Letters to the Editor
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When short term memory loss collides with pathalogical naivete.......
you get people, including journalists - maybe especially journalists - endlessly running around expressing shock and surprise at the same endless parade of greed and corruption.
From Bush's insane lawlessness, to his ridiculously corrupt administration, to a Republican Party that can't get all the way in or out of the closet, to a corporate culture gone mad with greed, they never fail to act shocked by each new revelation as if it is happening for the first time.
Of course they're acting like greedy pigs, what in their previous behavior would indicate any other course of action from them?
Why is anyone still surprised?
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Not just you
@ Amie
No, you certainly aren't alone in no longer buying CDs (or downloading them, either). I believe the last CD I bought was several years ago and overseas, because I knew I'd never hear those songs on US radio. Now, I'm in a metro area with lots of good radio choices, especially public radio, so I don't even have to worry about silly auto dealer ads. Works for me!
I imagine it will be much the same for me next year when they kill analog TV. I just can't be motivated to replace my perfectly functional, albeit old, TV on FCC's say-so. Especially when it means TV will then be DRM'd up the wazoo.
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Screw NBC ( and screw Apple,really,really really hard.Really)
As I've made abundantly clear before,I despise Apple and all it's products.I also can't think of any NBC programs I'd download for any reason.However,should I wish to view one,I'd simply visit one of the many torrent download sites,and wham,bam,thank you ma'am.And have absolutely NO
crisis of conscience in doing so.Look,these bastards make BILLIONS of dollars through advertising,etc.,so these shows are paid for a gazillion times over.If anyone is unaware of how to do this,I'd be more than happy to explain the joys of piracy and how simple it is to watch anything you like.
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Who's telling the truth?
As a long-time Apple user, I have one comment: Don't believe an Apple announcement. The truth lies somewhere in the middle of NBC's and Apple's posturing.
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What the market will bear...
I can't think of any shows on NBC that I would pay $5 to download--I don't even watch their channel for free most times.
And I've also parted ways with Apple, whose prices are a little steep considering its market share. I have a nano, but I recently purchased a Zune mainly because of its superior video quality (no I'm not affiliated with either company or ever have been).
I've always loved Apple products but I feel the corporation has gotten way too pricey across the board.
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Mr Wolf, you're wrong
>>Look,these bastards make BILLIONS of dollars through advertising,etc.,so these shows are paid for a gazillion times over.If anyone is unaware of how to do this,I'd be more than happy to explain the joys of piracy and how simple it is to watch anything you like.<<
No matter how much money you fantasize content producers earn from advertising, this does not give you the moral right to steal anything. It is just a cheap rationalization for you to justify your immoral behavior.
The fact that you don't feel any moral qualms about stealing content says more about you than it does about anything else.
And if you think content companies are making obscene profits, all you have to do is look at their stock prices to get a dose of reality.
Content companies use profits from hit shows to finance next year's shows. The hits pay for the shows that aren't hits.
But I am sure all this subtlety escapes you.
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An Open Email to NBC Universal
http://www.stonethembas.com/files/4cdab97f953ea73bd91f17fae27205af-148.html
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Useless useless useless
$1.99 a show from Apple? That kind of pricing would make even me, an avid torrenter, seriously stop and think about just getting the show from iTunes and save me the hassle of waiting for it to show up on the torrent sites.
That's if I even used iTunes. But for $5? Are you crazy?
Then it's back to torrenting. I don't HAVE to watch any show the very day it comes out. I can hold out another few days to a week for the next cycle of America's Next Top Model and just watch it, and SANS commercials to boot.
They make it this hard and/or expensive for us to watch the stuff we want, well then we'll just find another way to see it for free.
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NBC Went Mad A Decade Ago
When they cancelled Homicide: Life In The Streets.
And you're just noticing now?
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Arguing with anonymous
You can't argue from the general to the specific like that. Yes, a Wal-mart-like near-monopoly drives the smaller competetition out of the market with its low prices, but just because that's generally true of a monopoly doesn't mean it's true in every case. In this case it's plainly not true, because Apple has had no small competetitors to drive out of business.
You say "It's very hard for any company to start up and compete with Apple's low prices for music and video," but how do you know? Given the lack of competition we don't know whether these prices are actually low or not, and it may well be that $1.99 for a TV show (or $9.99 for an album) is not a low price at all. Is there any evidence that potential competitors are being kept out of the market because these selling prices are unprofitable? Why should we believe that Apple is using its iTunes sales as a loss leader, when there's virtually no other seller to drive away and they could so easily be making a good profit?
Sure, companies should be free to experiment with different pricing models, but so should retailers be free to refuse to sell goods at abnormally high prices demanded by the suppliers--which in this case is about 250% of the price of other networks' shows. I mean, come on.
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Thank you for your insights, Mr. Wolf.
I'm glad you brought your thoughtful critique of the situation to this discussion. It's about as well-reasoned and mature as your other post concerning Apple:
http://letters.salon.com/tech/machinist/blog/2007/06/21/iphone_hype/permalink/354298e3f487d6145a2fe3ad411ff674.html
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How much does NBC make
Danny Sleator asked how much NBC might make from a regular viewer.
For an over the air program, a CPM (cost per thousand views) of $ 20 US per commerical is pretty good - some premium times (Superbowl, Olympics) will make more, others less. With 14 commercial minutes per hour, and typically 30 second commercials, they might sell 20 commercials (the other slots going to time for their affiliates, and for promoting other shows). So, per viewer per 1-hour show, that would be $ 20 x 20 / 1000 or $ 0.40 (40 cents).
So, I would expect that they make something under a US Dollar, and maybe well under a US Dollar, from each viewer of each show.