Personalized TV

http://www.forbes.com/2009/05/07/zilliontv-video-broadband-technology-enterprise-tech-zilliontv.html

This article goes in depth into the ideas of what consumers really want out of their televisions today. Specifically, the idea of personalization and being able to watch whatever programming one wants whenever they want to. The interview with Mitch Berman explains the battle between PC and TV in terms of people being able to watch their favorite video programs. Video-on-Demand services appear to be the most popular medium for people to get these programs. While PCs offer this service virtually for free, there's still an issue of convienence.

Berman brings up the idea of an officer worker who sits in front of a computer screen all day and then coming home to look at another computer screen to get his video content. Chances are, according to him, this isn't going to be the case, and that worker will want to sit in front of a television screen. However, being able to have the same level of choice as they would on the PC is equally as important to the consumer. Mitch Berman's ZillionTV is just a stepping stone in the direction of giving the consumer so much personalization options that they can even control what ads they see.



This has huge implications for the future of broadcast television. If consumers decide that they want to be able to choose when they watch programs and don't want to be constricted to time slots, it could hurt everyone. As mentioned in the article, broadcast television may become more ad-heavy because of their need to sell ad-space at lower costs. Programming could also be hurt because of their high budgets and no one watching them as they premiere, meaning no show-specific advertisement revenue. Subscription television providers like Comcast and Dish Network could lose profits because, while they do offer some VoD service, it's not on the scale that say, ZillionTV is promising.

The article also brings up the concept of the new Vizio TVs, which offer internet access built in to them. As long as these services and provide streaming video up to 3 megabits/second as described on page 333 of the book, then these kinds of VoD services could prove to be much more reasonable to the consumer who might like the idea of a pay-to-play service rather than a subscription for hundreds of channels, many of which they'll never watch.

Localism: A Threat to Radio?

http://insidecatholic.com/Joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5318&Itemid=48

Though this article is from the perspective of a biased organization looking after it's own constituencies, it brings up an interesting point about the idea of localism, a regulation by the FCC similar to the Fairness Doctrine. Localism means that, in this case, a radio station must provide some sort of service to its community and that service must be in the best interest of said community.

This is an extremely important issue because of the impact it has on the freedom a certain radio station, and by extension television station, has to broadcast what they want. Whereas the Fairness Doctrine mostly relates to political campaigning and commentary, localism regulations essentially act as a means for the government, by way of the FCC, to determine what kind of programming is "in the best interest of the community." While the idea in and of itself isn't necessarily a bad one, as it has existed for many years and has benefits as mentioned on Page 32 of our book, it may still be possible for government to abuse this kind of regulation.

The article brings up the idea that Catholic radio stations may, under the encouragement of the Obama Administration, be issued fines or have their licenses revoked if the government determines that the radio stations aren't catering to the needs of minority groups in their community for instance. But then, who's to say that a local sports station or talk radio station wouldn't also be under review by the government if they don't meet their standards of the FCC for providing "services" to the community?

Entertainment stations can be in just as much danger as say, religious ones because it brings into question what actual services they are providing to their community. The services these stations provide as well as the extent of what these services are really are based around the opinions of those in government and not necessarily those of the community itself. There's no telling what standards the government is going off of or if they are reflective of the community at large or just the current political party. Regulations such as these require much greater definition and not vague wording which could lead to trouble for the future of radio.