That’s the question of the day for the TV and Web video world, prompted by a blog post Jason Kilar published last night.

It’s a lengthy read about the TV business and where it’s headed, and most people I’ve talked to today think it’s smart and well-written.

Some of them also believe Kilar wrote it so that his bosses–executives at News Corp.’s Fox, Disney’s ABC, and Comcast’s NBCU–will give him the hook.

That’s because a lot of what Kilar wrote challenges the TV networks’ existing business model: He argues that there are too many ads, and that consumers want to be able to watch their shows on demand, not on a linear schedule. And, crucially, he argues that the cable network bundle is on its way out.

In other words, change or become the music labels: “History has shown that incumbents tend to fight trends that challenge established ways and, in the process, lose focus on what matters most: customers.”

And all of that makes perfect sense. Except for the part where he says it in public, while working for a company owned by three TV networks.

Kilar’s post began making waves immediately last night, and the Financial Times’ Matthew Garrahan was able to quickly find several network executives who are agog at the post.

Most tellingly, he got a Disney rep to officially distance the company from Kilar’s post, stating that his views (published on the official Hulu blog) were “personal and clearly not shared by anyone at Walt Disney.”

In fact, his views are almost certainly shared by some Disney executives, and others at Hulu backers News Corp.’s Fox and Comcast’s NBCU. (News Corp. also owns this Web site.) It’s just that they have no intention of changing their business anytime soon. Especially now that they’ve gotten cable providers to start paying them for content they used to give away, via “retransmission” fees.

“80, 90 percent of what he says is right,” says an executive at one of Hulu’s network owners. “But why print that? Does he think we’re going to say, ‘Oh, thank you! You’re right! We’d never thought of that! Let’s give away retrans!’? I can’t see what he thinks will happen.”

So here’s one possibility: Kilar knows he can’t win. And his post is supposed to be his “Jerry Maguire moment”, as Garrahan puts it–a fireworks display you put on because you don’t want to work at your current job anymore.

The other possibility: Kilar genuinely thinks he can win.

Up until now the former Amazon executive has done a marvelous job of building a site everyone was convinced would fail, and then sustaining–and expanding–a joint venture everyone thought would collapse.

Kilar has pulled some of that off with brinkmanship. As last week’s well-reported Wall Street Journal piece notes, Kilar threatened to quit last fall, when he was trying to get the networks to agree to cut their monthly price for Hulu Plus. He didn’t get the 50 percent cut he’d been pushing for, but he still managed to get the networks to agree to cut the price by 20 percent, to $8.

Also note that Kilar’s post quite clearly argues that the path he’s pushing for will be better for the networks in the end: “We believe content owners are in a strong position to make higher returns from TV content distribution in the future than they have historically.”

But if Kilar thought his arguments would carry more force in public, he may well have miscalculated. This could all blow over with time, but for now, at least, he has some very bummed backers.

“Here’s the irony. Jason is probably best to lead Hulu. But he is also too righteous/robot to do it ‘the wrong way’ or a way he won’t agree with,” says an industry executive.

Another reports that network executives are “crazy, angry” over the post. “I’d be stunned if Jason was still there in 60 days.”

I’ve asked Kilar for additional comment. I don’t expect to get it.

Then again, it’s been headed that way for quite some time–it’s just that News Corp. (which also owns this Web site) is now being that much more forthright about it. News Corp. COO Chase Carey said today that the company is “actively engaged” in discussions about “strategic alternatives”.

Which is exactly what the company said a few weeks ago, shortly after laying off several hundred workers.

The only difference today was that Carey said it in an earnings call, not via a public relations proxy, and it seemed clear from his tone that the company is done with the social network.

When an analyst asked about his projections for Myspace’s losses for the remainder of the year, you could hear the surprise in his voice, when he reiterated that the “focus is on strategic options.” And asked again about timing for a decision, he said that the company was “actively engaged” in discussions.

That is: Make us an offer.

For the record, News Corp.’s $275 million charge on its digital operations, announced today, breaks down this way: $107 million of that is for the restructuring, and the remaining $168 million is a writedown, presumably focused on Myspace.

And for those who care, costs for the Daily are being assigned to News Corp.’s publishing group: $7 million of the $30 million it has spent so far were assigned to this quarter.

EARLIER:

It’s an all-News Corp. kind of day around here. Jumping on the company’s earnings call, where we’re certain to hear about the just-launched Daily tablet newspaper, along with details about the company’s $275 million writedown on its digital businesses.

(Once again: News Corp. also owns this Web site. I don’t think we’ll get mentioned during the call, though.)

4:34 pm: And we’re off. Here’s the link to News Corp.’s earnings release, so you can play along at home.

4:35 pm: On the call: COO Chase Carey and CFO Dave DeVoe. No Rupert Murdoch, which is odd since he appeared happy to answer questions this morning during the Daily unveiling.

4:36 pm: Carey on that digital charge. Also included in that number, if I understood him correctly: Losses from sale of Jamba, FAN digital display network.

