| Missing the point... Many of the posters here seem to be missing the point.
This isolated issue may only add up to 79 cents to the monthly fees paid by subscribers to an ISP. But, what will happen if ESPN's business model succeeds? Other big and powerful companies will start jumping on the bandwagon, expecting ISPs to pony up for their customers to have access to popular websites.
The next thing you know, there are 50 "extra fees" -- then 100 -- and consumer ISP costs will go through the roof.
I look at it this way:
According to netcraft.com, there are over 226 million websites on the internet. Most folks probably pay an average of $50/month for broadband internet access. That equates to about 0.000022 cents per website. Why should ESPN's be worth over 3,000,000% more than any of the others.
I know this country is sports crazy, but come on! |
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patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | This business model already succeeded, Hulu is locked to USA, iPlayer (???) from BBC is locked to UK. Now its just becoming more granular to specific ISP rather than specific country. |
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| reply to byteme
said by byteme :
I look at it this way:
According to netcraft.com, there are over 226 million websites on the internet. Most folks probably pay an average of $50/month for broadband internet access. That equates to about 0.000022 cents per website. Why should ESPN's be worth over 3,000,000% more than any of the others.
I know this country is sports crazy, but come on!
Your $50/month is not going to content providers. It is going directly to the ISP. Content providers make money from ads, subscriptions or from selling merchandise. |
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| reply to patcat88
said by patcat88:This business model already succeeded, Hulu is locked to USA, iPlayer (???) from BBC is locked to UK. Now its just becoming more granular to specific ISP rather than specific country. That's completely different. Hulu/BBC region locks are done because the content providers only license online distribution in the USA or UK. ESPN's region locks are done based on payment from the ISP. |
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Cyron
join:2002-09-24
Charlotte, NC | reply to byteme
Funny how ISP's want to charge Google to deliver all their content. Imagine if Google just pulled an ESPN and withdrew all their content unless ISP's paid. Would be funny to see who consumers pick  |
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| said by Cyron:Funny how ISP's want to charge Google to deliver all their content. Imagine if Google just pulled an ESPN and withdrew all their content unless ISP's paid. Would be funny to see who consumers pick Bing is better. |
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patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | reply to fifty nine
said by fifty nine:That's completely different. Hulu/BBC region locks are done because the content providers only license online distribution in the USA or UK. ESPN's region locks are done based on payment from the ISP. No, its the same thing, IP address discrimination. On my TWC cable modem, Music Choice allows me to listen to the channels online, from my AT&T DSL I get redirected away. Or what about Netflix on Xbox 360 in Europe?
The same games they played with PAL/NTSC, region codes, regional versions of games and video, address verification, etc that they played offline, they want to play online now. |
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openbox9
join:2004-01-26
Alexandria, VA
kudos:2 | reply to Cyron
Google would wither and die. That's exactly the advantage that Yahoo, MS, and most ISPs would jump on. |
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