03 July, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending July 3rd. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter CEO	A simpler, leaner, BBC — that’s the stated goal of a restructuring that will cut up to 1000 jobs, to realise some £50 million in savings annually. The BBC has lost about £150 million pounds in operating revenuesbecause households across the UK have stopped paying their licence fees. Previously, every UK household was required to pay £145.50 annually to subsidise the BBC’s live TV broadcasting; however, a loophole allows those watching online or via catch-up TV services to avoid the fee. Simple mathematics makes it clear that the job cuts alone won’t be enough to plug the hole, and with the Cameron government promising to decriminalise non-payment of licence fees setting off a serious political row, this story is far from over.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	Michael Wolff’s new book is called, “Television is the New Television: The Unexpected Triumph of Old Media in the Digital Age”. Wow. I guess the verdict is in. Case closed. Apparently, with the need for digital sites to continue to sell more and more advertising at lower CPM, soon all digital advertising will become almost free and video on the internet will cease to exist. #sarcasm Or maybe not, as outlined in Why He’s Wrong. Possibly a more appropriate book title would read something like, “The Big TV Companies Are Still Doing Just Fine”.
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	While a FCC decision on first Net Neutrality complaint could set precedent, India’s Department of Telecoms highlights the ambiguity within the government on the issue. In a report, while supporting net neutrality, DoT adds services such as Viber, Skype and WhatsApp should be regulated and brought under a licensing regime just like telcos. Rightfully such proposals have been criticised as pandering to telcos’ somewhat `twisted’ arguments. As the government awaits TRAI’s recommendations on the issue, Indian policy-makers are watching theirEU counterparts who have eliminated mobile phone roaming charges, but on net neutrality rules, disappointed the netizens (allowing zero-rated services and some prioritization).
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Yes, the digerati are clearly disappointed by the EU’s decision. It doesn’t go far enough in instilling “unequivocal” equality on the internet; it’s “a contradictory text that does not deliver net neutrality;” it’s “an abdication of responsibility.” Yadda yadda… Apart from the interwebbies, Euro-lefties hate the idea that network operators might actually seek to make money through providing services; they call that “handing over the future of the internet to telcos.” Well, that kind of debate is one Europe can afford, but (returning to India) I still worry, now that the DoT has given its views, that unless the telcos have a business model to make money off video, we’ll end up with a poorly financed, poor-quality, slow network that is…oh yes… equal to all.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	The social media video wars just started heating up again, with Facebook announcing it will split ad revenues with video creators. This is a big deal, since Facebook now is getting something like 4 billion video views per day. The move positions them squarely opposite YouTube, and follows another move to rectify the problem of “false positive” viewing numbers generated by its autostart plays. (Of course, that’s a problem Twitter has recently embraced, by putting autostart videos into users’ feeds.)
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	All the way over in Green Bay, Wisconsin, the pay-per-view sports industry is fighting the same battle CASBAA fought in Hong Kong 7 years ago: against publicans airing unauthorized video streams in their commercial premises. People interested in enforcement in Asia can only dream about having legal processes (and awarded judgements) that are as favorable as in Wisconsin!
Jane Buckthought Advertising Consultant	AOL is taking over Microsoft’s display ad business on Xbox, Skype, and other products. AOL will now control some of the most prominent advertising space in the tech world and will make Bing their search engine of choice instead of Google.Only time will tell if we are seeing two iconic brands reinventing themselves or, as the journalist Robert Peston described the earlier Nokia/Microsoft deal, “ two drunks supporting each other at the end of a party”.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Everybody knows there is a lot of video porn being consumed, mostly on the internet, rather than pay-TV platforms. But here’s an interesting note from a corner of the industry we don’t talk much about. It seems that the mobile telecoms industry is raking in the cash from people watching porn clips on their smartphones. Another interesting note is that “adult SMS” services are poised for big growth in India. Who knew?
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	The war for eyeballs in the TV industry doesn’t stop with programming, but is extending into the devices used to access the vast array of content. Back in the day, to control our TV, we only had to deal with a “cable box”. Ok, REALLY back in the day, some of us only had a channel and volume dial. Nowadays the options are many: Apple TV, Google’s Chromecast and Android TV, Amazon’s Fire TV and Fire TV Stick, WD TV Media Player and Roku, to name the most popular. “There’s one thing Roku has that no one else does, and that’s neutrality. Every one of Roku’s rivals, including Apple, Amazon, and Google, has a vested interest in their own content.”
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	An interesting development in streaming video sees Netflix launching prepaid cards in the UK. Netflix already offers prepaid giftcards in North America and Australia and sees this as an easy way for newbies to try out the service beyond its free trial without making a huge commitment and sharing credit card and bank details.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

26 June, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending June 26th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Scissors, or a razor? A new report in the US shows 8.2% of former pay TV households cut the cord in 2014… but another 45% shaved it, by reducing their services. Meantime, ratings agency Nielsen has released its Q1 Total Audience Report, which compares usage of TV, radio, and digital platforms in the US. Guess what? Adults still spend the most time watching TV. There are a lot of caveats in the report, and some worrying data too (millennials are almost as busy on their devices as they are watching TV), but overall it’s an encouraging message.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Digital delivery of programming continues to create a fluid landscape for every aspect of the pay TV business. As more people are watching catch-up, some networks are reacting by creating “DVR-Proof” programming specifically designed for live viewing. We also see a YouTube powerhouse going somewhat traditional. Disney-owned, Maker Studios, has agreed to supply its Polaris+ channel to Sling TV. And on the distribution side, HULU is now offering Showtime to existing Hulu subscribers. This business is ripe for dealmakers.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

NZ TV operators have won their court case against VPN providers. The case was settled, but the VPNs have canceled their Global Mode service. The issue in New Zealand – like Singapore – is that the providers offered geo-unblocking technology that covered “every… customer, without them having to do anything,” and then they marketed themselves as a circumvention service. A blogger on TorrentFreak, arguing that VPNs could also be used to get around Australia’s new site blocking law, got it right: it seems “unlikely that services who play by the rules (i.e do not promote their products for infringing purposes) will be blocked.”

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

News from the advertising festival that is the Cannes Lions is that Tencent’s SY Lau has accepted this year’s Cannes Lions Media Person of the Year award, which had nominally been announced a few months back. Speaking at the event this week Lau addressed the changing behaviour of young people in China, a generation he referred to as “native citizens of connectivity” and warned that any global brands looking to “exploit” rather than “explore” the growing Chinese market will come unstuck. Highlights from the festival including more form SY Lau can be seen here.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

A couple of interesting internet commentaries this week: In Canada, a court rejected Google’s argument that it couldn’t control its search service. The judge said freedom of expression was important, but so were other rights, and the justice system needed to strike a sensible balance. And a New Zealand blogger worried that spyware is embedded in the latest Chrome software. He observes that Google’s “mantra ‘Do no evil’ is surely coming under immense pressure from stock-holders, most of who are only interested in the money those stocks will earn.” Jeez, whatever happened to all those internet idealists – just money-grubbers like everyone else?

