Speaker: We don’t make the rules, we're just trying to play by them
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
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See also the "www" which appeared on the front of a URL because an organisation wanting to make a web presence would set up a dedicated server and name this www.gradgrind.com to go with mail.gradgrind.com and ftp.gradgrind.com.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
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An ad from the page you linked to..
That name Key just won't go away eh?.
Also retains healthy profits. -
Steve Barnes, in reply to
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Ah, yes, but...
The use of www is not required by any technical or policy standard and many web sites do not use it; indeed, the first ever web server was called nxoc01.cern.ch. According to Paolo Palazzi, who worked at CERN along with Tim Berners-Lee, the popular use of www as subdomain was accidental; the World Wide Web project page was intended to be published at www.cern.ch while info.cern.ch was intended to be the CERN home page, however the DNS records were never switched, and the practice of prepending www to an institution's website domain name was subsequently copied.
Berners-Lee, Tim. "Frequently asked questions by the Press". W3C. Retrieved 27 July 2009.
But we digress. ;-) -
Really the only way Lightbox et. al. can compete with Netflix US et. al. is to provide a better platform. That might include more local content. Or better presented and curated content. Or more convenient features in your apps (e.g. complete device transparency).
Add value and you'll get customers. Don't and you won't.
I appreciate that this is really hard right now for them - they need to get in the game now or risk missing out, but at the moment they're beholden to the old model of false exclusivity. I guess they have to make investment decisions as best they can based on their knowledge of that - if the false exclusivity isn't worth the money asked, then don't provide that content.
That taking legal action against something that is perfectly legal seems like a sure-fire way to never get my custom though.
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"Sky viewers rage as Game of Thrones' NZ simulcast fails"
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11431915Teensy weensy timely fail there, then.
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
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It's interesting how Netflix only filter by IP, rather than caring about where you 'were" when signing up, how you pay, etc. So, as that page indicates, if I access the service from NZ, I get the NZ content, but if I move (physically or virtually) to the US, I get US content.
That says to me that they, at least, don't really care very much about where their customers are.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
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Teensy weensy timely fail there, then.
Aye its a game of thorns, all right...
I can't help but feel that LightBox, Neon, etc are a bit like all those people rushing into setting up one hour photolabs - on the cusp of a major technology sea change...
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izogi, in reply to
“Sky viewers rage as Game of Thrones’ NZ simulcast fails”
Okay, I know I'm not totally with it and that Sky shouldn't be excused for messing up something which it's blatantly used to pull in lots of subscribers, but...
Sky viewers who stayed home today to watch the first episode of Game of Thrones' fifth season at the promised time of 1pm say
Do so many people really take GoT so seriously that they take time off work to watch it immediately on release? So much of the publicity and media coverage around the show seems to be as if there aren't a bunch of books already out there which more or less explain what's going to happen anyway.
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
Do so many people really take GoT so seriously that they take time off work to watch it immediately on release?
No different to taking the afternoon off to watch cricket
Or to play WoW on the day they release new content
Or to go to your child’s first soccer game
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
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I think that for those three events, they can only be done at the scheduled time. The telly is the same if you watch it now, tonight, next week or five years in the future.
(If you wait five years, it has the advantage that the hype is gone and you can make a reasoned decision to stop wasting your time after 10 minutes).
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
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These guys whole SOP -
1. don't understand a new area of business
2. set up a flawed operation
3. get the government to bail us out
4. profit!Remember Telecom T3G?
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BenWilson, in reply to
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I think that for those three events, they can only be done at the scheduled time.
No, only the soccer game has a fixed time. You can time shift the cricket, and you can definitely wait until the evening for the new WoW content. But you might not want to if you're a big fan.
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izogi, in reply to
I'll take that as a Yes. Fair enough and I withdraw what might have appeared to be judgement of anyone.
I think I'm just thrown by how massive the marketing is, including how it's managed to infiltrate MSM to the extent that it's an event to find out something which could be easily looked up anyway. Okay then. :)
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bob daktari, in reply to
So much of the publicity and media coverage around the show seems to be as if there aren’t a bunch of books already out there which more or less explain what’s going to happen anyway.
the marketing of being able to watch a show the same time it airs in the US (home country) is pretty much 98% of services like sky, neon, lightbox et al's marketing - its the don't wait to pirate it tactic - not everyone takes time off to watch as not everyone works a 9-5, its also the school holidays... blah blah blah. Its also one of the big TV events of the year
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BenWilson, in reply to
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Well, the scripts aren't going to be identical to the books. The buzz isn't so much about what's going to happen as about how it will be portrayed. Also, people do actually like surprises. I don't want any spoilers until I've watched it tonight. So I'll probably avoid Twitter until then.
