How big is the streaming pie?
By Steven Kim 
posted Feb 29th 2008 8:35PM
posted Feb 29th 2008 8:35PM
With the WGA strike seeming like a distant memory (two weeks old), it's a good time to examine what the fight was over online streaming. The resulting agreement grants residuals to the writers for content streamed more than 17-days after the on-air showing, and first year shows get treated to a 24-day window. Those are some pretty favorable terms for the studios, if you ask us. Real-life analysts seem to agree, estimating that online video ad spending will swell from $1.3 billion in 2006 to $7 billion by 2012. Those online ads are prime real estate, too -- "brand recall" from them is way above that seen for broadcast TV. If "brand recall" figures like 60-percent for online video ads versus single-digits for conventional TV hold up, expect to see another WGA uprising in the future. Until then, keep these figures in mind when TV studios decry internet video as a deathknell.[Image courtesy Today's Real Estate]
Harlan Ellison had some choice words for the decision and now I finally know why he was against it. That's a raw deal. 17 days? 24 days? Seriously? Terrible...
http://unitedhollywood.blogspot.com/2008/02/harlan-ellison-reacts-to-proposed-wga.html
Nice find -- thanks. Just made my day!
Personally, streaming is irrelevent to me. (I don't even watch the cr*p on YouTube.) I never bother with streaming TV episodes mostly because I have a PVR that allows me to save and watch anything I want any time I want it and I am not subjected to unskipable ads and the whims of some faceless suit who decides what will be streamed and what will disappear forever.
For permanent storage, I want the physical media. I don't trust that the movies or episodes that I might want to revisit will still be there when I want them. If they are on my shelf, I am in control.