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Category Archives: Video/Music/Media

YouTube Kids Review – and 10 Ways to Improve it

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YouTube Kids - main uiWe finally got around to downloading the iPad YouTube Kids app, now that more than half of my children can do things like spell words mostly correctly. And since there’s a bit of a family-wide addiction to Plants vs Zombies (1 and 2), they’ve been watching some gameplay video. Which got me realizing that a 6-year-old should not, at all, accidentally watch most of the results of “zombie” in a YouTube search. Enter YouTube Kids.

Here’s the family consensus of the strengths of the app:

  1. YouTube Kids does an excellent job filtering out anything age-inappropriate. In fact I put a dedicated effort trying to “trick” it with any means possible, and I couldn’t find a video that I considered PG-13, scary/gory, adult-themed, etc. Searching for “zombies” pretty much only showed animated results:
    YouTube Kids - zombie

    On a very special Thomas the Train, …

    and a search for “game of thrones” showed mostly music videos, Minecraft interpretations, and other “safe” versions:

    YouTube Kids - game of thrones

    Good thing nobody has any free time to do anything creative anymore…

    Nothing else that I threw at it, from curse words to Skinemax-level “soft” words, came back with results. I even tried using horror movies, explosions, Michael Bay, etc:

    I hear Night of the Living Pharmacist has some pretty creepy moments

    I hear Night of the Living Pharmacist has some pretty creepy moments

    Considering this is probably the single most important role the app has, I’d call it a win if your goal is to let your kids autonomously search for videos about topics that interest them.

  2. It’s exceptionally easy to find copyrighted materials. A search for Shaun the Sheep (family favorite) instantly provided full episodes:
    It's Shaun the Sheep!

    It’s Shaun the Sheep!

    And pretty much any search for “title of movie full movie” presented exactly that (including Frozen, Lion King, He-Man, etc):

    The illegal copy never really bothered me anyway

    The illegal copy never really bothered me anyway

    Interestingly I couldn’t find PG-13 level movies, so Harry Potter was absent, though the Harry Potter Lego Version was all over the place.

  3. Exploring and discovering learning/educational content actually is interesting. There’s tons of solid channels available, from LEGO to National Geographic and more.YouTube Kids - LEGO channel

I’d certainly call this an acceptable experience, but I’m nowhere near calling it Great. Which is disappointing, because I think it could, and should, be great. It unfortunately falls into the category of what we call “babysitter apps” – which are exactly the ones we try to avoid. We just prefer the apps that really engage our children, or that we want to use along with them. And from our perspective it falls short.

So here’s how I’d improve the YouTube Kids app:

  1. Actually age-restrict Settings. Here’s what it looks like for “adult mode”:
    That's the same combination for my luggage!

    That’s the same combination for my luggage!

    While my 6yo can’t fully read, he’s got the numbers down already. Which makes the above beyond simple. Either enable a PIN-code, or have a math problem, but it needs to be a bit more serious than this.

  2. Enable simultaneous search and playback. Just like in the main YouTube app, it should be easy to have a video playing while searching for the next one you want to watch / queue up.
  3. Enable a queue / playlist. While search results become automatic playlists, as do channels, there’s no way to build your own simple playlist as you go. Maybe my 4yo couldn’t handle that, but the older ones certainly could.
  4. Save a playlist. Would be great for music videos especially.
  5. Mark/save favorite videos. If you are unfamiliar with children, there’s never ever been a video any child has ever watched only one time. More like 300 times.
  6. Add Recently Watched/History. Per the above.
  7. Subscribe to Channels. As you may have gathered by now, there’s virtually no personalization in the entire app. Why can’t I save my favorite channels, and have those appear on “my” home screen? The generic Home view is pretty useless after the kids have browsed it a few times. Also, being able to automatically find “latest episodes” from channels is a pretty core YouTube feature – one that the kids should get too.
  8. Add “Show More Results” to search. Because otherwise you can never, ever, find certain videos!
  9. Add a Web experience. Seems like a pretty natural extension, and my children do use this archaic thing I have called a computer. And once they’ve been using YouTube autonomously on the iPad, I’d like to enable them to do so on the laptop too.
  10. Allow for age ranges. Again, there’s no 8yo who wants to see the same stuff as a 4yo. With a simple range (2-4, 4-6, etc) setting, the experience would be so much better and tailored to the individual.

I’ve tried to keep the feedback fairly “light” here – things that aren’t monumental shifts in the app, but would fundamentally improve it at every level. I could go on at much more length at how to make a truly great Kids experience, but I’ll save that for another time.

