Live Internet Television

Robert is back in Hell’s Kitchen…and I caught a really good freezeframe while rewinding to catch up. Had to share:

“In the digital realm you can try to keep Free at bay,” Chris Anderson writes, “but eventually the force of economic gravity will win."

Don’t miss the New Yorker article about why the free-to-consumer model for content seems inevitable. In the tradition of the New Yorker, it’s long but a very worthwhile read.

Some excerpts:

The cost of the building blocks of all electronic activity—storage, processing, and bandwidth—has fallen so far that it is now approaching zero. In 1961, Anderson says, a single transistor was ten dollars. In 1963, it was five dollars. By 1968, it was one dollar. Today, Intel will sell you two billion transistors for eleven hundred dollars—meaning that the cost of a single transistor is now about .000055 cents.

…

[An experiment conducted by an M.I.T. behavioral economist] offered a group of subjects a choice between two kinds of chocolate—Hershey’s Kisses, for one cent, and Lindt truffles, for fifteen cents. Three-quarters of the subjects chose the truffles. Then he redid the experiment, reducing the price of both chocolates by one cent. The Kisses were now free. What happened? The order of preference was reversed. Sixty-nine per cent of the subjects chose the Kisses. The price difference between the two chocolates was exactly the same, but that magic word “free” has the power to create a consumer stampede.

Like I said, read the whole article, it’s full of  interesting points.

I didn’t read the first part of The Wrap’s reality-TV series dealing with contestant suicides, having a tempered interest in the meaning  behind rare occurrences. But I was fascinated with the second part: Win or Lose, Reality Show Competitors Often End Up With Severe Problems.

I appreciate their thoughtful piece and have excerpted pieces below.

People don’t have any idea what it’s going to feel like to have so much of their life exposed to the camera, said [Dr. Michelle Callahan] …”Your persona on the show extends back to your real life. “If you’re on ‘The Biggest Loser’ and the show ends and you’re driving down the street and you stop at Popeye’s, people are gonna say, ‘Hey, you still look fat.’ Your weight issue has become public.”

“We live in an age of disposable people,” [Dr. Jamie Huysman] told TheWrap. “The producers don’t care about the players, they care about the sponsors who want eyeballs, confrontations, meltdowns … That’s why the highest-rated shows are the ones where people get crushed emotionally.

No one tells these people it all will be edited, not just to shorten the running time but to manipulate character development. Character defects may be exaggerated simply by editing down their good qualities.” Some contestants end up being the good guy; others end up as the villains.

“Just like a dramatic series, the producers decide before taping who will wear the white hat and whom the black. The problem is, we all are made up of good and not so good qualities and the contestants don’t get to choose which qualities they want displayed to the audience.”

I am an enthusiastic fan of quite a few reality series.

I love Project Runway, Chopped, Top Chef, Top Design, The Restaurant, Kitchen Nightmares, Hell’s Kitchen, Iron Chef and I have a place in my heart for such fare as Millionaire Matchmaker, Real Housewives of [XYZ], the Bachelor series (did I have to admit that?!), The Cougar, The Hills (minus Speidi), and The Pickup Artist (for sarcastic, gawking reasons, I swear!), The Stagers.

Because of that, I’m going to take a few minutes today to think about how I “consume” reality show contestants, and recommit to nonjudgment of the  people behind the characters the producers create. Besides the contestants, I’d argue the viewers can develop a kind of PTSD of their own: Are we being encouraged to become judgmental, mean jerks who thrill at the sight of bad behavior?

I’m not sure anyone wins when we oversimplify people into cardboard cutouts. I’m not winning if I am training myself to see everyone in 2 dimensions, and I know what happens onscreen has offscreen implications for me as well as the contestants.

After all, with dramatic series, movies, and novels, complexity of motive and character is what draws us in every bit as much as the recognizable character traits. Balancing our love of spectacle with compassion and empathy is a better idea than demonizing someone who doesn’t exist.

Case in point:

Jade Goody, a 21-year-old dental nurse from London who died from cancer earlier this year, was dubbed “the most hated woman in the United Kingdom” during her 2002 “Big Brother” stint and was routinely called out for being bitchy, two-faced and fat.

A newspaper columnist wrote, “Jade is one of the most hated women on British TV and life will be hard for her when she leaves the house but don’t feel sorry for her … vote the pig out.”

And she wasn’t the only one to be targeted: A 15-year-old who had the misfortune to look something like Jade was beaten up after being mistaken for the contestant.

More good reading, fodder for thought:

WKU Herald: COMMENTARY: Reality TV has real problems
The Atlantic: What the snobs don’t understand: The Case for Reality TV

In a serious mood, ready to entertain some heavier concepts?

Ethics & Reality TV: Should We Really Watch?

In an interesting twist, Hulu is experimenting with the approach initially taken and abandoned by Joost, almost as if the companies think the grass is greener on the other side.

When Joost started it was a downloadable, full-screen only, archived TV viewing application with limited content.

VCs came in, scrapped the downloadable application and went with a flash-based web player instead, echoing Hulu.

After launching its Flash-based website with a large menu of archived content, Hulu has since curtailed its plans to distribute with Boxee, and has now created a downloadable, full-screen only, archived TV viewing application.

Hulu’s best decision was to keep its meat-and-potatoes website offering, since the bulk of its viewership originates from its webpage.  Hulu’s downloadable player doesn’t offer users any advantages over its Flash-based player, in either content or functionality.  From a functionality standpoint, Hulu’s player contains the same design flaws as the Joost original.

ivi’s approach to the market is different, and we have a clear point of view about what Internet TV is and can be.

The ivi experience begins with the understanding that websites simply aren’t good live TV delivery mechanisms.  They’re great for relevant video clip delivery and archived video, as websites are easily organized thematically and are searchable.

Live TV, and alpha-state TV viewing, requires channel changing, and most importantly continuously-streamed content. ivi delivers the living room TV experience in a downloadable, stand-alone player.  Unlike the cumbersome “full-screen only” players designed by Hulu and Joost, the ivi player allows multi-tasking, because it can operate in easily customizable window sizes.  Television is coming to every Internet-connected device —  It will be powered by ivi.

With the proliferation of Adobe Flash-based sites streaming live content, including Hulu’s announcement that it is live-streaming a Dave Matthews concert and other the event-streaming done by IBM (US Open) and Microsoft (Beijing Olympics), it’s an exciting time.

Cable and satellite don’t have to fear Internet content cannibalization … yet.  There are still hurdles that have to be overcome before people will entirely abandon their cable or satellite service.  The user experience and bandwidth costs are primary among them.

At ivi we call the traditional TV user experience “alpha-state viewing.”  Users turn on their television and watch whatever is on.  We estimate that traditional television is 90-percent alpha-state viewing.  Interactive viewing and event-based viewing make up the remaining percentage.  Internet television has made strides towards increasing the user experience in interactive and event-based viewing.  However, Internet television has not yet replicated the traditional television experience of: “Let’s see what’s
on!”

Additionally, until the Internet’s transactional delivery model can be turned into a broadcast delivery model, the cost of delivering large scale, broad-appeal video is going to be both cost and bandwidth prohibitive.  The user experience is the ultimate leg up for cable and satellite providers.  Until somebody creates an “alpha-state viewing” experience for Internet TV, users won’t depart cable and satellite in the high volume contemplated in articles like this.

ivi TV was designed to overcome these hurdles. Live Internet TV will be a reality soon.