4:39 pm: Now time for some context: Cable is doing nicely, as it always does for News Corp. Ad sales up 17 percent, affiliate fees up 11 percent. And that includes the one-month blackout we had with EchoStar, which cost us about $30. million.

4:39 pm: Film: We’re down, but part of that is because we had a great quarter a year ago, comparatively. But “Black Swan” is great!

4:40 pm: TV: Up, due in part because of political ads. NFL ratings and prices are up, which is good because the World Series wasn’t as good as it could have been.

4:41 pm: [If you're interested in News Corp.'s satellite business, I'll direct you to the earnings report. Back shortly.]

4:42 pm: Publishing: Down from last year. Advertising is up across the board, but Harper Collins is down, and we invested in the Daily [so that $30 million charge is *not* included in the $275 million?]

4:43 pm: “Other”: Pretty much Myspace at this point, which is a mess. A loss of $156 million, which is $31 million worse than last year. Myspace results are “worse than our expectations.”

[Apologies, that was DeVoe.THIS is Carey:]

4:44 pm: Ad markets up at all our cable businesses, but we’re not dependent on that, because we have this great revenue stream from subscriber fees.

Fox News beat all other news networks combined. It’s the No. 4 channel in basic cable. All our affiliate deals are coming up, and we’re going to get a lot more from the cable and satellite guys for the rights to that channel.

4:47 pm: Ad market strong for broadcast, too. “Absolutely thrilled” with “American Idol”‘s performance. Fox Sports doing great, too. NFL was best ever, and Super Bowl will be great. NASCAR may be down a bit, though.

And don’t forget that we’re now starting to get paid by cable guys for our Fox broadcast, too, which they used to get for free. “We’ll be taking this business to a whole new level of profitability.” Will generate $1 billion annual operating income in a couple of years.

4:50 pm: [Satellite talk, which makes me drowsy yet again.]

4:51 pm: TV studios doing great. Making a pile from “Modern Family” reruns. “Glee” a money maker, too.

Film studios not as strong this year, but that’s the nature of the business.

And don’t forget “Avatar” 2 and 3!

4:52 pm: On the Daily: Rupert is still giving briefings on this as we speak–exactly the kind of thing we should be doing.

On Myspace: Completed “rebuild” of business, and “right-sized it.” And “now is the right time for News Corp. to consider strategic options for the business…and we’re “evaluating strategic alternatives.”

Time for Q&A: First question was about retrans fees, which I missed. But retrans worth “hundreds of millions of dollars.” Carey says.

Q: Color on ad market, please.

Carey: “It’s really good, solid growth” across all platforms. Print not as much as TV, but everything’s strong.

Q: What do you think of TV Everywhere?

Carey: “I prefer to call it “authentication.” But “it’s a good thing…it’s struggled to get going” because cable systems have been resistant. But “at the end of the day, success has got to be built on making it a good experience for consumers or they’ll find another way….At the end of the day, consumers are going to migrate” to good experiences. “It hasn’t gotten very far.”

Q: More on authentication, please.

Carey: I don’t think that the right way to do this is to say, “You can watch something on cablecompany.com or Fox.com”–you should be able to watch it when you want, where you want.

[A lot of "you know"s in Carey's last answer.]

Q: Please talk about how you will monetize Fox content. Disney just did a Netflix deal, and most of that value comes from ABC content. What do you think about doing something similar, and making old shows available online, and do you think “Modern Family”‘s value has decreased because of online exposure, as Turner said?

A: Two different values–delayed access to current content, and library content, which is what Netflix is doing. Netflix is competing for library rights, generally. We’re a buyer–at FX–and as buyer, I wouldn’t want to pay a lot of money for syndicated TV and have it also show up at 20 million homes at Netflix. In general, TV businesses have been selling their product too cheaply. “We need to make sure we’re getting fair value for our product, no matter what the distribution channel is.”

5:06 pm: Q: What about moving up windows, etc. for video on demand?

Carey: Creating an early window “is very important for us.” Getting that window properly priced is important, and I think you’ll see people moving forward with it in the first half of this year.

[Sorry missed a question, and next one is about satellites. Even Carey is yawning as he answers.]

Q: What are your expectations for Myspace losses for the year “or earnings”?

“Focus is on strategic options” [as in, who cares? We're selling this dog. Do you have a dollar?]

Q: How does Hulu fit into your vision about monetizing content at Fox, etc.? Also, what’s up with TV syndication dollars? Still strong? If so, why?

A: “Hulu…they’ve done a great job.” Glad they’d doing subscriptions. And “I think the digital marketplace is going to continue to evolve…not going to speak for their strategy” etc. [i.e., non-answer].”

Meanwhile, “TV continues to prove itself…as second to none” in terms of value to consumers, advertisers.

Q: What are economics of the Daily? When will you break even, and what does it mean for newspaper strategy in general?

Carey: “The Daily is not a newspaper. It’s a news product” so don’t think about it as part of our newspaper business, or part of our television business.

By the way, we should do that with all brands and content. Not ruling out the Web, but for us, the digital play is figuring out how to leverage “the content brands that we have.” And digital is great because “for a pretty modest investment” you can create great stuff.

Five hours into our launch, I won’t talk about breaking even.