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
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I assumed you meant taking the afternoon off to physically go to the ground and watch?
And I assumed that with online multi-player games there was some advantage in being among the first in?
But then, I don't do sport (other than my annual ski trip), I don't watch telly and I don't do games.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
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1. don’t understand a new area of business
2. set up a flawed operation
3. get the government to bail us out
4. profit!Remember Telecom T3G
and Novopay...
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BenWilson, in reply to
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I assumed you meant taking the afternoon off to physically go to the ground and watch?
Some people do that, but I'd say a heck of a lot more do it using the TV, which doesn't require being in the same town as the ground. However, I bet time shifting cricket isn't that popular.
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One of the issues that bothers me greatly is that by taking action against global mode as a whole, Lightbox et al. are trying to protect its NZ exclusive content by preventing me from accessing content to which it does not have an exclusive license, or any license now or in the likely future.
A business built on exclusivity may well work where it makes the difference between having the product available or not available at all. But when it requires the removal of existing availability in order to become exclusive, then that is hostile to the very people you want to be your customers, and rightly doomed to fail.
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
I assumed you meant taking the afternoon off to physically go to the ground and watch?
And I assumed that with online multi-player games there was some advantage in being among the first in?
But then, I don’t do sport (other than my annual ski trip), I don’t watch telly and I don’t do games.
Far be it from me to stop you judging others, that's perfectly acceptable :).
As for the cricket, I went home to specifically watch it on TV, all by myself. Weird yes but I wanted to. I could have gone to Eden Park but I enjoy ODIs more on TV but "live".
As for WoW, actually the reverse, at the time of release the game is usually buggy and the servers so overloaded the experience is less than optimal - but somehow weirdly fun.
I threw in the soccer game because it was what "normal people" do :)
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BenWilson, in reply to
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Weird yes but I wanted to.
Not that weird :-). I don't cricket much, but getting in the World Cup final is the kind of thing I might put a riveting afternoon at the office down for.
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SteveH, in reply to
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That says to me that they, at least, don’t really care very much about where their customers are.
Why would they? As with any unencumbered business they're happy to sell to anyone. The only reason they even do geoblocking is because the content owners force them to. But they're also big enough that they can get away with a token effort and the content owners don't press the issue.
Which gets back to the point Bill made: the issue here is that the content owners are not providing Lightbox the exclusivity they promised, but Lightbox are unable or unwilling to try to enforce the contact they signed. Instead Lightbox et al are attacking a softer local target and that looks very much like an attack on the consumer. It's telling that Kym wrote 1400 words defending their action and yet failed to address this point.
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Sacha, in reply to
the issue here is that the content owners are not providing Lightbox the exclusivity they promised, but Lightbox are unable or unwilling to try to enforce the contact they signed
Whereas you'll find the Lightbox CEO agreeing with us in her Media Take appearance, so the message has obviously got in today. Bravo.
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So... the international CEO of a major NZ corporate - who has been saying their piece in multiple outlets - needs a little help to provide clarification on why they are looking at removing consumer choice with the attempt to enforce their IP rights. Throw in commentary about the amount invested (ad nauseum), some vain attempts to instil nationalistic pride, ignorance to the amount NZrs are forced to invest in 'content' - NZ on air is not free money, its my money.
Take for note.
Lightbox is not a new media. Lightbox is the child of a NZ monopoly. A monopoly that has abused NZ citizens for many years. A monopoly that has stripped profit out of NZ for years. A monopoly who is now attempting to set foot in a new area, and expecting NZrs to continue to pay hand over fist. A monopoly that has few friends. A monopoly that has driven many consumers away. If somehow the courts decide that this activity falls foul of the copyright act (which it shouldnt). if the courts somehow state that it is currently not legal for callplus to provide a simple VPN to its clients, then you will not gain new customers. Telecoms ship has sailed.
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oga,
I hardly need to say that as a disabled customer there is no streaming TV service in NZ that provides captions with its content, thereby driving me to source content that does, i.e., Hulu, Netflix (US), or torrents + srt files. I have the greatest ease with the latter and if I like what I watch I later buy the Bluray set to give my money to the content creators. It's a delayed reward mechanism that works. I watch what I want, when I want, without being subjected to the (poor) decisions made by content distributors or schedulers.
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