See It At The Same Time As The US
I picked up the same point that Mark Jones did: that commercial television in Australia is concerned with online video. They’re so concerned that they’re now showing some of the popular series (Jericho and The OC) within only a few days of the US, and claiming you can “See it at the same time as the US!” Up until recently some shows would be broadcasts, months or years, after US release.
Jericho is an interesting pick, but The OC makes complete sense given it’s appeal to Generation Y.
Mark makes the point that this wouldn’t be happening if there was no commercial driver, “the loss of audience attention to the internet.”
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:57 pm
I think that this is going the same way as major music and film releases.
music labels and films companies have this fear that if music from one particular artist or a particular film is released on one day in the US, for example, and on another date in other countries, then the opportunity for them to:
. sell CDs
. sell film tix
. sell DVDs
. sell related merchandise
reduces significantly because the kids find out about it and then use BitTorrent or some other P2P site to download the music or film for nix.
there is actual examples of how this so untrue, and they were bought to light in the Kazaa vs the Music world case last year. I’ll find it soon, and send it you.
essentially, the guy fighting for kazaa used to work for the recording industry. he had worked out that the over the years, the amount of that the industry was earning over the years had reduced since the inception of the internet. however, the amount of money that was also being spent on promoting artists and finding new artists had also reduced significantly.
so, if the industry had spent more money on promoting and fostering new talent, they would make money.
overall, over the past 20 years, the same profit to investment ratio has remained the same; albeit production costs have decreased and the internet was introduced. kids don’t need to sit by the TV with a tape recorded trying to tape from Countdown on a Sunday nite.
in TV land, the same thing has happened.
now they’re trying to plug the gap with this - ‘let’s change the timeslots’
so we now end up with all of this mindless reality tv sh!t that noone downloads being served at the same time globally.
people who have foxtel will be able to tell you that there TV watching habits have changed significantly since being able to watch TV on demand. they are not bound by the schedule anymore. regardless of whether it is being served in the US at the same time.
just because people are being served the shows at the same globally is not going to stop the downloads or interfere with their audience capture.
if the execs just decided to make quality TV and more of it (almost like an oxymoron really!), then they may not have this issue. there just may be more of a compelling issue to watch more tv (and still download a little :) )
really, how many more pop idols or big brothers does the world have to suffer?
November 4th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
Hi Jason
You might have seen this, or be in fact refering to it, but Alex Malik had some fantastic research last year. Here’s my entry from my Gadget Lounge blog:
There is a growing trend for major music labels, and their industry counterparts, to point the finger of declining sales at peer-to-peer file swapping. Over the last few years, the Recording Industry Association of America has been very vocal about the damage they claim the technology is causing. Now the Australian Record Industry Association (ARIA) is jumping on the same bandwagon.
In their Australian Record Sales - 2004 Full Year Results, they point out that CD Albums declined by 4.75% in volume and 5.52% in value. They go on to say that the “CD singles market experienced a slight decline of 1.89% by volume, though the larger decline in value of 6.45%”. All up “wholesale recorded music sales (including albums, singles and DVDs) were down almost 4% by volume to 63.1 million units and the overall value fell by 6% to $607 million”. Which as an industry is something to be concerned about, especially when this is the second year in a row for a decline in sales of CD singles.
So what do they attribute to this decline. Bad management? Crap music? Lack of innovation? No. In fact they point to three main reasons for the decline. Firstly, competition from “digital music carriers” like the iPod, and non-music DVDs, and not only the dollars they consume, but retail rack space. Secondly, competition in general from the retail environment, where all forms of consumables are now competing for the buyers dollar. Finally, broadband. Yes, that good old subversive medium, where all things evil occur. Or as they put it, “which more easily enables the illegal downloading of music”. Admittedly, they do see this as a potential boon, suggesting that when the Australian online music market gets its act together they’ll see growth like the rest of the world, but it’s interesting to see them pick that as one of the three reasons for decline.
What they neglect to point out is the major decrease in choice they’ve provided to the Australian music consumer. Fortunately, we’ve got some very clued in researchers, just like Alex Malik. Malik is conducting research at the University of Technology, Sydney, toward his PHD, and being a former ARIA in house lawyer, happens to know the market well. His research, which uses ARIA’s own data, points out that the major labels have released 39% less albums and 42% less singles for the year when compared to 2003. No wonder sales have decreased.
Even more concerning is the reports suggestion that the majors are investing less in developing new artists as well as releasing and marketing less Aussie music. Thank God for indie music scene though, who doubled their album releases last year.
The point is, that while pointing the finger at broadband and suggesting that the decline in sales is due in part to illegal downloading of music, they should consider that it’s the lack of choice that is the root of the problem. I’d say that a 6% decline is a fabulous result for a 42% reduction in choice. It seems almost unfair, because you’d certainly expect a much greater decline in sales. It also seems, with numbers like that, that major labels have made a concerted effort to contract the market.
In fact, with numbers like that, thank God we’ve got digital music carriers, broadband, and the indie scene, because otherwise music may already be dead.
November 4th, 2006 at 9:27 pm
and with a response like that, I don’t even need to do any digging around - you got the guy who I was referring to and the info that I was referring to.
that’s why you be the man!
mark twain said it best a long time: “there’s three types of lies in this world - lies, damned lies and statistics”.
the statistics will come back to haunt the music industry in the not too distant future.
November 8th, 2006 at 8:48 am
These days there’s another element to TV shows, their online websites, associated forums and just general discussion with folks from overseas.
I’m sure every Aussie has had a moment online when they either mentioned they liked Show X or visited their website, only to see show spoilers which ruin the show.
There’s no need for other countries to be so far behind the US and it really limits the abilities of the shows to thrive.
I have bought a music CD that was out for 4 years in the US before it came to Australia, which is just plain bullshit. This is just cartel behaviour, plain and simple and I’m not playing that game.
I’m not buying any more media from major labels or production studios until they get their act together. I don’t download illegal stuff, I just get the real free stuff online instead. The quality is so high, they’d better not wait too long to get their act together, I might not want their stuff anymore by then.