DeVoe: Like we said, we spent $30 million so far, and another $500 thousand a week going forward.

Q: Your prices and subscriptions for digital are based on household, not per connected device – ie, charge familes more, single people less. Wouldn’t that cut down on piracy, too?

Carey: DirectTV does charge per box, actually, and I think cable guys are doing that too, based on number of TVs. But “I’m not sure there’s a lot of upside” in that for cable networks, etc.

[Apologies, have to duck out of this for a few minutes]

[Back now, thanks]

5:30 pm: Sigh. Another Sky question!

5:31 pm: Color on timing of Myspace decision, and premium VOD launch?

Carey: Actively engaged in Myspace discussions now.

Finished. Apologies for multitasking during this one. Need an extra pair of hands, eyes, ears and another mouth today.

The catch here is that the capability, which will be offered on Apple’s iPad as well as tablets running Google’s Android, will only work inside subscribers’ homes.

So you still can’t watch a live episode of “Two and a Half Men” on your iPad in the airport, but you will be able to watch it in your kitchen, while your better half watches “Frontline” in the living room. Or whatever.

It’s worth noting that Verizon announced its own version of this feature (with the same limitations), for its FiOS TV subscribers last summer, but has yet to roll it out.

Comcast will be demoing the feature later today at a Citigroup investors conference, but won’t be providing details about timing, or if there will be any programming restrictions on what you can watch on your tablet.

It’s possible there could be some holdouts, but the cable giant ought to be able to offer just about everything, since there’s no issue with carriage rights or ad loads, etc.–tablet watchers will be watching whatever’s already on live TV.

The killer feature, of course, would be the ability to do this on-the-go, but we’re not there yet, and it may take awhile to get there. Mobile rights for video–especially live video–are a whole different ball game.

Meantime, though, Comcast is offering a half-step–as previously promised, it will let traveling iPad users start to watch a selection of on-demand content, via its Xfinity TV app.

Comcast says it will offer some 3,000 TV shows and movies that iPad users can watch on-demand, over any network–AT&T’s 3G, or Time Warner Cable’s broadband, or whatever. Once that feature is up and running, which should be shortly, we’ll be able to compare that catalog to the ones that Netflix and Hulu Plus are offering for $7.99 a month.

And that’s the big picture here: Comcast and the other big cable providers, which continue to insist that cord-cutting isn’t real, want to make sure that it doesn’t become a reality, by offering their subscribers access to as much stuff, in as many places, as they can. It’s going to take years to find out whether that works or not, but best to start experimenting ASAP.

Qualcomm once had high hopes for the service. However, Jacobs acknowledged at a Churchill Club event last week that, outside of certain live events such as sports, it probably makes sense to offer mobile TV via on-demand streaming, rather than as a broadcast.

To be fully eligible for the rebate, customers must have purchased and activated the service, though there is also a form for those who didn’t even make it that far.

Qualcomm doesn’t want your unit back (apparently, it doesn’t want a bunch of FloTVs, either). Instead, the company’s Web site lists some recycling options. Or you could always keep it as a collector’s item–an early adopter badge of glory.

It’s worth noting that your service gets deactivated once the refund is processed, so on the off-chance you are still watching your Flo, you might want to wait until March to send in your form.

But don’t expect to use Netflix to watch shows that aired last night, or even in the last few weeks or months. In most cases, Netflix is adding shows that are a year old or more.

And in the case of the handful of shows that Netflix does run in the same season they appear on TV, it is increasing the “window” between their air date and the time they show up on the company’s streaming service.

Netflix previously had the ability to stream some Disney Channel shows, like “Wizards of Waverly Place,” the day after they aired. But now it will wait 15 days to run them, says Netflix content boss Ted Sarandos. The flip side: Netflix will get access to other Disney/ABC-owned shows that it hasn’t had in the past, like “Scrubs,” and in some cases it will get a deeper catalog, like more episodes of “Lost.”

Which makes this deal similar to other deals Netflix has cut in the past year with movie studios like Sony and Time Warner’s Warner Bros. for their offerings: Netflix writes a big check and agrees to wait longer to distribute some content, in exchange for the rights to more content, overall.

So what if you want to watch TV shows that ran last night? There are plenty of other places to get that, like Hulu, Apple’s iTunes or video-on-demand offerings from cable providers.

“Day-after broadcast is not core to our strategy. We’re not in that business, particularly,” Sarandos says. “I highly value completeness over freshness. For our customers, it’s much more about being able to watch the entire run of a show, as it is about being able to see time-shifted episodes.”

Translation: Hey Hollywood and TV executives! Don’t believe what you hear and read–we don’t want to blow up your existing distribution models. We just want to write you big checks for stuff after you’re done with it.

Earlier this fall, Netflix announced a similar deal with GE’s NBC, and Sarandos says he thinks his agreement with News Corp.’s Fox is fairly robust (News Corp. also owns this Web site).

Which means we should expect to see something from CBS down the pipe, too, right? “We’re constantly in talks” with other content owners, Sarandos says.

Translation: Hey Les Moonves! We’re no Google. How much do you want for “The Mentalist”?