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

Even as India’s broadcast and telecoms regulator TRAI continues to await a new Chairman (who would be expected to pilot final recommendations on OTT and net neutrality) and Telecoms Ministry yet to make public its own report on net neutrality, the debate rages on with shrillness lessening in recent times. With the cash-rich Reliance Industries recently outlining its digital and telecom vision, lobbying has started to snipe telcos’ growing influence. Experts now opine telcos shouldn’t be allowed to own content, which could ensure neutrality. Watch this space for more drama.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

The dog-and-pony shows were held back in May, but now the upfront deals are starting to come in, and the tug-of-war between networks and buyers is as fierce as ever. Meantime, the digital hoi polloi are starting to freak out about ads in their paid streaming Seinfeld eps, and Netflix subscribers would apparently be willing to pay more to keep the platform ad-free. All of which once again begs the question: what is the future of the 30-second spot?

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

And watch this steamroller coming: It seems the internet is becoming THE key medium for advertising. The fastest growth is coming in our backyard: Zenith Optimedia identifies ‘Fast-track Asia’, which includes China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam. Now, it would be nice if we can get the people profiting from all that growth to adopt some basic business standards, like not placing mainstream ads onto porn and piracy sites!

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

Major IPTV player Fetch TV has created a new mobile ratings app which provides live data on TV viewing across some 250,000 set top boxes, the app is already the largest window into the TV viewing habits of millions of Australians with the channel selections of tens of thousands of consumers available on a one hour delay. Should traditional measurement companies be worried?

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

More than anything else this report once again highlights the strident importance of online video consumption— something that Indian policy-makers refuse to acknowledge in totality and CASBAA has been stressing on. A research report by Bank of America-Merrill Lynch highlights online video content will disrupt India’s pay TV market big way. Gainers: broadcasters & content owners. Losers: DTH operators. The report adds with digitisation roll-out continuing, albeit slowly, MSOs would benefit, but would also have to be innovative in revenue generation methods.

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

A new press freedom group is calling out the Singaporean governmentin a bid to push for sedition laws and those controlling media licensing to be abolished. The group is taking aim at Singapore’s Sedition Act, which was used to close socio-political website The Real Singapore, and the Media Development Authority’s licensing framework, which since it was introduced in 2013, has led to the closure of independent news site The Breakfast Network, and other laws that make critical voices vulnerable to legal action.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

US start-up Toggle is partnering with a relatively new entrant in the streaming video market — retail behemoth Wal-Mart. Quietly launched back in January, the Vudu dongle is the hardware in Wal-Mart’s streaming service, and some 100,000 units have sold so far. The device and service are positioned to compete against Google’s Chromecast, the Roku set-top box series, and Amazon’s Fire TV range of devices. However, Wal-Mart’s online aspirations plus its dominance in the bricks-and-mortar retail sector (US$1 billion in sales daily), coupled with seed investment and ongoing partnership with Warner Brothers, could make Vudu a serious contender to watch.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Australia’s two main news organisations, have withdrawn from officially covering the 2015 rugby union World Cup in England. They announced that they are not happy with how this year’s Rugby World Cup rights are being managed and have decided not to seek press accreditation because of unreasonable restrictions. The tournament will be officially shunned by most main print outlets – including the Sydney Morning Herald, the Herald Sun and the Australian. Instead, for the first time they will all rely on TV and social media to keep their readers informed – which suggests an even greater opportunity for broadcasters carrying the tournament.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

After Reliance Industries announcement on RJio and ambitious 4G plans, Netflix’s probable entry into India hots up things further. It has, reportedly, also sent many players scurrying for backups and Plan B, C… Should the Indian consumer rejoice for being spoilt for choice? Yes and no. Choices would be aplenty, but only if Department of Telecoms could speed up broadband connections to fire up PM Modi’s Digital India dream.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

19 June, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending June 19th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

New t-shirt idea: “WWABBD?”… or “What Will Alibaba Do?” Among the answers, apparently, is launch Netflix in China before Netflix can get its market entry sorted. (Remember, it was just a month ago that Netflix’s share price soared on rumors of a potential partnership with Alibaba; predictably, they’ve taken a hit on the more recent news.) But Alibaba’s TMall Box Office (or “TBO” for short, hmmm…) isn’t the only streaming deal the online behemoth has in the works — it’s also backing a plan by Gehua, Beijing’s municipally-owned cable operator, to expand its video streaming service across China. In another effort being compared to Netflix, the less-catchily-named “China TV Theaters Operating Co” (中国电视院线运营公司) has two other state-owned partners, and is seeking to bring together cable operators across the country, to leverage scale and negotiate content deals directly with rights-owners.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Rupert Murdoch himself has confirmed that last week’s reports were on the money, and he is handing over the reins at Fox to his sons Lachlan and James, effective July 1. COO Chase Carey will step aside and into a new role as Executive Vice-Chairman that he will hold through June 2016. All company operations will jointly report to the brothers. James will now be CEO and report to the Chairman and the Board of Directors, with Lachlan being Executive Chairman reporting to the Board. And as expected, Rupert will stay on as Chairman. No drama here, no pressure on the new generation, it’s not like anyone will be second-guessing them, or anything like that, no sireee.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

The Aussie Communications Minister made two noteworthy statements this week, on two very different issues. He said the government would review the operations of the telecoms and broadcasting regulator ACMA to ensure Australia’s regulatory framework is “future-focused” and “able to effectively deal with challenges arising from a rapidly changing communications sector.” Good plan; let’s see if they can really bring themselves to deal with the very tilted playing field.

And then he expressed strong support for getting new copyright legislation passed, including Australia’s first-ever provisions allowing courts to order pirate websites blocked in Australia. As a sop to consumer advocates who have been opposing the legislation on the basis it could take away consumers’ right to use VPNs, Turnbull said the new legislation would not permit closing down consumer access to VPNs used to access programming in other countries: “If Australian rights owners have got issues about American sites selling content to Australians in respect of which they do not have Australian rights, they should take it up with them.” So no new legislation, but legal analysts have said whether VPN use is legal would be “likely to depend on the specific circumstances and the terms and conditions relating to the transaction.”

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Latest chatter from the Ministry of M&A: of course Comcast wants to buy T-Mobile, but then again, no Comcast doesn’t want to buy T-Mobile, but then what happened to Dish buying T-Mobile, and anyway, the whole thing is just the Worst Idea Ever.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

What is going on with TV Shows nowadays, and what is the future of Television? I Love Lucy, the first big sitcom, produced 35 half hour programs in its inaugural season. Thereafter, for a long time, broadcasters ruled that there would be between 22 and 24 episodes per season. Then things started slowly heading south. Now, with shows like Silicon Valley and Veep, 10 Episodes Is the New 13. Soon the world may all turn British and our view of a highly successful TV show will be 2 seasons long and have 6 episodes in each. I, literally, couldn’t get enough of The (original) Office where, David Brent, like new TV programmers, doesn’t live by “the rules” either.

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

According to the Global OTT TV & Video Forecasts report from Digital TV Research, Global OTT TV and video revenues [covering 64 countries] will reach $51.1 billion in 2020; a massive increase from the $4.2 billion recorded in 2010 and the $26.0 billion expected in 2015.

