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 espaethDigital PlumberPremium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN
kudos:2
 ·Clear Wireless
| reply to Lazlow
Re: And why should they lose money so video providers get rich ? said by Lazlow:"The overwhelming majority of our TV viewing today" I think that is radically changing. I think the perception of people on this site is radically changing, but I don't think the habits of the average TV viewer is really changing all that much. The population at large is slow to adopt digital delivery.
Take digital music; you can't watch anything on TV without seeing an ipod commercial now. Retailers like Target are stocking all kinds of mp3 players, some for as low as $20. Despite the fact that digital delivery is everywhere for music content (including iTunes for the multitude of ipod owners), 85% of music sales in the US is still in the form of physical compact discs. Source: »online.wsj.com/public/article/SB···526.html
There also hasn't been a recorded major shift in online video consumption according to statistics from ComScore published in September. This report shows:
* 75 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience viewed online video.
* The average online video viewer watched 235 minutes of video.
* 91 million viewers watched 5 billion videos on YouTube.com (54.8 videos per viewer).
* 51.4 million viewers watched 400 million videos on MySpace.com (7.8 videos per viewer).
* The duration of the average online video was 2.9 minutes.
So while the average online user is watching just over 4 hours of video per month, the average traditional television viewer is watching approximately 5 hours per day according to Nielson Media Research. Also, watching a bunch of short (2.9 min average) clips isn't even remotely close to TV viewing habits.
If you read the opinions on this site it sounds like everybody is getting Roku boxes or downloading movies on their Xbox360/PS3 or watching hours upon hours of Hulu. People love to argue that changes in broadband usage policies aren't about infrastructure limits and are simply a way for broadband providers to limit video competition. The problem with this argument is, the stats show that "competition" is barely a rounding error in relation to their core video viewership.
said by Lazlow:Spending $100 on HSI(say 5 meg) without cap is going to(if it is not already) suit many peoples lifestyle much better than spending $45 on HSI(capped) and $55 on cable (whatever the actual numbers are) and having to watch only when something is being shown. I agree the economics could maybe play out on this, but the problems of delivery and the amount of work required to make this happen would need to be solved. Right now I set my Dish DVR to record shows I want to watch (including local news / local sports), and I can watch them with a click of a remote anytime in 1080i on a nice 58" screen from the comfort of my couch. In the past I've had to track down shows that didn't get recorded (due to storms or power outages) from the net, get them converted into something I could stream to my PS3, and watch them that way -- but that's a lot of work. Unless an online delivered solution offers the same quality and convenience of existing DVR/traditional delivery options, it's not going to catch on en-mass as a replacement for standard TV consumption. | |
Lazlow
join:2006-08-07
Saint Louis, MO | Espaeth
On the digital music front; I think people are still concerned that they will either have to store (long term) it locally or risk the initial provider no longer providing access(which I recall happened earlier this year). So a lot of people bite the bullet and buy the CD, and then rip it to their mp3 player. There is also the issue of most mp3 providers not using a high enough bit rate.
As to the current video consumption; I think you missed the point. Compare all those numbers you provided (for online consumption) to what they were two years ago. Now project that rate of growth forward two years. I think the cable companies have and that is why this change (caps).
The fact that you use a DVR and a PS3 just proves how close you already are. The difference between running a DVR hooked to your big screen and a PC hooked to your big screen is a very small jump. Once you have the PC tied directly to the TV them the format issues drop out of the equation. Most popular (and a lot of not so popular) TV shows are currently available online in Xvid format that is somewhere between 480i and 720p in quality (roughly 350meg per one hour episode). A lot of content is/has been available in 720p(roughly 1.2gig per one hour episode). In the last six months even 1080p(not i) has begun to show up for some media. Personally, while I can tell the difference(on a 40 inch screen) between the typical Xvid format and the 720p stuff, it is not significant enough (for a TV show) to warrant the 3-4 times increase in file size. | |
espaethDigital PlumberPremium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Clear Wireless
| said by Lazlow:As to the current video consumption; I think you missed the point. Compare all those numbers you provided (for online consumption) to what they were two years ago. Now project that rate of growth forward two years. I think the cable companies have and that is why this change (caps). 63 million unique viewers for YouTube in 2006.Source: »www.comscore.com/press/release.a···ess=1023
91 million uniques in September -- it hasn't even doubled.
said by Lazlow:The fact that you use a DVR and a PS3 just proves how close you already are. The difference between running a DVR hooked to your big screen and a PC hooked to your big screen is a very small jump. It's easy to think of it as a small jump, you're just replacing one box with a video output with another, right? The problem is, the UI for PC video sucks from a couch viewing standpoint. The only widely available commercial remotes are for Microsoft Media Center, you have to fight video card driver issues and ensure that you get a video card that not only supports HD copy protection over HDMI but also does hardware VC1/H264 decoding so it can keep up with 1080p output. Even then, you still need to jerk around with overscan settings to scale the picture to fit your TV because video cards are designed for computer monitors, not the LCD / Plasma displays that you pick up at an electronics retailer. The existing BluRay / HD-DVD software options absolutely blow, be it PowerDVD, Nero Showtime, or WinDVD. There's also the issue that most PCs are damn ugly in the scope of an entertainment center unless you spend a lot of cash for a really nice media center case. You also have the noise factor of the PC unless, again, you spend a lot of cash building a quiet system.
said by Lazlow:Most popular (and a lot of not so popular) TV shows are currently available online in Xvid format that is somewhere between 480i and 720p in quality (roughly 350meg per one hour episode). A lot of content is/has been available in 720p(roughly 1.2gig per one hour episode). In the last six months even 1080p(not i) has begun to show up for some media. Personally, while I can tell the difference(on a 40 inch screen) between the typical Xvid format and the 720p stuff, it is not significant enough (for a TV show) to warrant the 3-4 times increase in file size. That's the thing... I plunked down the cash for a 58" to watch stuff in HD. While there's a lot of content available in highly compressed xvid, or 720p mkv containers, why would I go through all the effort to track down that content when it doesn't look nearly as good as the 1080i feeds I capture I my Dish DVR via the OTA input? I highlighted each show I wanted to watch when I got it, told it to record all new episodes, and it has faithfully done just that for a couple years now. Online video isn't even close to getting to this point yet. | |
Lazlow
join:2006-08-07
Saint Louis, MO | Utube
2006: " In July 2006, YouTube served nearly 3 billion video streams worldwide, "
2008: "# 91 million viewers watched 5 billion videos on YouTube.com (54.8 videos per viewer)."
Not quite doubled in two years, and that is just utube. Was Hulu, etc around in 2006?
I guess I use MythTV, a usb remote, and HDMI(1920×1080) output from the PC(no overscan). I put together a very small PC with a 45wattX2 and gigE. My dvd player makes more noise starting up than the PC. Cost me less than $400 and I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. All storage is done on my house server in the basement. I run Linux so the video card copyright thing is not an issue. You do have a point that I do not currently know of a service that you can get a seasons worth of content in a one click solution. Blueray is just beyond my budget at this point, so I do not have a player. Take a look at the compression rate of your DVR(yes it does compress too) and compare it to the 5gig/episode available(again I have no idea how these two compare). Personally I have a hard time justifying watching House in Blueray(or even 720p, 1.2gig) vs Xvid(350meg/episode). Now Jeremiah Johnson (or something similar) I could see the point. | | |
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