The two companies say they will make ESPN’s flagship channel available online for TV subscribers of Time Warner Cable. Those who can confirm their TV subscription through an online registration process can watch live programming on the Web just as it appears on TV for no additional charge—a model known as “TV Everywhere.”

Most of the industry’s forays in TV Everywhere so far have put scripted shows online in an on-demand format—usually sometime after they air on TV. For the most part, TV networks have yet to put their channels on the Web in real time, and doing so with one of the most popular cable networks and live sports programming—the best source of high audience ratings for TV—offers a high-profile stage for a risky experiment.

“We think this can be a catalyst to drive the industry towards broader adoption of the authentication model,” said Sean Bratches, executive vice president of sales with ESPN. “We anticipate doing this with a number of other affiliates.”

Read the rest of this post on the original site

The agency tweaked its so-called “CableCard” rules to make it easier for consumer electronics makers to make cable-ready TVs and other devices and for consumers to install them.

Cable-ready TVs and set-top boxes have been around for years, but consumers haven’t been able to use them to see some cable programming (like On-Demand movies) because of some technical protections cable companies installed to prevent piracy. The FCC changed its rules slightly to make it easier for consumer electronics makers to produce devices that access all cable channels.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Alan Sklar feels it. The 61-year-old has stood behind the counter of Alan’s Alley Video in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood for 22 years. Revenue is down, and his staff, which reached 10 a few years ago, is now about five. “If we pay the bills we’re happy,” he said.

Many nights, like last Thursday, are very quiet.

He lists the culprits. “Netflix (NFLX), Redbox and on demand,” he said, over Audrey Hepburn’s voice emanating from a television in the corner playing “Funny Face.”

“People like things being given to them. We don’t see as many warm bodies.”

Since the first video-rental shops emerged in the late 1970s, they have served as shrines to films and created new social spaces for neighborhoods, often reflecting their personalities. They drew cinephiles, rebellious teens seeking movies of which their parents might not approve, and budding young actors and directors who canonized them in their work.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

That may well have been the case, but they don’t seem to have done much good, because Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy today, beaten into submission by nearly $1 billion in debt, growing competition from Netflix, Amazon and Apple, and consumers’ developing affinity for streaming and on-demand video services.

Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes said the move will allow Blockbuster to “continue to transform our business model to meet the evolving preferences of our customers.”

Which presumably means further retail store closures as the company reduces its nearly $1 billion debt to about $100 million.

Hardly a surprise–particularly since the company alerted the six major movie studios of its plans to enter a “pre-planned” bankruptcy in mid-September.

Incidentally, the companies that have been instrumental in landing Blockbuster in the dire straits in which it finds itself are all doing quite well on the stock market today. At $162.13, Netflix (NFLX) is up 3.31 percent; at $155.20 Amazon (AMZN) is up 2.19 percent; and at $291.80 Apple (AAPL) is up 1.39 percent.

Rental prices haven’t yet been set, but sources tell the FT that newer film titles would cost about $5–a bit more than the $.99 to $3.99 YouTube charges for the older films currently available in its fledgling pay-per-view catalog. Presumably, there will be some sort of integration with Google’s forthcoming Google TV platform, though details are scant.

If the company does manage to roll such a service out, we’ll soon see YouTube going head-to-head with Apple’s (AAPL) iTunes, Netflix (NFLX) and Hulu–and in a big way. YouTube’s reach is already quite broad–with the right deals in place Google (GOOG) could bring a powerful pay-per-view service to the desktop and mobile Web very quickly. “Google and YouTube are a global phenomenon with a hell of a lot of eyeballs–more than any cable or satellite service,” an executive with knowledge of the plans told the FT. “They’ve talked about how many people they could steer to this…it’s a huge number.”

Previously:

• Google Announces Web TV Google TV
• Why Will Google TV Be Any Different From WebTV? Or AOL TV? Or MSNTV? Or…

As promised, All Things Digital is posting the full videos from our eighth D: All Things Digital conference, held in early June.

Today, we tune into Comcast (CMCSA) COO Steve Burke to hear about the cable giant’s plans for its pending acquisition of NBC Universal from GE (GE), which will create a television powerhouse.

Also on topic: Net neutrality; the future of the cable bundle; the prospects for Hulu, the premium online video service that competes with Comcast’s on-demand services; and how the company will deal with TV incursions from Google (GOOG) and Apple (AAPL).

Here’s the full video of the D8 interview session with Burke, which I conducted:

Want to see it bigger? Click here.

Note: We’ll be posting full D8 videos on Mondays and Thursdays. Next up: John Donohoe, CEO of eBay (EBAY).