Again, it’s a great start at an awesome experience, but still falls short IMHO. Though there’s one total saving grace I may have forgotten to mention. So thank you, very much, Team YouTube Kids, for this:

her?

her?

Why It’s a Great Time to Start a TV Startup, part 2: It’s Time For Change

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2015-03-04_1049As I asserted in Part 1,  I believe we are entering a “fourth generation” of television, one in which the rigid walls that have previously defined the industry are fundamentally disrupted. In the post-1.0 era, not only have consumers lived within “walled gardens” of content, but the industry itself has remained mostly closed to outsiders. When even companies as powerful as Intel and Google have tremendous struggles dealing with Hollywood, gaining access to content, etc, it’s almost comical to think of the startups who tried the same. Aereo’s $96 million in funding became about $1M in auction to TiVo this week.

This is mostly due to the incredible entanglement of contracts and legal issues pertaining to content ownership, distribution rights, release windows, playback, etc. Heck, even TV-related companies trying to change struggle with the mess. For context: We live in a world today that lets me buy NHL Gamecenter (directly from the NHL) yet not watch my hometown team (Montreal Canadiens, FTW) play “blacked out” games that air on, wait for it, the NHL Network.

The way I’ve always tried to describe the complexity to people is to think of taking a few dozen cables, neatly wound up, then throw em in a backpack and go for a quick jog. Then try to extract a single cable – good luck (for off-topic reading, here’s why that happens).

But we, today, are seeing important catalysts of change, and the catalysts are strong enough to make the powers that be look at how they can un-entangle their own mess. Here are the factors that I believe contribute strongest to a looming shift:

  • Netflix, Hulu, SlingTV, HBOGO, and TVE services break down the barriers to making content available through live and near-real-time streaming options. They also “train” content owners to think differently about distribution options.
  • iTunes, Google Play, and VOD services enable a la carte alternatives that are truly viable options to many consumers.
  • Pervasive 4G access, inexpensive smartphones, and tablets train consumers to demand anything/everything on all devices everywhere and all the time.
  • Bittorrent, Popcorn Time, and other piracy options have made finding and accessing high quality content for free far too easy for far too many people.
  • YouTube, Vimeo, and the suite of multichannel networks like Fullscreen are providing infinite entertainment alternatives to younger audiences, who may be losing the “attachment” to broadcast-quality television. This should be particularly scary to all sorts of companies – if the zeitgeist of pop culture shifts away from TV, we can expect to see more change, faster, than anyone can predict.
  • Cord cutting and dropping TV ratings are at the cusp of causing dramatic impact to advertisers, the unquestionable lifeblood of the industry.

As my colleague Adam Flomembaum, Editor at Lost Remote, shared with me yesterday:

“… we have seen in the last year that control of high quality content is being wrested from the hands of cable and satellite providers. Consumers are becoming increasingly aware of other great options for accessing their favorite content, and TV startups that make this process more seamless – or at the very least, more consumer friendly – have a great chance to thrive.”

"What do you mean 'Lets get rid of the middlemen' we are the middle men!"Fundamentally the thing that’s made the TV industry “work” is the requirement and dependency on the two-tiered “middlemen” between content production and audiences.  But if the audiences are shifting patterns, quickly, and the producers are able to find new methods of profitable content distribution, change will come. I can’t say it’s a “this year” thing or a “10 years from now” thing – but I do believe we’ve entered the phase wherein there’s industry awareness of changing times, and reactiveness is following.

I’d also argue that this was not the case over the past decade, and is directly attributable to why so many TV startups crashed and burned. As Eric Elia, Managing Director of Cainkade, puts it:

“The technology has been here for a while, but we’ve been waiting for 10 years for the TV industry dynamics to shift. The table is now set with [hundreds of millions of] streaming devices worldwide, the unbundling boom (HBO, CBS, Sling TV, etc), and a Netflix clone for every taste and geography.  It’s going to be a fun few years for tools companies, programmers, ad tech. But I would not want to be a commodity content owner that can’t flap its wings outside the bundle.”

Now with any change we’ll see some mega-corporations begin their slow road to the deadpool, while others seize opportunities. We’ll see startups rise seemingly out of nowhere and become household names. Even five years ago cable and broadcast execs could easily keep their eyes on the distant horizon fearlessly – today, they’re building survival plans.