As expected the US will remain the dominant territory – with OTT TV and video revenues rising by $16.6 billion between 2010 and 2020 to $19.1 billion but China’s OTT TV and video revenues are predicted to sky rocket from just $40 million in 2010 to $2,815 million by 2020. In addition, SVOD revenues will soar from $1.0 billion in 2010 to $21.6 billion in 2020 with SVOD set to become the largest revenue source by 2020, overtaking OTT advertising.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

Jurassic World has some Indian competition. Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Industries Ltd at an AGM earlier this week unveiled its digital vision aka Reliance JIO’s 4G services. Sample some facts: initial coverage of over 90% urban India and over 215,000 villages; 250,000 km of fibre optics; capacity to serve over 100 mn broadband subs; low-cost 4G LTE smart phones starting from INR 4,000/USD 62; basic monthly subscription charge of INR 300-500/USD5-8; 18 per cent of India’s spectrum across five bands. Though the stock markets or river Ganga did not erupt into flames at these announcements, experts believe at some point “smaller operators may begin to question their own business model…or even put their hands up“. Granted an MSO licence too this week, RJIO, which started to drip-irrigate its apps beginning with JIO Chat, proposes to invest INR 700 billion or approx USD 14 billion. A classic Reliance disruption or some kick-ass dino moves? “No,” a friend in RIL said, with tongue firmly in cheek,” That’s what it takes to build #DigitalBharat (Digital India).” We have noted the hash tag.

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

Some interesting research suggests that OTT consumers are getting to grips the technology and are becoming more demanding, expecting at the very least that OTT services are available on different devices and while consumer stickiness is driven by exclusive content. Another piece of research indicates a strong preference among mobile video consumers to view and navigate videos in their native languages. 80% of those surveyed in India also said they would prefer a single OTT app for finding both regional and international video content.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Copy-rant alert!!! Storied rock producer Steve Albini recently declared that “… the intellectual construct of copyright and intellectual property ownership is not realistic.” (To be fair, Albini’s been a scatological curmudgeon about the music business since, oh, about 1993.) In reply, guitar legend Marc Ribot (who has played with Tom Waits, Elvis Costello, and many more), asked in an open letter if Albini was “… just another lousy hypocrite shilling for Google and other huge tech companies…” and made it very clear: “If we don’t have copyright, we don’t get paid.” Hmmm… fighting words, indeed.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

As the “big bundle” offered by pay-TV suppliers in the USA comes under commercial pressure from various online offerings, this commentary on “Why Does the Cable-TV Bundle Exist?” is a useful bit of history. But the article concludes that debates over “to bundle or not to bundle” are increasingly irrelevant: “The technology of Internet-delivered TV programming is swamping the argument of whether cable operators ought to bundle or unbundle their cable channels…”

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

12 June, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending Jun 12th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter CEO	The sheer inevitability of an 84-year-old man deciding to slow things down a little gives a lot of the headlines a “Dog Bites Man” feel, but then again, it is Rupert Murdoch we’re talking about. The transition has been anticipated for years, decades even, but it will still be examined — and second-guessed — in excruciating detail. But despite the quite-clearly-enunciated succession plan, expect a lot more coverage from a range of different perspectives, as befits this sort of milestone moment at one of the world’s most important media conglomerates. Historic, to say the least.
Sara Madera Director, Member Relations & Marketing	If you were wondering when the tipping point for smartphones would be, Ericsson has your answer: 70% of the world will be using smartphones by the year 2020. The latest edition of the Ericsson Mobility Report has hit the streets, and is as loaded with forecasting and insights as ever. Mobile video will grow 13-fold worldwide between now and 2020, at a rate of 55% a year, and the Asia-Pacific region will only broaden its global dominance of smartphone data traffic.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	Technological innovation has put us on the cusp of virtual reality becoming a market reality. “The Dawn of Virtual Reality” provides a fantastic summary of where we are at and where we could go. Leading this is Oculus Rift that was purchased by Facebook for over $2 billion last year. The Rift consumer headset (announced just yesterday) is expected to be on sale in the first quarter of 2016 with a price tag rumored to be around $350. Other big manufactures have also jumped into the frey with Sony, Samsung and HTC joining the race. Recently, Google and GoPro announced the Google Jump Camera Rig that combines 16 GoPro Cameras operating in sync to produce 360 degree 3D videos. Google’s Jump Assembler is software that combines these videos into the equivalent of five 4K TV’s playing at once. Exactly how cool with this technology be? For you to get a taste, buy a Google Cardboard Viewer (maybe $20 bucks), download Google Cardboard app for either iOS or Android (free) and start experiencing this for yourself. The options for our industry are numerous: fully immersive TV shows, travel documentaries, action videos (think Red Bull TV on steroids), movies and virtually sitting in the stands of any live sporting event… from the comfort of ones own home. Is there a market for us here? I think so.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Ah, ‘tis the season. The bidding is starting for the next three years of English Premier League broadcasting rights. No surprise… in Thailand, True Visions has let it be known they are very much in the biddingthough they have no plans to pay outrageous amounts. (In the last three-year cycle, the amount bid by competitor Cable Thai Holdings (CTH) was jaw-dropping.)
Christopher Slaughter CEO	When I read about Virgin Media’s eleventh courtroom victory out of eleven patent lawsuits filed against it by Rovi, I was reminded of the massive importance of discovery in the modern media industry. There are loads of companies focused on the critical areas of search, recommendation, and curation, and while I’m not saying we need to take Netflix as a model for everything, it’s worth noting that the company employs some 800 people and spends more than US$150 million a year on recommendation technology alone. Even YouTube, just ten years old, felt it needed to “rewire” itself to upgrade its recommendation capabilities, tapping deep into parent company Google’s vast digital resources to help it do so. We’ve come a long way from 1992 and that Bruce Springsteen song, “57 Channels (And Nothing On)”… or have we?
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	Even as India’s Department of Telecoms fails to clear ambiguities over net neutrality and regulator TRAI is yet to release recommendations on OTT services, Indian companies are increasingly smelling the digital coffee. One of India’s largest film studios, Eros International, was stopped by shareholders from starting a traditional TV channel, favouring a push to its Netflix-type paid service, ErosNow. India-based entertainment firms like Star, Zee and Sony are betting big on the potential of online. Hooq, a joint venture of SingTel, Sony Pictures Television and Warner Bros, is slated to launch its services soon. At Indian Rs 4,35,00 million in advertising and over 40 per cent growth rate, digital is hot, a keen observer of media pointed out.
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	Malaysian – based Internet TV service iflix has announced plans to set up a development centre in Kuala Lumpur in association with the Scandinavian group Vimond Media Solutions. Staffed with product management and R&D teams they will concentrate on developing mobile TV products. iflix, part of Kuala Lumpur-based Internet investment firm Catcha Group, launched in Malaysia late last month with free trials, and said it is also now available in the Philippines with local telco PLDT having earlier invested US$15M.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	Online, schmonline, TV is still the most effective advertising vehicle out there. A new report from market analytics firm MarketShare (registration required) tracks the five year period from 2010 to 2014, a time when television increasingly came under fire from a proliferation of new media opportunities. Nonetheless, the study shows TV outperforming digital and offline channels at driving key performance metrics like sales and new accounts.
Jane Buckthought Advertising Consultant	Some 455 million digital TV homes were added around the world between end-2010 and end-2014, taking the total to 1.05 billion, according to a new report from Digital TV Research. The number of pay-TV subscribers reached 878 million by 2014, up from 718 million in 2010. Asia Pacific increased by 106 million, or two-thirds of the global additions, during this period to bring its total to half a billion.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Content owners sometimes complain about finding unauthorized copies of their works on Youtube, but apparently Youtube’s Content ID system makes them relative angels, compared to Facebook, which doesn’t offer any way for content owners to monetize viewing. Among other lines in what was called a “tweetstorm” of criticism, the head of content network Fullscreen said “I love FB (Facebook) video but getting very tired of seeing our videos ripped there with no way to monitor or monetize…”
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	The tech giant Facebook is now out of the space race, having decided to scrap plans for satellite internet. According to tech news site The Information, Facebook’s concerns were that it will not recoup costs. What effect this will have on facebook’s internet.org project is unknown. They are still looking to use high-altitude long-endurance planes and “lasers”. Not to worry, Those Magnificent Men [and] their Flying Machines, of Sir Richard Branson of OneWeb and Elon Musk of SpaceX, still have grand plans of developing constellations of small communications satellites for internet access.
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	And while Asia — South Asia more so — grapples with ways and means to bring about coherence and business-friendly environs for hitherto untapped digital services and also try arrest growing online piracy, European Union has some radical views. Speaking recently at Midem, EU’s Andrus Ansip opined existing copyright legislation and geo-blocking are pushing people to piracy. EU’s solution: providing good legal options is the best way to tackle piracy.
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	Software and OTT Technology provider Kaltura has said it intends to use its latest injection of capital to extend its operations into several key Asian markets – China, Japan, Australia, Singapore and South Korea.Backed by Intel, SAP and Nokia, Kaltura have also notably strategically secured regional funding from India’s Nexus Venture Partners and Japan’s Mitsui & Co. which the company believes will help them with their plans for APAC expansion.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	Everything that’s old is new again — or at least, you might believe thatbased on all the TV series reboots in the works. And while it’s one thing to celebrate the past, sometimes, things that have died are best left in the grave.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

