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John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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The organizers of the very large trade show IBC in Amsterdam threw a Chinese set-top box manufacturer out of the show last week, after the Zhuhai-based Gotech Technology Group was convicted in US Federal court of selling “hybrid” internet key sharing (IKS) boxes that allowed consumers to access pay-TV programming illegally. Such cases are not new; in the US DirectTV and Nagravision have long been active in pursuing such cases. What was new here was the very public shaming of the pirate manufacturer. However, the real shame is that it took a formal conviction, and spending millions in legal fees, to get even this level of basic action against the tech pirates – who of course pretended to be doing legitimate business while churning out the pirate boxes. And all it takes is a cursory web search to find dozens of slimeball Chinese manufacturers putting out piracy devices and services, conveniently delivered to your door. |
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Anjan Mitra
Executive Director, India
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| It’s only been out of the box for a little over a week, and already Reliance Jio is stirring the telco and media pots in India. Telcos are demanding higher “interconnection” fees to accept calls from Jio subscribers, the company is being slammed for adding subscribers more slowly than initially planned, and skeptics are sounding a warning that Jio’s cut-throat disruption could be a bad thing overall, but so far, consumers don’t seem to be complaining. Not only that, but Jio TV has been adding content, and is currently offering 368 channels, putting it on a level pegging with many of its cable MSO competitors. Watch this space…. |
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Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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Everybody is jumping on the OTT bandwagon lately, and surely that’s not a bad thing… but despite high-profile launches like HBO Go, and ESPN’s public discussion of its OTT plans, it remains to be seen how
successfully broadcasters can go direct-to-consumer, as Turner CEO John Martin seems to be interested in doing. “We’re reinventing our company from the inside out. And we’re remodeling it when the plane is up in the air. We have to go from being a wholesale, linear cable TV company to being a consumer-focused, consumer-centric company,” Martin told recode.net. Other Turner execs are also talking transformation, with TNT & TBS President Kevin Reilly telling the L.A. Times, “…we want to start taking some crazy swings and rewriting some of the rules again.” |
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Mark Lay
Vice President, Singapore
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| A couple very interesting pieces in the world of streaming this week. Lessons from the Strategy Crisis at Netflix says that Netflix is experiencing an “existential strategy crisis” and that scale could actually hinder their success. “The streaming business is more likely to develop into something that looks a lot like the highly fragmented magazine sector, in which no one dominates and very few now make good money.” Meanwhile Amazon is pursuing the rights for numerous sports entities. And if you ever thought that Amazon Prime was about video, you are dead wrong. They are giving away video to sell more of everything else. Talk about throwing a monkey-wrench into the video business competitive landscape. |
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Kevin Jennings
Vice President, Programme
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Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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| And if all that wasn’t enough digital content, Time Inc. is throwing its hat into the video-streaming ring. The veteran magazine publishing house is kicking off its online video efforts with the People/Entertainment Weekly Network, the name of which pretty much tells you what you’re in store for — tear-jerking stories, celebrities, and lots of talk about tee-vee shows. It’s available for free on the People.com website, but is also app-tastic, and featured on connected devices and smart TVs. But even as the company embraces its new digital future, CEO Joe Ripp, the man tasked with bringing Time Inc. into the 21st century, is moving on. |
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John Medeiros
Chief Policy Officer
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In the USA, FCC Chairman Wheeler announced he was changing his proposal on set-top boxes. Under the new ideas, cable operators would have to offer apps to consumers so they can get their programming without paying a monthly box rental fee. This represented a substantial
concession to the industry, as it would leave the ability to structure commercial offers and improve the viewer experience in the hands of the cable companies. Some tech industry observers said Wheeler had “caved” to the cable industry. But the industry didn’t seem happy at the result; Comcast said it would immediately file suit against the new rules. Of course, what’s behind all of this is the usual battle among Goliaths, with a large internet company whose name starts with G stirring the pot, all the time protesting “oh it’s all for the benefit of consumers.” (And if you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I’d like to sell you.) One observer quoted by CNN pointed out that Google is “very adept at inserting its corporate interest into the public policy process in a way that other companies…..envy.” |
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Jane Buckthought
Advertising Consultant
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Zenith Optimedia’s Advertising Expenditure Forecasts says that global adex will grow by 4.4 per cent to reach $539 billion, much better than 4.1 per cent growth it forecast earlier. It will expand by 4.5 per cent in 2017, and 4.6 per cent in 2018, better than the 4.3 per cent and 4.4 per cent it had earlier estimated. By 2018 global advertising expenditure will total $589 billion, $4 billion more than forecast in June. It has revised its estimate for APAC from 6.2 per cent to 6.3 per cent and for Western Europe from 3.5 per cent to 3.6 per cent. Its APAC optimism is based on heavy political spending in the Philippines in the run-up to the May 2016 elections.
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Jane Buckthought
Advertising Consultant
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| Meanwhile Advertising spend in Asia-Pacific is expected to grow by 3.9% in 2016, according to Carat, a reduction of the growth rate of 4.4 per cent the media agency predicted six months ago. The region’s fastest growing major market this year will be India, growing by 12%, while China is expected to grow at 5.7% and Japan by 1.8%.Asia’s slowest growth markets are Hong Kong (-11.8%), Taiwan (-7.6%) and Thailand (-5.2%), due to lacklustre economic growth and weak demand. |
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Mark Lay
Vice President, Singapore
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It’s probably going to take a l o o o o o n g time for all of the dust to settle from the recent explosion of that Space X Falcon 9 rocket, but even so, the company is planning to restart its flights in November. In the meantime, the investigation into the cause of the blast is well in hand, and you can bet that the insurance companies are hip-deep in the debris at Cape Canaveral. After all, their business is all about “… how to insure something that blows up once every twenty times you use it.” For his part, Space X founder Elon Musk is making a personal appeal for any amateur video footage of the disaster, calling it the “… most difficult and complex failure we have ever had in 14 years.” |
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Kevin Jennings
Vice President, Programme
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| Just when you were getting used to the idea of adopting virtual reality headsets (for use in the privacy of your own home, naturally), there’s a back-pack powered PC and VR set allowing users to walk around unhindered in their virtual worlds without the leashed constraints of cables. The Tokyo Game Show kicked off this week, and the company MSI is showcasing its VR backpack called the VR One which offers 90 minutes of uninterrupted – and fully mobile – virtual play. Given the fact that people haven’t even been able to play Pokemon Go on their smartphones without having accidents the idea of being in an immersive VR world should set alarm bells ringing – I mean what could possibly go wrong? |
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Christopher Slaughter
CEO
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| A lengthy profile of FX President John Landgraf in Vanity Fair, coupled with a similar Landgraf profile in GQ (complete with slightly hagiographic headline), and lazy journalists all over the place are writing again about his Peak TV comments last year, just in time for the impending debut of a whole raft of new shows. But seriously, the whole “too much TV” thing is turning out to be the journalistic equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel — the articles practically write themselves. The only truly original take on the trope I’ve seen recently is the one about how too much TV…. can reduce a man’s sperm count. |