Next up: defining “TV 4.0”, identifying short-to-long-term opportunities, and other thoughts on why I think it’s a great time to be riding the wave of change in television.

When Will TV Shows Get Surge Pricing?

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Surge TVThere’s a lot of mixed feelings about Uber’s “Surge Pricing” concept, which described in a nutshell is: if lots of people are trying to get Ubers in a certain region, the price goes up. Economic-minded folks will call it simple supply and demand, whereas others feel the company is attempting to gouge their customers, manipulate pricing, etc. Assuming for this discussion it’s more the former – a simple case of supply and demand – I’ve been wondering about applying a similar model to TV shows.

When Better Call Saul premiered, it launched as the number one series debut in cable history. I was/am very interested in watching it, but without a pay TV subscription, I had no option to see it in/near-real-time. Within hours the episode was available in a variety of Video on Demand (VOD) formats, either for free or a low fee ($2.99 in iTunes at this moment). Older shows in iTunes tend to run at $1.99 per episode.

I’d argue the TV industry, specifically content owners, are missing opportunities right now by having equanimous pricing. The value, to an interested audience, of a piece of content is much, much higher in a short window. Especially for content that has any kind of zeitgeist/cultural value. Being “in” the crowd who sees the premiere matters to some segment of the population.  Similarly, older content has less inherent value. Do I really find an episode of WKRP in Cincinnati is “worth” the same as others? WKRP in Itunes

And yes, there is a range – Game of Thrones is $3.99 per episode, for example – but I’d argue there’s a lot being missed out in both directions. Older, library catalogs are worth less, and hot/newer shows are worth more. I’d probably also argue that anything more than 2-ish years old should have free S1E1 viewing to all viewers.

This takes a lot of new-style thinking for an older-style industry. And I see the hazards as well – if content gets priced too high, audiences may well seek out illegitimate sources. But I’d assume there’s a lot of opportunity to be had in a real-time priced marketplace. As content owners seek out new methods of monetizing their huge inventories, I hope to see experimentation in this space. Then again, I’d hate to see a snowstorm make a good show cost 2.8x the normal rate!



Viacom, the TV Industry’s Canary in a Coal Mine

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When people ask me about the future of TV, I frequently tell them “just watch Viacom.” Their ratings have plummeted in recent years, and the recent loss of Stewart and Colbert may well be irreparable. Or is it the beginning of a brand new approach to big media? 

yutesViacom’s in a fascinating position to watch. They obviously own a lot of content, but if you look into the brands, it’s very youth-oriented. Which puts the company squarely in the targets for where the bulk of change is occurring. If “those kids today” truly prefer YouTube and Netflix to Saturday Morning Cartoons, that impacts Viacom heavily. And while I have a whole other series of thoughts regarding how younger audiences behaviors shift as they age, it’s also safe to say at this point that today’s 20-year-old will act like today’s 30-year-old in a decade. They won’t.

If “those kids today” are actually cord-nevers, that is about to impact everybody.  And “about” in TV industry terms could be a year, or maybe ten – hard to say.

The two biggest challenges networks face are changing audience behaviors and an advertising industry shift toward more data.  This combination puts Viacom in the position of having to react to the changing times in near-real-time if they want to be relevant in 10 years. And a-changing they are! Viacom is pushing ahead in so many ways, trying new technologies, looking for what’s working (and what’s not). In a way they appear to be trying to avoid the classic Innovator’s Dilemma conundrum.

They may make it, they may not. All depends on how good their ability to be a media giant and a scrappy startup at the same time. But watch them, I shall.



Active or Passive Television?

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1411575895493_wps_54_Couple_waAs I think about the “future” I think a lot about existing audience behavior, and what patterns might be changing. Too much talk is overarching of “All Television” – as in “the future is ALL binge-watching” or “the future is ALL mobile” or etc. To ponder the future, we must get specific about patterns and trends, and determine their implications.

As a starting point to divide the conversation somewhat, I believe there are two fundamental modes of “watching TV” – an active and a passive mode:

Active television watching. This is Game of Thrones. This is the season finale of Idol. This is any episode of Broadchurch. The shows that you watch and do virtually nothing else. You are captive in the action, the drama, the storytelling. And for different folks, this is different shows, genres, networks, etc.

Passive watching. Basically everything else – the shows that are half-captivating your attention, and by definition, half-not-captivating your attention. This is when people Tweet, Text, Facebook, Snap-o-gram, or whatever other thing that may catch their eye.

