Medialoper

We're Not Who You Think We Are

Kassia Krozser

Video on Demand Update: 2007 State of the Industry

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Back when I was just a young thing, an (old) man said to me, “Girl, you got a lot to learn about video on demand.” Or maybe not so much. He, with all seriousness, promised me one thing — there would be no VoD. Ever. He’d been in the industry for well over twenty years and on demand programming was always the golden ring. The rainbow. The dream.

Funny thing is, he’s still right. We don’t have true video on demand. We have a lot of video and a lot of demand, but actual, true video on demand remains elusive. There are several reasons, one of which being the root cause of the current writers strike: money. I will be focusing on the motion picture industry here, because the ownership rules are different in the movie biz.
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The World’s Most Expensive RSS Reader

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I know, I know, Kirk has already done the ultimate appreciation of RSS — what can I possibly add to the conversation? Well, how about a little thing that I like to call the “World’s Most Expensive RSS Reader”? See, it’s not enough to have RSS; the entire experience cannot be enjoyed without a decent way of reading feeds. Sort of like cause and effect but more modern.

Since I switched to a Mac, I’ve been in a sort of RSS limbo. I’ve tried and rejected far too many readers — the built-in reader for Thunderbird came closest to meeting my personal needs (and it’s important to note that there is no one size fits all solution when it comes to RSS — everyone has their own quirks and requirements), but then, for reasons too lengthy to detail here, I stopped using Thunderbird.*

I hesitated over using Google Reader. I am not sure why — it just seemed wrong for me. Yeah, I can’t explain it. I mean, I’m one of those people who, as a matter of course, opens a slate of seven “standard” tabs each time I restart Firefox.** Those tabs represents the websites I must have access to multiple times during my normal day. Adding Google Reader to this group was not a challenge (obviously), but still I didn’t embrace the technology. I half-heartedly rebuilt my feeds feed in Google Reader…and still hesitated.
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All My ‘Lopers

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I’m a sucker for serialized content. Since I was kid, I have sought out continuing story lines. Naturally, this lead to a youth wasted watching soap operas — though I never went there, it strikes me that at one point in my history, the ultimate girl youth rebellion was to choose All My Children over your mother’s Days Of Our Lives. Soap operas offered a glimpse into a glamorous, dangerous world that contrasted sharply with daily reality.

There is much to be said for the power of escapism and even the skeptics find themselves entrenched in the lives of the Rachel and Julie and Trish and David and Raven and Cash and all the other characters. The writers of soap operas are masters at creating new scenarios, introducing new drama, while making sure that the casual viewer is able to catch up with the story within moments. If you’re away for years, sure, there will be some disorientation, but not enough to make you throw up your hands and say, “That’s it! I’m never watching Young and the Restless again.”
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CBS: Down The Rabbit Hole Without A Parachute

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Outside the bubble, awareness of the Writer’s Guild of America strike is less than you’d think. For those of us who are living and breathing the strike, it seems that everyone should be talking about what’s going on. It turns out that this is not so. As the two parties sit down today to again try to find common ground, the average American, exhausted from a weekend of shopping, is discovering that TiVo is delivering less in the way of new programming and more in the way of wacky recommendations.

(Side note: how about that TiVo love letter on ”’The Simpsons”’ last night? I’ve long maintained that bad things happen to people who watch commercials…I was right!)

This post isn’t about the strike, per se. It’s more about how Hollywood simply doesn’t get today’s consumer. Or rather, Hollywood doesn’t get how today’s consumer is rejecting the notion of appointment television. A common ‘loper mantra is that we want it when we want it. Seems simple enough to understand.
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360 Deals: The Musical Merry-Go-Round

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Sometimes, you don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Artists across the entertainment industries — publishing, music, motion picture — earn money from their efforts in slightly different ways. For musicians, who earn a pittance from record sales, the real money comes from touring and merchandise.

Naturally, as sales have dropped, the labels have looked far and wide to find other sources of income. They see radio as a new cash cow (“can you believe they’re playing our music for free?”). And they see those lovely t-shirt and ticket dollars as theirs to share. After all, you know how hard A&R guys work while on tour.