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100712/full-d8-video-comcast-coo-steve-burke/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100602/d8-video-james-cameron-talks-movie-release-windows/ http://allthingsd.com/20100602/d8-video-james-cameron-talks-movie-release-windows/#comments Thu, 03 Jun 2010 05:39:16 +0000 Drake Martinet http://d8.allthingsd.com/?p=1700 “Avatar” director James Cameron answers Walt’s questions on the pre-Web release strategy that still dominates feature film releases. Walt goes deep with the underwater director on the future feasibility of on-demand and cross-device delivery.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100602/d8-video-james-cameron-talks-movie-release-windows/feed/ 2 http://allthingsd.com/20100602/vivian-schiller-session/ http://allthingsd.com/20100602/vivian-schiller-session/#comments Wed, 02 Jun 2010 17:32:55 +0000 Peter Kafka http://d8.allthingsd.com/?p=489

Radio was supposed to be gone by now–wiped out by iPods, on-demand streaming and an endless buffet of personalization options. But the digital wave doesn’t always break the way people predict, and it turns out that National Public Radio’s audience has grown through the Web era: It now attracts a record 28 million listeners a week.

There’s still plenty for CEO Vivian Schiller to worry about, though. Like how to hoover up the donations that power her nonprofit in a recession. Or how to cover international news when it’s increasingly risky to do so.

But this isn’t Schiller’s first time at a media company facing big challenges. Her last gig was at the New York Times, where she ran the publisher’s flagship Web site.

Liveblog

Prior to Schiller’s appearance, we’re treated to a gag reel: Your favorite NPR personalities trying out inappropriate digital memes: A Karl Cassell iPhone app, Scott Simon in a motion-capture suit, etc. Good stuff.

Kara: Before we get to your current job, tell us about your old gigs.

Schiller: Walks through bio: NYT.com, cable, Russian interpreter, etc.

Kara: Okay, back to radio. Where are you?

Schiller: First of all, note we don’t call ourselves National Public Radio anymore. We’re NPR. That said, we’re still growing our radio audience. We have 34 million listeners a week. But our job is to inform citizens, via universal access. That used to mean radio, but we don’t think we should be limited to that anymore.

Schiller: This wasn’t done in response to declining audience, by the way. We just wanted to reach more people, on more platforms. We want to make it as widely available as possible. So all our RSS feeds are full-text. And we’ve got a very robust API, etc., which allows us to do cool things like the iPad app, which we made very quickly. And an Android app, which a developer built on his own. We just made the code for his app totally public.

We get over a billion requests on our API. Very few media organizations can say that. So we’ll see more cool stuff. Like combining NPR stories with information from local stations and creating “news products” that track trends, like the oil spill or the flu epidemic. “We don’t know what could be created, but we know things will be.”

10:43 am: Kara–How hard is it to change a radio organization into a multimedia organization?

10:44 am: Schiller–Within NPR, they were already starting to do it when I came on board. You don’t want to force people into it. You let early adopters show the way. There were concerns that we were taking resources away from traditional radio to go into digital, which was not the case. We put all 300 journalists into a digital training course, though.

10:46 am: Schiller–Outside of NPR, at the affiliates, it was a different story. Some smaller affiliates weren’t really set up for digital, so we had to provide tools for them so they could be part of the process. Some of this was tools for photos, etc. But fundamentally, helping them deliver audio streams. Radio towers are going away within 10 years, and Internet radio will take its place. This is a huge change and we should embrace it. Mobile will play a big part.

10:47 am: Our biggest shows are “Morning Edition” and “All Things Considered.” Those are tent poles. We produce and distribute those. Others we only distribute, like “Fresh Air.”

10:49 am: Kara: So do these shows become Internet shows or radio shows?

10:49 am: Schiller: I think of them as shows. We’re agnostic about the way they listen to it. All of our revenue streams work equally well with each delivery method. And to the listener’s ear, it’s identical. So why should we care? Forty percent of weekday listening is in the car, which makes sense. When cars are Internet-enabled, that should be the same thing.

10:51 am: Kara–Will you ever charge for this stuff?

10:51 am: Schiller–Nope. That’s our mission, to provide this stuff for free. We ask our listeners to contribute, and about 10 percent of them do, pretty consistently. That said, on a B2B level, this could change. Our stations don’t pay for our Web programming right now, but that could change. They get it free with the radio license fees they already pay.

10:52 am: Kara–Do you think commercial radio will be able to charge for their shows on the Web?

10:53 am: Schiller–Question of the moment. There’s a disconnect. Do publishers need the money? Yes. Do people want to pay? Not in large numbers.

10:53 am: A memory trip back to NYT.com and its Times Select pay wall experiment.

Schiller–We got up to 200,000 subs, $10 million a year. But that was a pittance compared with ad revenue we were generating. And we had to weigh that against the audience weren’t reaching. We figured the $10 million wasn’t worth it. So we dropped the wall, and within a couple of months, our unique monthly users went from 12 million to 20 million. Did that immediately translate into revenue? No, not right away. But eventually.

10:55 am: Schiller–What they’re doing now, by the way, is not the same thing. It’s not going to cut off Tom Friedman from a kid in a Bangalore Internet cafe. So I think that could work.

10:56 am: Schiller asked to talk about Web news in general. A bow in the direction of “creative destruction”–in this case, laid-off journalists creating interesting stuff on the Web. The problem is that all of these sites, like the one in San Diego, etc., don’t have enough reach. So we should be able to partner with them, and create a “supernetwork”–”not a mega-portal” but partnerships between the smaller regional stations and the mother ship, etc. We already doing that with Pro Publica, etc.