With those definitions in mind, let’s consider the potential for change. From my perspective, passive watching is a definitive activity, and one that people still enjoy. Its the same as having music on – the show is the background activity. TV is not threatened here, because it’s just not the primary thing going on in the viewers’ mind. And this is also where the “$0.50 of every $1.00 spent on ads is thrown out” – because at best the advertiser gets a little brand awareness. It’s not really measurable, and a near-irreplaceable activity. You can’t really passive watch YouTube, nor passively use Facebook – these are both primary activities. Conclusion 1: passive TV audiences will become increasingly un-monetizable, across any platform. Conclusion 2: passive TV viewing is most vulnerable to anything that creates entertainment-related background noise (hence Pandora being one of the most popular “apps” on smart TVs).

And as for changing active watching? Well good luck with that. There’s just too much great TV, in literally every genre available, to pull away from. If, for the purposes of this discussion, we define “TV” as 22- and 44-minute long shows, then we can also assert that YouTube clips/videos are not directly competitive of active viewing TV behaviors. Regardless of the delivery platforms – be they live, streaming, on-demand, linear, whatever – this is a deliberate, desired activity by whomever is watching. And they’ll keep tuning in long into the future of whatever it is we call television.



Why Netflix Offline Mode is Unlikely to Happen

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squirrel-no-internetFrom TechRadar:

And despite the pleas of the masses (or maybe it’s just us) it doesn’t sound like it’s going to happen any time soon – or ever. Speaking to TechRadar, Cliff Edwards, Netflix’s director of corporate communications and technology, said “It’s never going to happen”.

Now personally, I’d love this to be false. I’ve flown 75K miles a year for quite a while now, and am on planes and in hotels enough that I could’ve powered through all of Luther, New Girl, Broadchurch, and much more by now (those are my current shows FWIW). Heck, I’d have watched Lost by now – but I don’t think I have 200+ hours of connected time I’m willing to sacrifice for lens flare.

But truth be told, Netflix has no reason to cater to me, nor the legions of business travelers who follow suit. Here’s why, in handy list format:

1. Nobody’s Canceling Netflix for a Lack of Offline Access

If the Internet has connected us all together to do one thing, it seems to be to collectively whine about high-class problems. But getting rid of the unquestionably best-bang-for-your-buck TV service because you were inconvenienced en route to JFK makes no sense. And since churn is actually a key factor for Netflix, the lack of this being a “Problem” is enough to shut down the topic.

2. Nobody’s Subscribing to Netflix if they Added Offline Access

Much like the above, it’s pretty hard to imagine a market of people with disposable income (as business travelers are prone to be) who choose not to subscribe to Netflix because of price/features. So it’s pretty hard to argue that adding this feature would generate a wave of new subscriptions. Further, since customer acquisition is again a huge metric for Netflix, if they believed this is an untapped market, we’d possibly see change. Clearly they don’t.

3. It’s a Hard Problem to Solve Well

We could mince words about it, but the fundamental experience around using Netflix is pretty great. Everything about queuing up downloads, archives, and managing storage is a not-great experience. So adding this burden, which would inevitably create customer support overhead, product experience dilution, etc, would have to be well-justified. Again – not saying it can’t be done, just saying doing it really well isn’t easy, and is it worth it? See above.

4. It’s an Expensive Problem to Solve

In case all the above didn’t somehow add up, remember that Netflix, to the best of our knowledge, does not currently pay content owners for non-streaming access rights. And content ain’t cheap. And having worked in this field for more than a decade would lead me to believe adding in offline access would be an expensive negotiation point.

In conclusion…

Combining any of the aforementioned challenges – why does it make sense for Netflix to spend more money to build more product to solve a problem for a small number of users without gaining new paying customers nor staving off churn of existing customers?

It doesn’t.

Why Twitch Will Be Bigger than Baseball (Smart Move, Amazon!)

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realsports_baseballYesterday, Amazon announced they purchased Twitch – a video site that lets viewers watch people play video games – for just under $1B.

First of all, the mid-1980s me who was mocked for playing computer games is elated to hear that (a) this exists, (b) the acquisition happened, and (c) a billion dollars! Somewhere inside I’m hoping all the “popular kids” are in some near-homeless state of living, but most of me has moved on from then (not really).

Second, as many others are pointing out, I think this is a great move by Amazon.