The birth of the 360 deal — where artists and labels (and artists reps such as managers) — share in the proceeds of all money-making efforts. The New York Times has a lovely storyabout how this process is working for a band named “Paramore”. Since I believe it’s never too early to explore the magical world around us…
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Where Some See Lemons: More On The Writers Guild Strike

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I know, I know, you’re sick of hearing about the looming Writers Guild of America strike. Well, it’s looming no more. It’s here, and, as you know, the first victims will be shows such as “Late Night with David Letterman”, “The Daily Show”, and even “The Colbert Report”. While some of those shows might stand up to the scrutiny of reruns, I’m guessing there will be a lot of audience loss — though this might very well be a boon for HGTV.

It’s my job to think about the future and writing. Okay, fine, nobody gave me this job; I appropriated it. It’s not like there’s a paid position out there called “Thinker About Future and Writing” anyway. Oh, if there were, I’d find the resume I last updated a decade ago.

So here are today’s thoughts on the issue. This strike is about ongoing compensation for work performed. In the majority of cases, when authors sign a contract with a publisher, they license specific distribution rights for their work for a certain period of time. Depending on the contract, the specific rights and length of time varies. Then there’s the whole of issue of “in print” — a contractually squishy point that some publishers use to retain distribution rights despite the lack of serious exploitation.
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Your Helpful Pre-Writers Strike Primer

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Unless a miracle happened over the weekend and I missed it, there’s a good chance that the writers in Hollywood are going to strike. As you know, the major issue on the table between the producers (the major studios and networks) and the writers relates to residuals for new media. One side says there’s no way to predict the future; the other side says “Remember the DVD!”

As a rallying cry, that’s not so bad.

New media is one of those fuzzy concepts — on the surface, it means any means of distribution not considered “traditional”, i.e, television or video. More specifically, it means distribution to your mobile phone or home computer. But it breaks down even further, and it’s helpful to understand the different models currently being contemplated. Once you understand those, you’ll see that “new media” isn’t so much a revolution as it is a way to expand the current distribution process.

For the sake of ease, I’m going to correlate the “new” to the standard terms used by the industry. Like I said, the basics aren’t all that different.
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Scalpers vs Teenage Girls

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I’m going to readily admit that, like the High School Musical phenomenon, the whole Hannah Montana craze is purely academic to me. While I’ve been living my blissful life, it turns out that the pre-teen (tween?) set has done what the pre-teen set has always done: created its own star system.

In the normal scheme of things, the entire Miley Cyrus (the daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus — why do I know this stuff?) thing should pass me by. Like most adults, my exposure should be limited to reading gossip magazines at the gym while I’m on the treadmill. One must maintain a certain level of cultural literacy; I’ve come to peace with this.
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Note To Music Industry: It’s Time To Clean Your Own House

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It is amusing to me that the recording industry has celebrated its first “victory” when it comes to prosecuting piracy. Last week, Jammie Thomas was ordered to pay $222,000 for illegal downloading of music. This amount is approximately ten times the median income for her community. I’m guessing the industry won’t see a dime — and I’m guessing the verdict won’t change the facts on the ground.

It’s a pretty safe bet that one of the biggest contributors to piracy is the industry itself. If you live in certain cities, you know that promo copies of CDs show up in used record stores long before the release date. All those freebies are pretty much turned over for better product or cash. And disks get passed hand to hand in hopes that “buzz” will be built for an upcoming release.

Mostly this doesn’t happen because most music that gets released on major record labels isn’t buzz-worthy. That’s another problem for another day.
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Ode To A Simpler Time

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So, yeah, here’s how it rolls. Get to the office, light up, boys from down the hall gather for a meeting, light up and pour a stiff one (meetings!). Lunch? Sure, make it a three martini deal, linger over cigarettes. Afternoon meeting — let’s smoke the time away. Post-meeting meeting? Two fingers of whiskey. Minimum.

And dinner? Well, sure, the wife’s at home cooking up something that starts with casserole and ends with cholesterol, but there’s this girl here and it’s the city and why not? Stay in town, drink until walking isn’t an option — though driving, that’s another question — and break most of the major wedding vows.

Mad Men, an AMC original series, is like a glimpse into a past I almost know. Like my peers, I grew up with a pastel-tinted view of “history” — Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley. The 50s were a rockin’, rollin’ time, but, oh boy!, nothing really bad happened. Mr. Cunningham was eternally faithful to Mrs. Cunningham. Even as the series edged into the 60s, there were no worries. As long as the Fonz was the worst kid in town, nothing bad could happen.
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