05 June, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending Jun 5th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Pricewaterhouse Coopers has issued its latest Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2015-2019. Among the key takeaways:consumers simply don’t care whether they’re watching linear TV or OTT, they just want to watch what they want to watch; and online advertising will overtake TV ad spend in 2019. It’s not a small report, but fortunately, there is a video summary (its last line: “Put mobile — and increasingly video — at the centre…”).

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

There are still hoops to jump through before Charter’s purchase of Time Warner Cable is final in the US, but winners in the deal are already being counted. Meanwhile, in the absence of real news, media coverage is focusing on the personalities; easy to do when one of the protagonists is John Malone, who can often be counted on to give good quote. Meanwhile, other M&A activity is developing in the US: Dish Network and T-Mobile are apparently in talks about merging, even as AT&T and Direct try to reassure regulators about their proposed merger.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Not very much like Southeast Asia: Indonesia’s TV censors are taking a sledgehammer approach to international TV content. A recent letter from the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) to pay-TV platforms was leaked, and has been reported in the vernacular press. (This report is in Bahasa Indonesia, but if you put it through a machine translator it comes out relatively comprehensible.) The letter tells the platforms that international channels (starting with francophone channel TV5 Monde, but more will come) have to be subjected to 24-hour pre-censorship, or taken off the air. KPI wants the platforms to bear the cost and responsibility of pre-censorship, but platform operators don’t want any part of that, so several have removed TV5 Monde from the air. Where will this stop? How many channels will the sledgehammer hit? Stay tuned. (Meanwhile, TV5’s OTT operation and satellite broadcasts remain available, to Indonesians with a broadband connection or C-band dish.)

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

The copyright lawsuit of interest this week sees normally fierce competitors CNN, NBC, Fox News, and CBS suing US company TVEyes, which monitors, clips, and repackages news content. Like the Meltwater service two years ago (in a suit by the Associated Press), TVEyes defends itself with a claim that it is making fair use of the news content it scrapes. The news broadcasters aren’t having any of that, though, and they told the court “TVEyes unlawfully misappropriates (the news) market for itself…. It systematically records content from over a thousand television channels, and charges subscription fees to its customers in exchange for distributing to them massive amounts of content it has neither created nor licensed.”

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Just ahead of the China and the World conference next week comes the news that China’s state media watchdog is planning a raft of new rules for reality TV shows, which will restrict satellite broadcasters to one reality series per year with limits on repeats. The new rules will begin to take effect by the end of June but so far Chinese online video providers do not seem to be affected by the new directive. It’s still not too late toregister for the China and the World event which will be held on June 10th in Shanghai.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

If one thinks that the only possible threat to their video distribution business from Google is Youtube, think again. Google’s Android TV wants to turn every app into a TV channel. Android TV was first unveiled in 2014, but has been making progress. Although initially available only on the Nexus Player (from Asus) and Nvidia Shield and Razer Forge TV streaming boxes, TV’s from Sony, Sharp and Philips are now making Android TV sets. The interesting thing about Android TV is that it tries to be a mix of on-line content with traditional TV shows. And get this, “the company [Google] is asking participating online video providers to actually program their channels in a linear fashion, complete with primetime slots”. What is (not even) old is new again.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

Some good news about the growing awareness of the Internet piracy in India. On a complaint filed by Zee Network, the Delhi police busted a gang of Internet television pirates. Over two dozen people were caught `stealing’ live feed of pay channels using more than 50 DTH and cable TV set-top boxes. The articles didn’t say, but we’ve seen that many of the pirate sites being fed by this ring are ad-supported. Zee used the occasion to argue for improvements in India’s copyright laws and we agree on that! We’d also say that this demonstrates the need for the online advertising industry to clean up its act, and take action to stop ad dollars from feeding the piracy syndicates.

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

At London Trend Seminar 2015, Henry Mason argued that the traditional demographics of age, gender and income were no longer pertinent. He identified new trends of consumerism in which people are constructing lifestyles in the way they want to.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Comedies were notably absent from the new programmes debuted at the recent upfronts in the US, reinforcing a programming trend toward dramas that has been building for a while. But the laughs haven’t gone away, they just seem to have found a new home on the web, where experimentation is cheaper, and the price of failure is lower. (Not entirely unrelated, Charlie Rose interviews Larry David on 60 Minutes.)

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Kansas City like Singapore? Availability of very capable broadband networks in Kansas City is resulting in – surprise surprise – people using those networks to increase piracy. The local newspaper takes the side of the pirates, complaining that Google Fiber is being cooperative with content owner bullies. In other piracy news, there’s an Australian support that streaming piracy rings have begun really going after the good stuff — targeting Foxtel’s proprietary sports channels and funding their operations by selling cut-rate subscriptions. And on the good news side, a report that Netflix’s growth is resulting in a decline in piracy. (An outcome devoutly to be wished – even if the article is very short on hard numbers.)

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

They claim it’s a first in the world. But whether a first or not, it’s certainly a novelty and brings much-maligned audience measurement data that much closer to an ordinary consumer of TV content. And along comes more transparency in the whole eco-system. With #BARCTweet, now even a non-subscriber to BARC India services can get data within five minutes via Twitter. With such technological innovations, one wonders where does it leave services of TAM India, which was the dominant currency of audience measurement till about 18 months back?