Third, I think the potential for Twitch is much, much bigger than a lot think, and will be a massively long term successful bet by Amazon. I think Twitch will be bigger than baseball, and here’s why, in convenient bullet format:

  • Video Games are shorter than baseball games, and people are impatient. If I had to make a wager on future trends, given society’s growing inability to sit around and do nothing for even a few minutes at a time, I’d bet that shorter-format anything increasingly wins over longer-format anything. Watch a full game, featuring the most talented people in the world (more on that in a moment), from start to end in 20 minutes versus watch a 1.5-3 hour game that may be two mid-level teams in non-divisional, non-rivalry play?
  • Video Games have global reach, and the world is increasingly “flat”. The World Cup set ratings records this year in the US. For soccer – the supposedly unsellable sport. In video games, anyone can play from anywhere, anytime. And as much as US broadcasters try to remind us that we only truly care about Americans, the impact of globalization is clear: audiences care for “the best” more than “those closest to home”. Further, there’s just a much much bigger audience potential.
  • Video Games are accessible to virtually anyone. Much like soccer, where all you need is a ball and some flat space to play, anybody with access to computers and the Internet can get into gaming. When I was a kid I dreamed of growing up to be first baseman for the Montreal Expos (I will hate Jeffrey Loria to the end of my days) – but I was unbelievably unlikely to become a pro baseball player. On the other hand, even now in my 40’s I could dedicate some serious hours to a given new video game, and just possibly be great at it.
  • Video Games are cheaper. Baseball is/was America’s pastime in large part due to the ease of which a family could just pick up and go to a game. At $200+ for a family of four, that’s no longer the case. So the cycle breaks down, the “family outing” for average Americans shifts to more affordable options. Without the “passing of the torch” and nostalgia, seems like there’s a gradual slope downwards for overall baseball popularity.
  • Video Game players aren’t icons. Because of the lack of physicality about video games, it’s unlikely that the “stars” and heroes of games will become household-known people.  Now their names, player names, avatars, etc will probably one day be at the Derek Jeter level of fandom. But even then – it’s more relatable for the average person.

I’ll be clear as a final point: this is not in any way a zero-sum game – baseball can still be huge AND watching gaming can be huger. But as I see it, Amazon just bought themselves not a team, but an entire sports league – with tremendous growth and potential still ahead of it.

Curved TVs are the new 3DTVs

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20140108-162233.jpgApparently the hot, buzzy thing at CES this year is the curved OLED TVs. I saw one – it’s very very pretty. And much like the last 2 attempts by manufacturers to stir up interest in buying new sets, this just isn’t going to cut it.

Firstly, we all need to acknowledge the massive rush to buy new sets last decade occurred because of *multiple* factors that contributed to a zeitgeist-level shift in set ownership:

  • Thinness: sets went from being 2 feet deep to 6 inches or less deep
  • Size: sets went from 27 inches to 50 inches
  • Resolution: shift from below standard definition to high definition
  • Quality: not only the raw resolution, but every aspect of picture quality was obviously visually improved
  • Sex appeal: being early to having a plasma was sexy – then when it became mainstream enough, not having some kind of flatscreen was definitively unsexy
  • Format shifts: simultaneous to new sets, tons of new content was instantly available – and not just new content, but libraries of favorites were accessible
  • Set price: getting a flatscreen (at Costco!) was very very affordable
  • Content price: while VHS libraries were only for the few, building a collection of your favorite DVDs was relatively inexpensive (for younger readers: VHS tapes in the early 90s would sell for $80 or so)

All of the above occurred in an effective blink of an eye. There were so many reasons to to upgrade, it just had to happen.

But now that these beautiful, thin, huge displays got mounted on peoples’ walls, it’s become a lot harder to unmount them. I don’t even want to think about doing it – and I don’t think the manufacturers have yet presented us a reason to follow along.

Smart TV? OK, if I’m buying a new set. Or I just get an Apple TV, Roku, Xbox, Playstation, Chromecast, etc. I gain very little benefit from an actual set upgrade, compared with the cost of an add-on box that I can easily replace. It’s akin in my eyes to paying the extra $3+K for an in-dash GPS unit as opposed to buying a $100 Garmin, or just using my phone.

2nd try: 3dTV? Personally, I actually avoided one the last time I bought a set (63″ Samsung plasma – yes!). Turns out I wasn’t the only one, and 3d was (as I predicted it would be) quite a failure.

Batter up…. CURVED SETS! Huh? Don’t get me wrong – they are pretty in so many ways. Thinner than my iPad – love it, very slick. But would I even consider the hassle of the upgrade for it? Same deal for 4K – just not *enough* to cause another societal shift for “MORE”. Further, I think the curved nature of the device is an ill-fit for most living rooms, where the benefit of super-thin is eliminated by the odd shape in the room. Has anyone checked if these things are Feng Shui?