10:58 am: Kara–What devices are most important to you?

10:59 am: Schiller–Of course, I need to praise the “magical device.” It’s “all things to all people.” I do wonder if it’s going to obsolete the iPod touch….We’ve had 300,000 downloads of the NPR iPad app. The trick is to create an app that takes particular advantage of the device.

Q&A:

Is there a way to support NPR without supporting the local station?

Schiller: No, not really. The lifeblood of NPR is the local station. You’ll note we always route the membership drives through the local station. However, we do have a philanthropic support through the NPR Foundation, but that’s not for small individual donations.

But the listener can go directly to NPR in the Web model, and doesn’t need to go to the local affiliate. So what’s the local affiliate’s role in the new paradigm?

Schiller: The fact that so few journalists are covering state and local news is scary. We’re committed to providing that local coverage via the affiliates. “We’ve got to have that local coverage, and NPR can’t do it….To the extent that [local coverage] doesn’t suit your needs, then we have to work together to make it meet your needs.”

Would NPR consider working with for-profit organizations to help solve the local news problem?

Schiller: We’re not constitutionally opposed to working with commercial entities. But I also think that some of the small, local nonprofits we’ve been talking about can make this work, too. Especially if we can leverage our strengths, which is one way to generate more philanthropy.

Are we always going to be counting on philanthropy to fund news coverage going forward?

Schiller: Yes.

How are you working to develop new shows that will become your next “All Things Considered,” “Morning Editions,” etc?

Schiller: We used to have a sort of TV-like development process where we spent a lot of time and money working on new shows. Instead, we’re incubating smaller scale things, like “Planet Money,” which isn’t a full show, and isn’t supposed to be a full show. But it’s a podcast and a touring show, etc. We can help people iterate without committing a lot of money.

You mentioned that both commercial publishers and not-for-profits get about 10 percent of their users to subscribe or donate. Is that 10 percent a universal truth?

Schiller: I hope not. I hope we can increase those numbers. “I don’t know what the answer is, but we’re going to try everything and see what sticks.”

A note about our coverage: This liveblog is not an official transcript of the conversation that occurred onstage. Rather, it is a compilation of quotes, paraphrased statements and ad-lib observations written and posted to the Web as quickly as possible. It is not intended as a transcript and should not be interpreted as one.

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]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100602/vivian-schiller-session/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100104/mobile-tv-gets-closer-as-backers-cut-a-path/ http://allthingsd.com/20100104/mobile-tv-gets-closer-as-backers-cut-a-path/#comments Mon, 04 Jan 2010 21:16:16 +0000 Lauren Goode and Amy Schatz http://voices.allthingsd.com/?p=19742 Watching live television broadcasts on mobile devices is common in some countries, but not the U.S. A new effort is taking shape to change that.

A group of broadcasters plans to use this week’s Consumer Electronics Show to promote their plans to deliver news, sports, weather and other local content to users on the go. While cellphones are an obvious target, backers of the effort also expect users to receive local programming on laptop computers, portable DVD players and devices in cars.

Results may not come quickly, or easily. Competition for users’ attention is stiff, including an array of on-demand video offerings for mobile devices as well as another mobile broadcasting network that is trying to build a U.S. audience.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100104/mobile-tv-gets-closer-as-backers-cut-a-path/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20091224/the-beaver-brothers-of-zazzle-talks-about-customizing-well-everything/ http://allthingsd.com/20091224/the-beaver-brothers-of-zazzle-talks-about-customizing-well-everything/#comments Thu, 24 Dec 2009 14:00:41 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=22426

A few weeks ago, BoomTown motored down to Silicon Valley, to the Redwood City, Calif., HQ of Zazzle, the online site that lets users order a variety of custom products by using a special (and patented) printing technology.

I went to talk to the Beaver brothers–Jeff and Bobby, who founded the company with their father, who is CEO, way back before the first Web 1.0 bubble burst in 1999–about recent changes, including finding more ways to slap custom designs on more products and recent international expansion.

Funded to the tune of $46 million by Kleiner Perkins and Sherpalo Ventures, Zazzle’s profitable business essentially remains pretty straightforward: A customer can pick from both branded and user-generated designs for a variety of items, such as T-shirts, shoes, skateboards and more.

Zazzle also offers a marketplace, under a commission structure, for those who do contribute designs.

But in the video below, the pair talk about the more intriguing and more innovative idea of making pretty much every retail product completely customizable and available on demand.

It’s an interesting idea, to be sure, and probably inevitable.

Here’s the video of the interview, as well as a tour of Zazzle’s offices:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20091224/the-beaver-brothers-of-zazzle-talks-about-customizing-well-everything/feed/ 12 http://allthingsd.com/20090922/is-spotify-spot-on-co-founder-daniel-ek-talks-about-the-hot-online-music-start-up/ http://allthingsd.com/20090922/is-spotify-spot-on-co-founder-daniel-ek-talks-about-the-hot-online-music-start-up/#comments Tue, 22 Sep 2009 23:14:35 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=18695

There’s no question that Spotify is the latest hot start-up of the moment, which would be super annoying to BoomTown–who is easily irked by never-ending froth around Web 2.0 companies–if co-founder Daniel Ek were not so sharp and the digital-music-on-demand service he created not so nifty.

