Network end users to pull down 2 gigabytes a day, continuously?

Mon Jan 8 22:15:54 UTC 2007

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-nanog at merit.edu [mailto:owner-nanog at merit.edu] On 
> Behalf Of Gian Constantine
> Sent: Sunday, January 07, 2007 7:18 PM
> To: nanog at merit.edu
> Subject: Re: Network end users to pull down 2 gigabytes a 
> day, continuously?
> 
<snip>
> In entertainment, content is king. More specifically, new 
> release content is king. While internet distribution may help 
> breathe life into the long tail market, it is hard to imagine 
> any major shift from existing distribution methods. People 
> simply like the latest TV shows and the latest movies.

What's new to you is very different from what's new to me?

I am very happy watching 1 year old episodes of Top Gear whereas
if you are located in the UK, you may consider this as old news.

The story here is about the cost of storing the video content (which
is asymptotically zero) and the cost of distributing it (which is also
asymptotically
approaching zero, despite the ire of the SPs).

> So, this leaves us with little more than what is already 
> offered by the MSOs: linear TV and VoD. This is where things 
> become complex.
> 
> The studios will never (not any time soon) allow for a 
> subscription based VoD on new content. They would instantly 
> be sued by Time Warner (HBO). 

This is a very US-centric view of the world. I am sure there are
hundreds of
TV stations from India, Turkey, Greece, etc that would love to put their
content
online and make money off the long tail.

> I guess where I am going with all this is simply it is very 
> hard to make this work from a business and marketing side. 
> The network constraints are, likely, a minor issue for some 
> time to come. Interest is low in the public at large for 
> primary (or even major secondary) video service on the PC.
> 

Again, your views are very US centric, and are mono-cultural.

If you open your horizons, I think there is a world of content out there
that the content owners would be happy to license and sell at < 10 cents
a pop.
To them it is dead content, but it turns out that they are worth
something to someone out there.
This is what iTunes, and Rhapsody are doing with music. And the day of
the video is coming.

Bora

-- Off to raise some venture funds now. (Just kidding ;)