Sooner or later we’ll likely find the next big reason to upgrade displays, but it’ll have to rank in there in the leagues of when TV was first available to the masses, to when it first went color, to the current state, before it happens.

Why it’s (almost) 2014 and you still need a set top box

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I actually had one of these!

I stumbled onto a discussion on Quora entitled “Why do we still have television set top boxes?” and as I often see, it’s full of conjecture and suspicion about the evil empire that is the pay TV industry.  While I am not specifically trying to support or vilify anyone from that industry, I thought it worthy a response that has less conspiracy theory than others.  So let’s start with some important facts:

1) Set Top Boxes (STB’s) take, on average, from day of deployment 30+ months to “break even” for a cable company2) Any tech support, home maintenance (“truck roll”), etc is costly to a cable company
3) Software updates, QA, etc are slow and costly to a cable company
4) Most north american pay TV providers now enable some form of “TV everywhere” service available by App or Browser
5) Many pay TV providers now offer same apps on Roku, Apple TV, and several smart TVs
6) Smart TV software platform updates happen 1+/year – which could easily result in incompatibility with pay TV services.  Only very recently have any of the manufacturers begun to standardize their own platforms.
7) The technology in homes is moving at an *extreme* pace, so even if a pay TV operator is moving “fast” they will still appear, relatively speaking, to be moving slowly.
7a) thinking point – Until about 5 years ago, this just wasn’t the case at at all, the pay TV providers didn’t really even need to innovate whatsoever.  So here we are 5 years later and they have APIs, multiple apps, etc – not too many industries one could point to and make a similar statement about incumbents…

I think if you add the above together, the answer should be something like this:

The pay TV industry would be happy to rid itself of STBs, but only *very recently* have viable alternatives hit the market.  Pay TV companies are very rapidly adopting these platforms, but your definition of “rapid” is radically out of whack with how an established industry moves.  Over the next few years you should expect most North American Pay TV providers to give you as a consumer multiple options for using their services in the platform of your choosing.

As a bonus:
8) CableCards *could have been* a good solution, but were way too soon to market to make the industry comfortable with them.  Ask yourself this question: if you were the person in charge of P&L on the hardware deployment business, and you knew full well that consumers will call you with any problems whatsoever, would you support some “standard” by which *other company’s hardware* was causing YOU customer service issues?  Me neither.

What a Next-Gen Apple TV Could Bring

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While I’m not as bullish as others that the following tweet should be taken as gospel, I’ve been thinking a lot recently on what a new version of an Apple TV product could look like.

So, in no particular order… “why update the Apple TV?”

  • 4K video
    I wouldn’t bet on this, at all, since there’s virtually no content available today, and probably won’t be much in the next 24-36 months.  If 4K looks promising, they can rev again in the future.  Further, Apple has historically *not* led in this category, and I’d be surprised to see them do it this time.
  • Rich SDK
    Yes, there are plenty of apps available for Apple TV today, but access is limited and granted in an ad-hoc fashion to selected content providers.  Many folks assume one day they’ll open this up to a wider developer network -as in, all developers.  I know very little about the programmability/guts of the Apple TV, but I have to assume the current one simply wasn’t designed to be uber-expandable.  As a sub-point, I *could* see an argument for an extension of iOS here, but I’d hope it’d be a differentiated offering to relate to the different UI mechanisms.
  • HDMI Passthrough
    For the literal heaps of things Google TV has done wrong, HDMI passthrough was smart.  Enabling the Apple TV to sit on Input 1 at all times enables no-input switching for any connected experience.  But even better than that, it’s not a stretch to see a version of AirPlay with a, wait for it, transparent layer.  What does that mean?  Imagine every cool thing about Interactive TV you’ve ever heard or thought of, minus all the lame stuff, now have it actually work, powered by your iPhone/iPad.  Awesome.
  • Gaming
    Many of us already believe the next generation of consoles is doomed, but what if the Apple TV came with an optional joystick and as much gaming horsepower as an iPad or Xbox 360, and stayed at the $99 price point?  It’s the exact opposite strategy Microsoft is taking with their platform (gaming first, everything else second), but since about 1998 that’s pretty much a winning approach.