But, indeed, Ek turned out to be a very refreshing and level-headed serial entrepreneur in an interview I had with him yesterday in London, where Spotify has an office.

While Spotify is only available in certain countries in Europe, Ek promises it will soon come to the U.S., presumably when he finishes negotiating with the major music labels–which all reportedly hold stakes in Spotify.

They would like it, given that Spotify is essentially a kind of not-iTunes, a label-friendlier version of the popular music-downloading software and service from Apple (AAPL).

So, it is probably likely Spotify will get the green light for its American invasion, especially given its strong performance in under a year, with several million users, mostly in the U.K., as well as Germany and Sweden.

Those consumers seem to like the simple and light software application that lets one find and play a terrific range of music instantly. (Spotify also recently released an iPhone app for mobile users.)

The innovative service is somewhat social and too light on recommendations, but the true appeal is the quick ability to build an eclectic online music library and discover new songs without having to spend a lot buying tracks.

Those who pay a monthly fee get those millions of songs without advertising, while those who use the free version get banner and audio ads. Spotify also makes money from users downloading songs and by spurring physical sales.

While it is still unclear if all this adds up to a big business–the online music business has been notoriously deadly to start-ups–investors have pumped tens of millions of dollars and given Spotify an alleged $250 million.

The start-up has also attracted the attention of U.S. Web hotshots, including Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who complimented it on his status update recently.

Other big companies are also likely to take a look-see at Spotify for acquisition.

The 26-year-old Ek insists he is intent on building a huge standalone business. Famous last words, of course, but he talks a good game, as you can see in this video interview:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090922/is-spotify-spot-on-co-founder-daniel-ek-talks-about-the-hot-online-music-start-up/feed/ 1 http://allthingsd.com/20090901/napster-dont-hold-your-breath-waiting-for-our-awesome-new-iphone-app/ http://allthingsd.com/20090901/napster-dont-hold-your-breath-waiting-for-our-awesome-new-iphone-app/#comments Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:40:20 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=10574 Best Buy’s Napster wants you to know that you can now buy music “over the air” and beam it directly to your phone. Yawn.

What about the company’s awesome new iPhone app, the one that will let you stream music directly to your handset? You know, like the one that Apple (AAPL) just approved for Spotify, the superhyped service you can’t even get in the U.S. yet?

Don’t hold your breath says Best Buy (BBY). That Napster app is not coming anytime soon. And neither are apps for Google’s (GOOG) Android platform or Research In Motion’s (RIMM) BlackBerry.  And it’s because of those darn music labels. From a press note the company sent out this morning:

One of the most common questions Napster receives is, “When will you offer an iPhone app?” Well, Napster has created an iPhone application that allows subscribers to stream music on-demand to their iPhone—including personal playlists, albums and radio stations. You can imagine the company is also looking at streaming applications for several other mobile platforms as well (Blackberry, Android). However, due to the high licensing fees for streaming to a mobile phone, Napster has not yet submitted the iPhone app to Apple for approval or attempted to bring the application to market.

Now that’s an interesting approach–something akin to showing off a shiny new sled in a toy store window below a sign that reads “Not coming soon, not our fault.” Or that bank ad where the jerk takes the truck from the chubby kid.

I also don’t know if Napster’s explanation tells the whole story: Best Buy/Napster and the big labels already have an agreement that lets the company stream unlimited music to your PC for $5 a month. Just how much more would the company have to charge to accommodate the fees the labels want for mobile streaming? I’m supposed to talk with Napster folks later today, and if there’s anything I can pass along, I will.

UPDATE:  A little clarification from Napster president Brad Duea. His company’s position is that it doesn’t want to move about its $5 a month price, and that it would have to do so in order to offer streaming.

Why would it have to do that? Duea won’t spell it out. But henotes that RealNetworks’ (RNWK) Rhapsody, which has submitted an streaming music app to Apple, charges $15 a month for “on the go” service it already offers, and assumes it will charge the same for a service that works with the iPhone. Similarly, Spotify charges the equivalent of $16 a month for its premium service in the UK.

Of course, it’s possible that RealNetworks or Spotify will try subsidizing some of the cost for a mobile app in order to grab market share, and offer their iPhone/mobile services for something closer to Napster’s $5 fee.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090901/napster-dont-hold-your-breath-waiting-for-our-awesome-new-iphone-app/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20090707/michael-jacksons-last-performance-big-but-not-obama-big/ http://allthingsd.com/20090707/michael-jacksons-last-performance-big-but-not-obama-big/#comments Wed, 08 Jul 2009 01:07:38 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=9045

Depending on your perspective, this is either interesting news or heartening news: Michael Jackson’s funeral and memorial were indeed a giant Internet event. But they don’t seem to have been as big as Michael Jackson’s death, and they weren’t as big as Barack Obama’s inauguration.

