spokesman for one of the anti-copyright groups named Kafka (I kid you not.) |
Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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A new report from PricewaterhouseCoopers entitled Videoquake 3.0: The Evolution of TV’s Revolution (free download) says one in four US consumers, or 23%, trimmed their pay TV services in 2015, with 16% of people surveyed cutting the cord entirely. There’s a lot more to the PwC report than just those headlines, of course, but it certainly reaffirms recent trends in the US. |
Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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As does Network control company Sandvine’s latest Global Internet Phenomena report (registration required), noting that streaming video now accounts for 70% of fixed broadband usage. Drilling deeper into the report, it shows that Netflix alone accounts for more than half that video traffic, although the share of streaming media provided by other sources is also rising. The trends are slightly different when looking at mobile broadband; video and audio streaming are big, but social media is also driving a lot of traffic.
Meanwhile, subscriber management company Paywizard has released a white paper called OTT Isn’t Just For Christmas (registration required) that’s based on surveys in the US, UK, Germany, Singapore, Australia, and Brazil. It’s predicting a big surge in SVOD sign-ups in the period before Christmas, but also (and rather worryingly) that 50% of those subscribers will drop their subscriptions by July. |
Kevin Jennings
Programme Director
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Vodafone is rolling out its 4G network in India. The service is initially available in Kochi, Kerala. Vodafone LTE services are available on most 4G-enabled smartphones Customers will have access to HD video streaming, mobile gaming and two-way video calling. Vodafone said it will soon expand its 4G roll-out to cover Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru and Kolkata. Vodafone is already offering streaming video and new users can watch movies with a free unlimited movie subscription via Hungama Play for three months. Competitor Reliance Jio has also said it will announce the launch of its 4G services in India by the end of this month. It is anticipated that Jio’s data pricing will be 50% cheaper by compared to its main rivals Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone India. |
Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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Lots of headlines coming out of the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference, starting with the bank itself, which published a report endorsing the bundle as the best value at the best price. Among the industry luminaries assembled in New York was Time-Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes, who says Apple’s Tim Cook is right, TV is broken. Meanwhile, CBS boss Les Moonves says traditional broadcasters are doing just fine, Fox CFO John Nallen says the streaming TV experience is not great for US consumers, Netflix’s Ted Sarandos joked (?) about starting a new sports league, Liberty CEO Greg Maffei reckons Wall Street overreacted to cord-cutting, and Discovery’s David Zaslav is looking globally rather than being US-centric. |
Mark Lay
Vice President, Singapore
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There has been a lot of talk about ad blockers recently but a company called Shine is taking it to the next level. "Where Ad Block Plus is a Kalashnikov, Shine is a weapon of mass destruction.” "Shine’s business is to suppress mobile advertising —all of it, to every customer — by simply eliminating ads at the cell phone carrier level.” “We should not underestimate Shine”, warns a Google executive, “they have traction; they recently got the former CEO of Vodafone Europe on their board of directors and more cell carriers are considering working with them”. In Asia, as a good portion of video viewing is on mobile, this type of ad blocking could be of serious concern to our business. |
Jane Buckthought
Advertising Consultant
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A new report released by GroupM has predicted that ad spend globally will remain subdued over the coming 12 months. It also highlights that global ad investment had grown about four per cent in 2015 and will continue to grow to four and a half per cent in 2016. Meanwhile, another report released this week by ZenithOptimedia says traditional spend on TV has already peaked and it will be surpassed by digital spend by 2018. A similar report, this time by Magna Global, says that spends on TV actually fell for the first time year on year in 2015 (outside of a recession.) |
John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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In India, the Net Neutrality issue has not gone away, despite being quiet for a few months. The government for the time being prefers to pass the hot potato to the TRAI, and wait for them to recommend. The regulator is torn between desires to chant to the mantra of “free and open internet” and the fact that its regulated telco constituents need to find a way to find massive infrastructure investments, and their revenues are being savaged by telecom OTT services. But this week TRAI issued a new consultation paper, explicitly targeting “zero-rating” plans like Facebook’s Internet.org and Airtel Zero. TRAI is just asking for views, but the framing of the questions doesn’t seem to favor the zero-rating plans, using words like discriminatory, non-competitive and thwarting innovation. |
Anjan Mitra
Executive Director, India
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Indian broadcast and telecoms regulator has put its foot down ruling out any extensions on the deadline for digital rollout’s Phase III amidst hectiv lobbying seeking some relaxations. Though unrelated to digitisation, but stakeholders continue to bicker over other issues that may just slow down digital rollout in its next and last phase and, may be, also PM Modi’s ambitious Digital India dream. |
Yegee Chun
Regulatory Assistant
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Netflix is often credited with sparking a binge-watching epidemic by allowing users to marathon episodes of their favourite TV series. With its one-hour holiday special, A Very Murray Christmas, it emulates a more traditional TV experience instead, though the special is obviously not aired live and will be available before, during, and every day after Christmas. Indeed, it seems that Netflix’s plans for 2016 have it starting to behave much like a TV station. Interestingly enough, the rise of Netflix is concurrent with a decrease in the proportion of piracy over total Internet traffic. |
Anjan Mitra
Executive Director, India
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Self regulation doesn’t seem to be working that effectively, it seems. A TRAI report states 139 TV channels flouting 12 minute per hour advertising cap. Or, is it that self-regulatory norms are not applicable on TRAI diktat, an issue that’s being still contested in courts? |
John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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Japan’s self-regulatory system for media content came in for comment last week, amid worries the government might be getting too pushy. |
Kevin Jennings
Programme Director
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Amazon Prime customers in the US can now manage standalone OTT video services from other providers without the need for a separate cable subscription through a new initiative called the Streaming Partners Program which launched on December 8th. The hub allows outside SVOD providers to market their platforms to Prime subscribers, delivering their video through Amazon’s streaming infrastructure. Billing would also take place through the retail giant’s payment system. Customers will be able to use one watchlist to browse across all subscriptions, with special Prime member pricing available for some services. At least 16 other partners have signed up for the program at launch, among them A+E Networks’ Lifetime Movie Club, AMC’s Shudder, Showtime, Starz, SundanceNow Doc Club and RLJ Entertainment’s Acorn TV. |
John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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Taiwan’s NCC is continuing to put forward its plan to split that island’s huge, archaic, analogue cable bundle into a fixed-price basic tier and various add-ons. The new system was originally mooted in 2013, but now the regulator said the new system could be in place as early as next year. That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were further delays. |
Mark Lay
Vice President, Singapore
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About 75-80 percent of us admit to using a second device while watching TV. Top activities are web browsing, browsing for content tied to what we’re watching, reading email, reading news, and social media. "Nearly 40% of people surveyed are already making the effort to manually tie together what they’re watching on the big screen to the small screen in front of them. Imagine how much higher that percentage could go if there was some mechanism for connecting the devices automatically ” I see it now, an app with IMDB and tv.com open in one corner. In the other is Twitter, WhatsApp and FB. And somewhere else is Amazon so I can purchase Don Draper’s latest tie. Brings Primetime to whole new level. |