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

So it’s a story even when it’s not happening – Apple has said won’t be announcing it subscription TV service next week at its Worldwide Developer Conference. Licensing deals and technology apparently remain the sticking points. Industry executives predict Apple’s Web TV offering may not launch until later this year, or in 2016.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member news

29 May, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending May 29th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Singapore’s Media Development Authority has awarded the tender for its new TAM system to global research giant GfK. This is the culmination of more than two years of effort, in which CASBAA played an important role in ensuring that Pay TV was properly represented. Special thanks go to Discovery’s Julie Petersen and Martyn Uren of Fox, who served as CASBAA’s subject matter experts on the MDA’s Tender Review Committee. The new system is expected to be in place and delivering measurement data in the second half of 2016, and CASBAA is hopeful that our industry will continue to be engaged as the system is implemented.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Feels like we’ve been here before, doesn’t it? Charter Communications is set to buy Time Warner Cable in the US, fending off a potential bid from European telco Altice. Of course, the deal still has to face regulatory scrutiny, but it seems a lot more likely to pass than the Comcast bid. Reactions have been, perhaps predictably, mixed, even though the merged company would be the second biggest cable operator in the US. The logic for the deal is as sound as it was the first time around, and it’s still as much about broadband as it is about pay TV. And, of course, since it’s Charter, it’s also all about John Malone… although, being from Denver, I’m personally not sure the whole “cowboy” metaphor really works, especially since Malone is a transplant from Connecticut.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

My favorite Asian leader (this week at least) is Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo. This clip of his statements on piracy is a must-watch. “Piracy is right in front of our eyes,” he says. “There’s no need to go searching for it.” And “Online…has to be addressed, and continuously.” Plain-spoken truths! (Wouldn’t it be wonderful if leaders in some of our other countries could work up some zeal on this issue?)

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Ahead of the CASBAA Satellite Forum next Monday, news that five international firms have bought bid documents for the installation and support services of Bangladesh’s first planned satellite. US-based Boeing, Canadian companies Telus and Orbit, MDA Corporation from France and Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC) of China have all purchased the documents to participate in the bidding. At the Satellite Forum, Myanmar’s Deputy Communications Minister is going to tell us about his country’s satellite plans.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

In Asia, we know well that – despite the industry press’s fascination with what goes on in North America – not everybody is entering the online universe at the same speed, and it will be a long long time before OTT supplants traditional TV business models. Two recently published research reports agree that satellite DTH transmission is going to continue to enjoy robust growth. “(Traditional) platforms are moving from strength to strength, with the pull of exclusive content, sports and localised channels being a significant draw for consumers worldwide to linear TV platforms,” says one report. That said, in the longer term “it will essentially be compulsory for DTH and other pay-TV platforms to offer OTT as a supplementary service… effectively becoming a ‘one-stop-shop’ for content as much as feasibly possible.” And the second one echoes, saying Asia Pacific and Sub-Saharan Africa will show the strongest satellite TV revenue growth.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

The cat certainly seems to be out of the bag, and CBS CEO Les Moonves is the one who opened it, by confirming reports of an Apple TV streaming service. To be fair, the bag wasn’t closed all that tightly anyway, but as Moonves put it, “When Apple calls, you always listen.” For its part, Apple still isn’t talking (surprise, surprise), but other (unnamed) industry sources say the service is being delayed because Apple wants local TV to be included in its offering.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

The business of pay TV has never gone through a more exciting period. How the players will adapt their business models to the changing environments of technology, competition and the viewing habits of all generations provide for almost endless analysis and speculation. In business, or in anything for that matter, few people like being told what they are doing wrong (7 Deadly Sins: Where Hollywood is Wrong about the Future of TV) but the ones who do may end up making less mistakes than others. A thorough analysis of the nuts and bolts of two business models is presented in the state and future of Netflix v. HBO in 2015. The current profit differential is staggering.

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Surprise news for Anglophile music fans as the BBC announces that the long-running pop-quiz show Never Mind the Buzzcocks is finishing after a 20 year and 28 series run. While not in the same league as David Letterman (and you can take that however you want), some Buzzcock highlights are listed here – a personal favourite, though tragic, is Amy Winehouse, with apologies to cat owners everywhere.

Sara Madera

Director, Member Relations & Marketing

Just a little light reading for the weekend… Mary Meeker’s annual Internet Trends report runs to a mere 197 slides this year.Takeaways? Shockingly, there are quite a few. My favorite, though, is that in 20 years, global Internet penetration has gone from 1% to 39%.

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

Down with the kids? Two pieces came up a new report from JWT Intelligence described Generation Z, the 12-19 year old cohort “the ambitious, engaged, sensible child” who wants to “create, connect and change”. Research from Turner on SE Asian kids who are of course digital natives, wield influence over family buying habits in unexpected categories. More than half of parents say their kids influence their choice of car, 70 per cent over which mobile phone they buy and 80 per cent over their selection of laptop computer.

Meanwhile, speaking of research, last week ASI hosted the first APAC TV symposium which saw speakers present papers on audience measurement from Europe. One burning topic discussed at the event: should we use the term “television” or “video” to describe content?

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

And in Thailand, despite the NBTC’s efforts to support its digital terrestrial channel licensees with a whole range of goodies including box subsidies, must-carry rules, light-touch ad minutage limits and so on, the financial constraints on the licensees (limited ad revenue, fierce content competition and high transmission costs) are having a toll. The first digital licensee to quit is trying to surrender its broadcast license and is facing demands that it pony up the rest of its bid for a license – a cool 1.6 billion baht. The operator says “we’re not going to pay”, and itblames the regulator for not making their business profitable, but manages to say nothing about the possibility they (and other operators) might have wildly overbid for the digital licenses! Meanwhile, another digital licensee, Nation Broadcasting, announced a big program revamp, moving more into entertainment to replace some of its news content.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

22 May, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending May 22th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