And that’s it – which is telling in its own way.  There’s no other “basic” TV/streaming need to upgrade the current hardware, and Apple certainly isn’t going to put out a new version without a very specific reason.  Perhaps I’m missing something (comment please!), but I am at a loss to come up with any other drivers for new hardware.   Oh, and yes, I’m ruling out Siri, physical motion gestures, cameras, etc – while any could certainly come at some point, they aren’t going to exist without one of the above as well.

Which leaves me with the following: if you do not think the above reasons are compelling, and you can’t come up with a better one, I think you can pretty much write off a new piece of hardware.  Further, I have strong convictions that the only truly viable option above is adding a Rich SDK/open developers kit, so if we don’t see that next week, I don’t think we see any new device show up either.

The only thing that could kill TV? TV itself.

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It’s fun to write about the “death of TV” (or flip flop on it, whatever).  Why it’s so fun, I’m not sure, but I have a hunch it’s because…

  1. It’s a HUGE industry ($500+B/year if not more)
  2. It’s been utterly untouched by the Internet (so far – a thing that really rankles a lot of people, mostly tech bloggers)
  3. The newspaper and music industries both got trashed, so why not TV too?
  4. It’s controlled by a very small number of extremely powerful and wealthy companies
  5. The aforementioned companies have a perception of (a) greedy profiteering, (b) being dinosaurs, and (c) restricting people from doing whatever they want with content, which also tends to rankle said tech bloggers

Arguments for the death of TV are equally fun to read and fantasize about.  They tend to fall into these categories:

  • “Those Kids Today”:
    Theory – Kids today like to watch the YouTubes and the Torrents!  Kids today don’t like to pay for content. Therefore when kids get older, they will continue to watch YouTube and not pay for content.
    Reality – To debunk comically: kids today like Play-Doh, Lego’s, Justin Bieber, and eating Mac & Cheese at every meal – none of which hold true when kids become grownups (well, maybe the mac & cheese bit).  To debunk more seriously: kids have loads and loads of time on their hands and very little money, so they can spend the time and energy hunting and pecking for free content – something most adults (30+, with kids) just don’t have.  Or, it’d be like assuming that because kids like Justin Bieber when they are teenagers they will like equally crappy music in their fifties.  Well, that might just happen I guess.
  • “Cord-Cutting/Shaving/Trimming/Slicing/Thinning/Balding/Receding”:
    Theory – everybody’s quitting cable! EVERYBODY!
    Reality – I’m not even going to bother finding the links, but bottom line is this – for every article that shows XX thousand customers quit Cable, if they don’t ALSO INCLUDE the part where XX thousand customers signed up for IPTV, FIOS, Telco’s, or Satellite, you need to utterly ignore the article.  After that, there’s not much evidence left.  This may change, but that’s just a theory, and one that’s yet to be really substantiated.
  • “The Great Unbundling/A La Carte/Go Direct to Consumers”:
    Theory – In the not-too-distant future, you’ll be able to set exactly the lineup you want, and not pay for channels you don’t watch.  Or you’ll watch *everything* a la carte, paying as you go.  Or channels like HBO will start selling direct to consumers.
    Reality – This is in utter conflict with how the TV industry actually works and makes money. And since they, you know, like making money, and since shows are, you know, expensive to make, they need to keep making the money.  So if channels were to unbundle, they’d instantly get so expensive people wouldn’t be paying for them.  Here’s some of my previous thoughts on this same topic.
  • “Newspapers/Music died!”:
    Theory – Because of the deaths of other industries, TV will die too, as it’s antiquated, etc.
    Reality – This is like arguing that because the coal and steel industries in the US shrank, so will the TV industry. Other than being ad-supported, TV and Newspapers are utterly dissimilar (and BTW, the way the ads work for both are exceptionally different).  Other than being, well, media, TV and Music are utterly dissimilar.  We might as well say the Internet will die soon because it’s just like newspapers.
  • “Startups! Technology!”:
    Theory – Some startup will come along and just utterly kill TV in every way.
    Reality – Yeah, no.

OK, Jeremy, Mr Big Talk Guy, so what could actually happen?  Here’s my theory on what could “kill” the TV industry as we know it – it’s “catch up TV”. For those unfamiliar with the term, “catch up TV” (also called “binge viewing” sometimes) is when you watch a show long after it aired, by days/weeks/months/even years.  Whether it’s via Hulu, Netflix, Amazon, iTunes, Video On Demand, or any other service, it’s the rapidly increasing trend on TV consumption.  And it’s the one thing the TV industry is massively enabling, and could massively come back to haunt them.