So let’s call them the third-biggest Web event of the year. To date.

That sounds more like what I was thinking this morning: Everyone had to watch Obama’s inauguration or read about Jackson’s death, but not everyone felt compelled to see his burial or memorial.

It also explains why the Akamai people were so uncomfortable with my earlier reading of their traffic stats this afternoon, when I concluded that the events were responsible for the content delivery service recording more visitors per minute than any other time in the last year. Though I’d still love it if someone could explain why that did happen. (Jennifer? Anyone?)

Statistics are tumbling in from different sites and services (if you’d like to share yours with me, I’m all  ears).

Here’s what I’ve got for now:

• Akamai (AKAM) says it delivered 2,185,000 “live and on-demand streams” today. If I’m comparing apples to apples here (Jennifer?), that’s much fewer than the seven million simultaneous streams the content delivery network delivered during Obama’s inauguration. Akamai also compares the number of visitors on its “Net Usage Index for News” and says that number peaked at 3,924,370–that’s nearly double average traffic of 2,000,000, but fewer than the 4,247,971 visitors who were looking for Jackson info when he died on June 25.
• Facebook, which integrated its service with live video feeds from CNN, E! ABC and MTV (why wasn’t Twitter doing this?), says that one million users posted 800,000 status updates during the event, with the overwhelming majority coming through CNN. There were 1.8 million updates with the word “Obama” in them during the inauguration.
• CNN says it served up 781,000 concurrent live streams during the event; during the Inauguration it served up 1.3 million. It served a total of 4.4 million streams during the event, and 10.4 million for the day.
• MSNBC claims three million live streams–which are different from concurrent streams–and says that is its second-highest total, after…well you can guess. More if they roll in.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090707/michael-jacksons-last-performance-big-but-not-obama-big/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20090520/americans-cant-find-a-screen-they-wont-watch-tv-web-video-both-up/ http://allthingsd.com/20090520/americans-cant-find-a-screen-they-wont-watch-tv-web-video-both-up/#comments Wed, 20 May 2009 17:48:38 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=7565 One big reason why very few ad dollars have yet to make their way from television to the Web, even though online video is booming: TV viewing isn’t shrinking. Yet.

So says Nielsen, via its newest “Three Screen Report.” The tracking service says more Americans are watching TV than ever before–up 1.2 percent in the last quarter–and they’re spending more time watching TV, too–that’s up 1.9 percent, to a staggering 153-plus hours per month. Of course, the same holds true for Web video, which is growing much faster.

Here’s how the data break down. Total number of viewers (click to enlarge):

Time spent viewing (click to enlarge):

Don’t be fooled: As much as the blogosphere likes to describe the TV guys as clueless dummies, they’re well aware that they’re now competing with the likes of Hulu and Google’s (GOOG) YouTube for their viewers’ time. That’s why Hulu, the JV between GE’s (GE) NBC, News Corp.’s (NWS) Fox, and now, Disney’s (DIS) ABC, remains such a controversial site within the industry–one camp thinks it’s the best way for the networks to position themselves against the eventual move to the Web, and the other thinks they’re hastening their own demise by training viewers to expect free, on-demand access via the Web.

We may get a slightly better sense of what advertisers think about this soon. It’s “upfront” week in New York, which means that all the broadcast networks–CBS (CBS), NBC, Fox and ABC have begun selling their wares to advertisers for next year. Prognosticators are betting that upfront sales could be down by 15 percent or so this year, but they’re assuming that most of that decrease has to do with the miserable economy, not a full-blown move–or “secular shift,” as the smart guys like to say–away from TV and to the Web. If that decrease gets much bigger though, it could mean something else is afoot.

Enough with the serious! Here’s the excellent celebrity singalong from the finale of “30 Rock,” which aired last week. NBC only allows Hulu to keep episodes of the show on the site for a limited time (expect to see more of this restriction, not less), so this may only work for a few weeks. Enjoy:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090520/americans-cant-find-a-screen-they-wont-watch-tv-web-video-both-up/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20090515/kara-visits-offbeat-guides/ http://allthingsd.com/20090515/kara-visits-offbeat-guides/#comments Fri, 15 May 2009 11:12:01 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=13590

This week, I went on a trek to downtown San Francisco–from ATD HQ, located in the wilds of the Castro–to visit David Sifry, the jovial Web entrepreneur who recently launched Offbeat Guides.

The San Francisco-based start-up makes “personalized, up-to-date travel guides that cover over 30,000 travel destinations, using a combination of search technology and curation by both amateur and professional travel experts.”

In other words, on-demand travel books, with a touch of humanity–an obvious and even innovative trend as custom printing gets cheaper.

But Sifry is also putting the guides on digital devices, like the Kindle from Amazon (AMZN).

Sifry, who also founded the blog search engine Technorati, talked to BoomTown about the business and gave me a quick tour of its HQ near Union Square.

Here’s the video interview:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090515/kara-visits-offbeat-guides/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20090324/cloud-gaming/ http://allthingsd.com/20090324/cloud-gaming/#comments Tue, 24 Mar 2009 18:00:22 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=15328

[ See post to watch video ]

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