	Regular rates end today for the CASBAA Satellite Industry Forum which will be held in Singapore at the Grand Hyatt on Monday 1st June. Limited space is available so book your place now to take advantage of these rates. View the programme here
Christopher Slaughter CEO	Music service Spotify has given more details about its plans to stream video. Last week’s announcement wasn’t exactly universally applauded, but with partnerships already in place with Comedy Central, Vice News, NBC, ABC, ESPN, and MTV, there’s no doubt that it’s entering an already-competitive market with a clear value proposition. Undoubtedly, its video aspirations were part of the pitch during its recent fund-raising efforts; earlier this month, CNBC reported that Spotify raised US$350 million from a variety of sources including Goldman Sachs. Meanwhile, the LA Screenings are wrapping up this week, and streaming video rights have been the talk of the town, with international buyers focused on SVOD at each of the studio sessions. Likewise, while many of the overseas buyers have been all about drama, not comedy, a lot of the top shows from the upfronts have been getting the love in LA, too.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Major brand advertisers are still making a big contribution to funding online piracy, according to the US-based group called the Digital Citizens Alliance. A year ago, the DCA issued a report entitled “Good Money Gone Bad”, which estimated ad support for piracy sites at US$227 million. Now there’s a follow up “Good Money is Still Going Bad”, which found that after a year of “massive turnover in the (piracy) industry that included the shuttering or de-grading of some of the largest sites,” piracy sites in the USA earned nearly the same ad revenues in 2014 as in the previous year. “Ad revenue is the oxygen that allows content theft to breathe,” concludes the DCA. One blogger asked “Why do ads for reputable companies continue to wind up on sites promoting illegal activity? Because the online ad system remains easy for savvy site operators to game.” Another commentary noted the risks to consumers themselves, from the malware embedded in the ads (and the sites themselves).
Christopher Slaughter CEO	Sharing is caring: apparently, something along the lines of one out of ten US viewers of online video services are using someone else’s password. As you might imagine, the number is even higher among millennials, indicating that the younger you are, the more likely you are to share your password.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	The lines between hardware manufacturer and media owner/distributor have blurred numerous times over the recent past. Sony, Apple and Amazon all come to mind. One of CASBAA’s newest members has made the news this week with a few very interesting stories along these lines. “Letv isn’t a smartphone company. It’s an Internet video company. The phones are a way of delivering video”, the Netflix of China is invading the United States with smartphones. And then, “LeTV Sports, an affiliate of online video portal and smart TV maker LeTV, has raised US$128 million in series A funding”: Alibaba founder Jack Ma leads $128M investment in live-streaming sports site. It seems that the market likes their hardware too as, Don’t blink or you’ll miss it: LeTV One Pro sells out in one second. That’s quicker than a Stones concert!!
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	The tech world is full of “disruptors,” and never was this more true in the realm of TV and video. The disruptors are so disruptive we now have newer disrupters like Vessel and Dish’s Sling TV aiming to disrupt the existing disrupters. Now everything new is old and in many cases disruptors are just emulating proven strategic business plans put in place by the incumbent broadcasters.
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	Will Indian MSOs go the Comcast way? Interesting question. When Comcast admitted it has more broadband subscribers than cable customers, it pointed to the future trend of Internet’s power of delivery. Though the Indian government in an ambitious project relating to PM Modi’s Digital India vision has proposed to rope in cable operators for the delivery of broadband services, it seems cable TV still remains a major attraction than broadband services. Various MSOs do offer high-speed broadband services in some pockets, but the base dwarfs in front of cable TV subs. May be the Indian market has its own quirky trends unlike the US or other developed markets in the West and APAC.
Jane Buckthought Advertising Consultant	There’s plenty of talk about Twitter, but there are plenty of competitors out there. Social media report from GlobalWebIndex (GWI) suggests that YouTube is still the ‘coolest’ social platform for teens aged 16 to 19.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	David Letterman had his last show on Wednesday, ending a 30-plus-year run on late-night TV, and almost-but-probably-not-quite bringing to a close a seemingly endless parade of homages in recent weeks, many of which we’ve already linked to. There’s more than a twinge of nostalgia, largely because for many Americans of a certain age, the arc of Letterman’s career parallels our own progress from adolescence to encroaching senescence. From his start as a local weatherman in Indianapolis, followed by a brief but quietly disastrous daytime talk show (I remember watching a bit about cleaning bathtub stains with Tipp-Ex), late night is where Dave eventually became Dave. Writers and producers and guests and ratings have come and gone, competitors have waxed and waned and waxed again, but Letterman has left his mark.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	It’s been a bad year for The Pirate Bay, which bemoaned back in February that the pirate site was having to jump from one hosting provider to another, because hosts were unwilling to host a bunch of convicted felons doing illegal business. Now they’re having to do the same thing for their domain names, as a Swedish court ordered that country’s domain name administrator to stop claiming “we’re just a pipe” and cease providing .se domain names for The Pirate Bay. Ah, but the ingenuity of the pirates knows no bounds (hey, isn’t that what “innovation” on the web is all about?) and they’ve lined up alternate domains, in places like Grenada, Armenia, South Georgia, the British Virgin Islands – and two countries in our little patch of the earth, Laos and Mongolia. Stay tuned for the next chapter…..
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	An ancient Sanskrit treatise on statecraft first suggested that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. This is playing out in the modern world of TV advertising where broadcast, cable networks join together in single group to promote TV advertising. And why wouldn’t they want to hold onto those ad dollars “because TV remains the most lucrative advertising medium out there”. Four ways YouTube and Netflix will transform television suggests that in the new world of TV, “viewers will see fewer ads and the ads won’t look the same”. Now, how for broadcast and cable to keep their friends close and their enemies closer?
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	Might cord cutters represent those with more discerning taste when it comes to programming? If Amazon’s latest move is any indication, this may very well be the case. The company has dropped several reality TV programs from its latest licensing deal with Viacom for its Instant Video platform, including Mob Wives and Teen Mom, reports Bloomberg.
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	As Net Neutrality and OTT debate rages on in India with the Telecoms Ministry still grappling to take a political stand on the issues (separately, regulator TRAI’s recommendations also awaited), Facebook head Mark Zuckerberg is trying to firewall against getting singed by public outcry, mostly shrill, in India. FB’s Internet.org, which offers subsidised access to certain Internet services including Facebook, if the consumer is on partner telco’s network, has been targeted for breaching all Net Neutrality ethics. Hectic corporate lobbying is being reportedly done by Zuckerberg so as the Indian outcry doesn’t stunt similar experiments in other countries. While on the subject, interestingly, DTH player Videocon D2h has flayed broadcasters for peddling OTT services for short term gains. Didn’t we say dance of democracy makes India a market of contrasting opinions and consensus is difficult to arrive?
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Thailand’s NBTC has come in for lots of criticism for its administration of the rules on digital terrestrial television. This week, the Nation Media Group (NMG) announced it was suing the NBTC for turning a blind eyeto a licensed digital broadcaster’s hostile acquisition of a large block of NMG shares. That decision was taken by a split vote at NBTC, and one recent commentary noted that divisions among the Commissioners have led to the Secretary-General and permanent staff taking a bigger role in driving policies forward. Meanwhile the NBTC’s administration of its subsidies for digital STBs was ripped by the makers and distributors of the boxes, who decry slow payments to them while the NBTC is wrapped up in political accusations of mismanaging funds and oversight by audit bodies.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News:

15 May, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending May 15th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter CEO	Another week, another proposed media-mega-merger, this time Verizon and AOL. Again, it will be subject to regulatory approval, but most reports are treating it as a done deal, even if it isn’t exactly receiving universal endorsement (cue the torrent of snarky jokes on Twitter). But the deal’s prime justification — the logic of merging mobile and content — certainly seems to be on-trend, as the kids say these days, even if the US$4.4 billion price tag might seem a tad extravagant. And even if it seems like there’ve been a lot of deals lately, according to PwC, media M&A activity has actually been pretty slow this year.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Nothing like hearing one of the biggest pirates in the planet call things “unfair”, as Kim Dotcom complained in an interview with Bloomberg this week. Wonder what the FBI would have to say about that? Meantime, a group of independent studios has set up what they’re calling the Internet Security Task Force, saying the Six Strikes rule (the voluntary Copyright Alert System set up in 2013) simply doesn’t go far enough in the fight against Internet piracy. And they might have a point, since the latest episode of Game of Thrones has broken its own record for illegal downloads.
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	It’s rumoured that Spotify intends to launch a video streaming service. The news is due to be announced on May 20th in New York but sources at the FT are already all over it. Unlike past rumours that a video entrée for Spotify would be designed to take on HBO and Netflix, it’s thoughtthe service will be more music related and in theory will be going head to head with Youtube and also Apple – set to relaunch its Beats music service on June 20th.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	In the US, the upfronts have pretty much run their course, resulting a pretty clear picture of what the new network programme offerings will be. Plenty of scorecard articles out there, lots of “X things we learned”listicles, a few burning questions, and the predictable industry thought pieces. Oh, and teasers, trailers, first-looks, more trailers, and more teasers (far too many of which were geo-blocked… seriously, why?). And just when it felt like the signal-to-noise ratio was getting a bit too much to handle, Miley Cyrus smoked a joint onstage.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	Last week was a big week for Netflix on the speaking circuit. Reed Hastings predicts the future of TV over the next 20 years in Berlin. I took particular notice of his quotes, “What happens in Hollywood is that if you want to sell a show you plant a rumor that Netflix is going to do it” and “We will come to see that linear TV declines every year for the next 20 years, and that internet TV rises every year for the next 20 years.” At the MoffettNathanson Media & Communications Summit in New York, Ted Sarandos talks global licensing, sports market and China. If your interest is the movie model, sit-coms, sports, kids’ programming, China, he touches them all.
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	In India, it’s very difficult to please people — if 80 per cent of the constituents give you a pat on the back, then consider yourself blessed. And, BARC India, the new entrant in audience measurement, is realising it early in infancy. While some have dismissed two sets of data released by BARC so far as nothing new or more insightful than previous TAM figures, new technology employed by BARC does seem sophisticated and can go a long way in holding a mirror to consumption patterns, etc. On news consumption behaviour, for example, BARC’s BMW software gives interesting data analysis in times of calamities and celebrations. And such data can put to good use by news channels in India, which are coming under severe criticism for being “shrill”, “ratings-driven” and, as MIB Minister Arun Jaitley recently described, becoming a participant rather than being an informant.
Jane Buckthought Advertising Consultant	The French audience measurement company Mediametrie has announced it will launch the GRP Video service in June in partnership with Integral Ad Science (IAS). Mediametrie has been consulting with industry players since 2012 on the creation of a common definition for the viewing duration and the portion of advertisements viewable for video ads on TV and fixed or mobile web devices. This brings the Ad industry one step closer to convergence viewing data and regardlesswhether you think this is comparing apples with oranges, if they like what they see then the currency will likely be adopted by media agencies globally and soon be coming to a market near you.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	More OTT services are launching in the US. CBS chief Leslie Moonves has said that Showtime streaming service coming in ‘Not Too Distant Future’. “Other than a little bit of consternation (from MVPDs), I don’t see how anybody cannot view this as a positive for HBO and a positive for Showtime,” Moonves said. Then YipTV takes aim at U.S. Hispanic market with 50-channel OTT service. For a price tag of $14.99 per month this 50-channel over-the-top streaming service aims to be a go-to provider for Hispanic and ultimately other multilingual groups.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	With the CASBAA Satellite Industry Forum coming up on 01 June, perhaps its understandable that we’ve been waxing astronomical lately, especially when we heard that NASA’s probe of the planet Mercury has crashed into the planet, which was actually exactly what it was supposed to do. Still, it was all a bit poignant, and a reminder that all of these spacecraft have a finite life-span, although it’s not terribly easy to pay one’s respects after they’re gone.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News:

08 May, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending May 8th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

In the US, the upfronts are almost about to start, and despite the fact that the annual network dog-and-pony show that began in 1948 is regularly derided as irrelevant, there are plenty of reasons why TV is still sold the way it is. But there is also no question that the upfront market dynamics are changing, largely because of competition from the digital space, as highlighted at the seventh iteration of the NewFronts last week and this week. This is the third year the market has been organised by the IAB, and the event is definitely gaining in importance among media buyers. A somewhat more manic version of the upfronts, as highlighted in a snarky video made by the “Honest Trailers” guys (who are themselves part of digital media company Defy), the message at this year’s NewFronts is clear: even though TV still has a bigger audience, millennials are online.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

CASBAA led the way: NCTA President Michael Powell told the audience at INTX (rebranded Cable Show) this week that really, he hates the name “Cable Show” which needed to be retired, because after all “your past can be a part of your glory but it also can be a weight around your ankle. And it also doesn’t fairly capture what (we) do.” Well. At CASBAA we gave up the “cable and satellite” words four years ago. They’re still a part of our history, but this industry today is so much more. So we gave up the words, and kept the initials. And we’re happy to have the NCTA follow our lead. (But what does INTX mean, anyway?)

Elsewhere, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts summed up his company’s stance: “Thank You, Time Warner Cable, but we’re moving on.” He then went on to poke fun at his own disasters, playing a cute video that likened the ill-fated merger to an exploding package. I guess his Board must have a sense of humor.

Meanwhile, another session featured all the other major US cable CEOs (less Comcast’s Roberts) talking about the hottest issues confronting the industry there. It’s all online if you want to watch. FCC Chairman Wheeler spoke just before them, and they all trashed his plan for increasing regulation of the industry. And the Cablevision CEO publicly asked Time Warner cable to buy his company… sending his stock up 7%!

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

The deal between Comcast and Time Warner Cable in the US might be off, but neither company is standing still. First-quarter earnings results from each company provided interesting insights; Comcast is now officially an Internet service provider with a side business in cable TV. (That’s not actually a bad business, since SNL Kagan estimates cash flow margins for Internet were 60 percent for cable companies at the end of last year, while video margins were 17 percent.) Meanwhile, Time Warner cable has added new subscribers in all areas of its business, and it’s in discussions with Charter again, this time about a “friendly” merger.

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

In an on again –off again saga the newly launched television audience measurement Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) in Indiawas asked to stop releasing ratings by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting this week over issues related to its registration. Meanwhile the rival and incumbent Television Audience Measurement (TAM) has said its business as usual and will continue releasing rating data. Then in an apparent about face the MIB have said the matter is resolved andBARC can continue to release ratings after all. With some companies already having declared their intention not to renew their TAMsubscription and probably breathing a sigh of relief, the most obvious thing was this was never going to be straightforward.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

Here’s an interesting take on the Net Neutrality issue, by a UK-based consulting firm. They note that the rise of online broadcasting has made what was a “technical” issue (access to websites) into a much more commercial one: who pays whom, and how much, for carriage of TV content. And because the issue is now about TV, it involves a lot more complicated equities, including things like national content support, media plurality, etc. etc. Welcome to the world of the Tilted Playing Field, boys. (Warning: there aren’t any answers in the paper – just questions!)

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

In a move that some would say has been too slow in coming German TV ratings will now start to include YouTube and other online video platforms in its viewing data, including reach. It’s a step in the right direction for sure and means we will see a slew of other markets following suit if they aren’t already working their way down this path ( some countries in Asia are being very progressive in this area, others – not so much). It’s still not a perfect system as online video usage will be monitored by collecting data from an Nielsen’s online panel and GfK’s cross media panel rather than using more precise digital measurement on servers…but we can expect to see a chunk of advertising revenuemove online once there is a uniform currency.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Over the May Day weekend, I was with a group of friends in Phuket, where we watched the big Manny Pacquiao/Floyd Mayweather fight on True Visions. Of course, the broadcast was in Thai, so we were second-screening like crazy, getting our colour commentary from live blogs and Twitter, a very 21st-century TV experience for such a decidedly non-millennial group. Turns out, though, that the real millennial experience was happening on Twitter-owned livestreaming app Periscope, which a worryingly large number of people were using to watch “shared” live streams of the televised fight — in short, pirating it. The app is being blamed for a loss in pay-per-view orders, although it clearly had nothing to do with Manny’s loss in the title bout. Still, the whole debacle highlights the challenges Twitter faces in wooing the media companies from whom it is also inadvertently helping people steal content.