In a nutshell, the TV ecosystem is like a big food chain, with advertising dollars acting at the bottom of it all (yes, TV ads are the kelp of the TV world).  Should advertising falter in a notable way (which, by the way, it isn’t at present), it could bring down the whole system.  There are several exceptions to the system, such as HBO, but the numbers there ($1.2B) are literally paltry when compared to TV ads ($90B).  And catch-up TV represents a problem, as it’s not monetized the same way as live TV.  See the Live TV part is where almost all of the $90B of TV ad revenue comes from – hence why ratings declines cause shows to get cancelled, as they don’t generate the cash flow to sustain themselves.

So as we all get further and further accustomed to being able to watch shows whenever we want, we (collectively) are reinforcing the habit of “why bother watch live?”  For example, my friends all tell me to watch Homeland, but I don’t really have the time for a new show right now, so I’ve bookmarked it for later (ahem, NextGuide), and will just start watching it on Netflix.  Along with Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and lots of other shows I know are great, but just haven’t watched – yet.

What, then, happens to highly anticipated shows that launch, combined with audiences who increasingly choose to wait to view them?  They get cancelled (great thoughts on this by Andrew Wallenstein here).   Sure a startup like mine can benefit from this, and even become a fabled Billion Dollar Company (FTW!), but success beyond our wildest dreams will, in no way, replace the lost revenue the entire ecosystem would suffer.  And just as environmentalists are concerned about loss at the bottom of our food chain, if the TV ad system begins to crumble, then so do budgets for new shows, etc.  It ain’t pretty.

Now I’m not predicting the above will all happen – but at the current pace of things, it wouldn’t shock me to see much of it play out.  The TV industry is giving its content away way too cheaply to all the providers to sustain itself without the advertising, and they are effectively disincenting viewers from the live experience (not that it’s not cool to get a sticker or a badge or something, but let’s face it, people are smarter than that – hence the general “meh” of most of the social TV offerings – sorry guys, but #come #on), other than for appointment TV programming.  Further, it has a certain prisoner’s dilemma aspect to it all, as no single network can make the bold move to pull recent content from the variety of catch-up/streaming services – oftentimes their own apps! From the discussions I’ve had with TV execs, there’s a lot of awareness and a growing concern, but no solutions in sight yet.   But, at least it’s the enemy we know…

NextGuide, now with Amazon and more awesomeness

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NextGuide, my personal favorite TV Guide app (that I built at the company I run), is now updated to include Amazon Prime and Amazon Instant Video alongside live TV, Hulu Plus, iTunes, and Netflix.  It’s really a great experience to browse all providers simultaneously and to search for shows and actually know where they are watchable. You can get the update here on the App Store.

That’s the “big” news (yes, adding a streaming provider with tens of thousands of hours of streamable shows and movies is a big deal IMHO), but we also took the time for a lot of across the board improvements to the app.  Here are some of the highlights:

>> New Gestures – two-finger swipe within showcards, pinch to hide, fullscreen media gallery, and more!

One of my favorite things about a great iPad experience is gestures. One of my favorite favorite things about any app is hidden features. While it’d be fun to document them everywhere, we’ve loaded up the NextGuide experience with many new gestures.  Explore around, let us know what you find and think of them!

>> Enhanced Cast & Crew with 1-click saved searches and Wikipedia biography lookups.

File this under “finally!”  When we shipped the 1.0 version, the cast and crew view just wasn’t that useful.  Now, go to the cast and crew tab for any movie or show, and tap on a person you are interested in.  Want to find more stuff from them?  Tap “add to interests.”

>> New Category Editor with easy drag & drop category setup

While we made removing/hiding categories really easy in the app, it’s always been a pain to add them. Now, push and hold on anywhere in the “Category Bar” to get a slick interface to add genres, custom genres, and trending topics.

>> Channel Setup now part of Initial Setup Wizard

The customer is always right, and lots of ours told us they didn’t like the fact they couldn’t customize their channel lineups until after launching the app.  Now you can.

>> Improved “Your Picks” algorithms

Let’s face it, recommending content is a very hard thing to get right. Our focus is to get beyond the baseline concept of “if you like this then you’ll like that.”  We’re constantly working to improve it, and I think our users will see a lot of progress in this department.

>> Lots of other little new features for you to explore throughout the app

Thanks again to every one of our users, even the 1-star reviews in the App Store – its the best way to learn, and learning is what we’re doing!

ps – sorry about not blogging much, just been working on, you know, everything you just read about.