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Vice has come a long way from being a Canadian government funded magazine in 1984 to recently receiving funding from 21st Century Fox ($70 mil), A+E Networks ($250 mil) and another $100 mil for a joint venture with Rogers Communications. Last week we heard rumors that Vice may be heading into the mainstream by coming out with a full channel, possibly as a rebranding for A+E’s H2. But as Vice moves more to TV possibly they will tone down their lineup somewhat from shows such as “Weediquette” and “Gaycation”. That may not matter though, as its CEO says Vice TV Network has already sold three years’ worth of ad time.

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Speaking of “Weediquette”, our favourite web series “High Maintenance” is joining the big leagues, with a six-episode deal on HBO. The show’s online video partner Vimeo is calling the deal “bittersweet”, and while acknowledging the primacy of TV, looks forward to a time when online and broadcast are on a more equal footing. Meanwhile, a number of YouTube stars have been breaking out of the second screen lately, but not all of them have exactly taken the TV world by storm.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News:

30 April, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending Apr 30th. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

As you probably know, the first four episodes of the new season of Game of Thrones were leaked online just prior to the season premiere on HBO, with more than 1.7 million downloads in less than 24 hours. Questions of the simple morality of downloading notwithstanding, the act of leaking the shows was certainly criminal. And if anyone needs a reminder of just how much damage piracy has done to the music industry, the New Yorker has an excellent article about one of the biggest “leakers” of music online, appropriately headlined “The Man Who Broke the Music Business.”

Speaking of music piracy, a couple years ago two Italian art director/designers with ad agency TBWA put together an installation called Piracy, using some 6500 CDs to create images of famous musicians, with the not-so-subtle message that all of them were suffering because of piracy. There’s a video, too.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Oo. Oo. Law begins to catch up with technology! Upwards of 100 pirate websites are now inaccessible on UK ISPs, because they’re the targets of “site blocking” orders by the courts. A court order filed this weekrepresents a potentially significant increase in the vigilance there: the “Popcorn Time” piracy network was ordered blocked –and this time the judge ordered blocks to the site where the pirate app is downloaded – as well as to the “index sites” that update content availability for existing app users. The judge found that even though the pirated content itself doesn’t reside on those servers, “the Popcorn Time application is the key means which procures and induces the user to access the host website and therefore causes the infringing communications to occur. The suppliers of Popcorn Time plainly know and intend that to be the case.” This is a very interesting precedent, as the industry in Asia is being decimated by app developers and “black box” manufacturers who also “plainly know and intend” their products to be used for piracy. (For legal wonks, click here to read the full judgement.)

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Is the basic bundle going away? Maybe not just yet, but times are a-changin’. We have seen a number of slimmed down bundles from the likes of Sling TV from Dish (Sling TV still set to slay cable, despite sloppy software), Playstation Vue from Sony (Can Playstation Vue Take a Bite Out of Cable) and the rumored new Apple TV Web TV Service possibly coming later this year. Existing pay-TV platforms are seemingly wanting to start offering these slimmed down bundles, but it may not be so easy as ESPN sues Verizon over custom TV bundles. Affiliate sales teams could have their work cut out for them. Remember back to our basic science courses, taking anything through a state change involves a LOT more energy.

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Fresh on the heels of the Comcast / Time Warner del heading south last week, the Wall Street Journal has reported that Charter Communications could soon make a bid for Time Warner Cable. Joining Charter and TWC would create an entity with 15.6 million video subscribers and 16.4 million broadband customers, compared to 21.7 million and 20.7 million for Comcast. TWC rejected a bid from Charter before accepting a Comcast offer last year.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

As the serious debate on Net Neutrality gets overshadowed by sloganeering in India, regulator TRAI seemingly emerged as the flag-bearer for telcos who threatened to raise prices for data services as an arm-twisting tactic. And, dumping concerns about privacy, TRAI made public email IDs of over 1 million Indians who had sent in their views on Net Neutrality; in retaliation hackers blocked TRAI website for a day. While Telecoms Ministry and the government battles with public anger and perception at this so-called Christmas gift to spammers from TRAI, apparently the regulator tried to amend its ways that turned out to be a hoax of sorts. The dance of democracy continues.

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant

Hulu has been making a lot of noise in the US recently, buying the SVOD rights to all 180 episodes of the comedy series “Seinfeld” for a whopping US$160 million. CEO Mike Hopkins has declared that “2015 is the year Hulu will break out,” as the company also announced an ambitious slate of buzz-worthy original content, and a deal with Turner to offer shows from Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, TBS and TNT.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Censorship remains a thorny issue in much of this region, of course. In Thailand, the regulator canceled the license for a satellite TV channel –of course, one run by the red shirt crowd. And it’s not only governments that are to blame for censorship… Here’s an Indian column bemoaning the industry’s own approach to the issue. The writer says that things are getting worse: “Television that was allowed to air 10, 15 years ago is now being chopped, blurred, muted and mangled. Shows like Friends and Seinfeld, which both aired in India with no real concern or outrage about their content, are now losing entire scenes that you might still remember if you watched the series on TV years ago.”

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Australia’s Ten Network has confirmed it is in talks with Australian pay-TV operator Foxtel who are looking to take a strategic stake in the free-to-air TV broadcaster. The network is playing down speculation the two companies are close to a deal. Last month Ten issued a statement saying it was in talks with “various parties” about “a number of proposals”. Several other interested parties, including Discovery Channel, are understood either to have walked away from a deal or failed to put forward a proposal of interest to Ten’s independent directors. Under current cross-media ownership restrictions, any Foxtel investment in Ten could not go above 14.9 per cent. There has been speculation the pay-TV company, which is a 50:50 joint venture between Telstra and News Corp Australia, is considering investing $85 million into Ten at 18c a share.

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

The wait is finally over after seven years! Thus screamed a trade website earlier this week on Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) finally rolling out its audience measurement services, adding that Indian broadcast sector will have a completely new TV rating system under BARC, a joint industry body promoted by broadcasters (60 per cent), advertisers (20 per cent), and advertising agencies (20 per cent). Having invested approximately Rs. 280 crore (Rs. 2,80,0 mn) in the roll out of the new measurement mechanism for television, the industry anticipates new findings from BARC. Watch this space for more interesting data, but first set of numbers released has less of surprises, though.

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

In Vietnam, there was a battle over censorship of the “Vietnam Idol” TV show. The 2015 season of the show, produced by HCMC studio BHD for the national broadcaster VTV, and one of the country’s most popular talent showcases, was initially denied a license, along with a bunch of other VTV shows, by the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC). BHD announced that auditions would go on, and now – after VTV wrote a letter to the Prime Minister, MIC has announced that VTV has agreed to tighten up their censorship and the show would go on. Shall we speculate on the behind-the-scenes tug-of-war that went on? No, let’s just enjoy the show…

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