VOD : The future for linear TV channels

Originally Posted by Mad Max

No, I do get it, as for the part in bold, it only takes seconds to find something that you've either recorded or can choose from a menu, so imo your argument about settling down quickly after a hard days work, and viewing a linear channel quickly, holds no water at all.

No, you really don't. As Spiderplant has pointed out, it doesn't matter how few seconds it takes to choose from a menu; the fact is, it takes longer, and requires more active thought, than simply switching on and channel hopping. It is the requirement for active participation that makes VOD a different prospect, and which ensures there will be room for both VOD and linear broadcast TV in the future. They fulfil two different needs.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Chris

You really don't get it ...

Of course cinema is a different experience. That is *why* it has survived.

The ability to switch on a TV and quickly settle down to watch something after a day at work, with the absolute bare minimum of effort, is a different experience to deliberately choosing from a menu of box sets, or setting up preferences for download or whatever, and is one of the key reasons why linear TV will also survive.

I do understand what you are saying, Chris, but generally the end result is that you are watching rubbish - or at least programmes that you don't have a particular interest in.

Of course there will always be those who will continue to take this approach, but my guess is that the majority of people will want to select the programme they want to watch when they switch on the TV.

If the majority of people are not as laid back as you in this area, sooner or later there will be an advertising revenue problem as fewer and fewer people make use of linear channels. It's the economics of it all which will drive change.

---------- Post added at 11:09 ---------- Previous post was at 11:08 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

No, you really don't. As Spiderplant has pointed out, it doesn't matter how few seconds it takes to choose from a menu; the fact is, it takes longer, and requires more active thought, than simply switching on and channel hopping. It is the requirement for active participation that makes VOD a different prospect, and which ensures there will be room for both VOD and linear broadcast TV in the future. They fulfil two different needs.

But surely channel hopping is a very inefficient way of finding the programme you want. I wouldn't recommend that at all. Whenever I have channel hopped I have been profoundly disappointed. Even if I find a programme I wouldn't mind watching, it tends to be just finishing by the time I find it!

---------- Post added at 11:18 ---------- Previous post was at 11:09 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

Some of the key advantages linear broadcast enjoys are:
- Ability to show live events (as identified in the article you found)
- Ability to connect with a passive audience
- Easy access to a mass audience for advertisers
- Ability to offer a version of the cinema's social experience - "water cooler" TV that is viewed simultaneously in sufficient numbers that it can be a discussion point the following day, thus enhancing the broadcaster's brand and the potential reach of their product.

Live events can also be shown as they happen on video on demand. Just as you can start a recording on the TIVO and then watch the recording while it is being recorded. So that isn't actually an issue at all.

Your third point is the issue. Currently, linear TV provides a mass audience. But if the trend continues and more and more viewers steer away from linear channels, there will no longer be the mass audience that is keeping them alive.

This isn't about your personal preferences sadly, Chris, it's simple economics.

[muppetman11]

How can live be On Demand you've been asked this before , your mixing up On Demand which is something stored in the cloud with live streaming.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

How can live be On Demand you've been asked this before , your mixing up On Demand which is something stored in the cloud with live streaming.

OK, I stand corrected. Live streaming, then.

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

How can live be On Demand you've been asked this before , your mixing up On Demand which is something stored in the cloud with live streaming.

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

OK, I stand corrected. Live streaming, then.

Now TV does both.

[Mad Max]

Originally Posted by Chris

No, you really don't. As Spiderplant has pointed out, it doesn't matter how few seconds it takes to choose from a menu; the fact is, it takes longer, and requires more active thought, than simply switching on and channel hopping. It is the requirement for active participation that makes VOD a different prospect, and which ensures there will be room for both VOD and linear broadcast TV in the future. They fulfil two different needs.

No, it's you that doesn't get it mate, you've an opinion so have I, you don't have to try and force your opinion on someone else just because he/she doesn't agree with it, and the part in bold, deary me, what a load of utter tosh!

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by Chris

simply switching on and channel hopping.

I've never done that. Am I in a minority?

I only watch shows that I specifically want to watch.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Mad Max

No, it's you that doesn't get it mate, you've an opinion so have I, you don't have to try and force your opinion on someone else just because he/she doesn't agree with it, and the part in bold, deary me, what a load of utter tosh!

I think Chris must have a really mind blowing job taking all of his mental energy, MM. He is clearly brain dead by the time he sits himself down in the sofa!

Forgive me, Chris, but it does sound rather strange. I'm surprised you have sufficient energy to cope with channel hopping at the end of the day.

---------- Post added at 14:01 ---------- Previous post was at 13:59 ----------

Originally Posted by passingbat

I've never done that. Am I in a minority?

I only watch shows that I specifically want to watch.

Channel hopping is such a waste of time. If you actually find a suitable programme, you're in the middle of it.

It doesn't take a lot of forward planning to ensure a really good quality viewing experience.

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

I do understand what you are saying, Chris, but generally the end result is that you are watching rubbish - or at least programmes that you don't have a particular interest in.

Of course there will always be those who will continue to take this approach, but my guess is that the majority of people will want to select the programme they want to watch when they switch on the TV.

If the majority of people are not as laid back as you in this area, sooner or later there will be an advertising revenue problem as fewer and fewer people make use of linear channels. It's the economics of it all which will drive change.

People don't need permission to watch rubbish. . You may not understand it, you may not approve of it, but it is what it is, and the great British public's appetite for rubbish is insatiable, as the success of multi-channel TV has proven beyond any doubt.

But surely channel hopping is a very inefficient way of finding the programme you want. I wouldn't recommend that at all. Whenever I have channel hopped I have been profoundly disappointed. Even if I find a programme I wouldn't mind watching, it tends to be just finishing by the time I find it!

I suddenly realised the other day, what it is you remind me of. You're like one of those late 1990s Apple Mac fans who would always loudly proclaim the superiority of their home computer over any Windows-based PC, and their incomprehension that anyone would deliberately choose to buy anything made by Microsoft (I know this, because I was that man).

It doesn't matter how inefficient it is (in your opinion - in truth, those who do it are getting what they want, very quickly and efficiently indeed). It doesn't matter whether you recommend it. The fact is, it is what large numbers of people want to do with their TV at 8 or 9pm on a Thursday evening.

Live events can also be shown as they happen on video on demand. Just as you can start a recording on the TIVO and then watch the recording while it is being recorded. So that isn't actually an issue at all.

If you're watching it live, you're watching it according to a schedule and it is, by definition, not "on demand". The fact that it may be delivered across the Internet is neither here nor there.

VOD cannot do live events. When a VOD provider does a live event, they are not doing VOD; they are broadcasting according to a linear schedule. They cannot put the entire 2015 F1 season on Netflix for immediate download. Were Netflix to get in to sports rights, they could only make events available according to a schedule. If you watch it on a delay of even 2 minutes, then you are, of course, not watching a linear broadcast, but a VOD stream.

Your third point is the issue. Currently, linear TV provides a mass audience. But if the trend continues and more and more viewers steer away from linear channels, there will no longer be the mass audience that is keeping them alive.

This isn't about your personal preferences sadly, Chris, it's simple economics.

This has nothing to do with my preferences. It is indeed a matter of economics, but you are misconstruing the economics because you don't understand statistics. You are making extrapolations about the future direction that past events don't support.

I absolutely promise you, linear broadcast TV will still be here in 10 and 20 years, sitting alongside and complementing on-demand services, and most likely other means of content consumption we haven't yet dreamed of.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Chris

I absolutely promise you, linear broadcast TV will still be here in 10 and 20 years, sitting alongside and complementing on-demand services, and most likely other means of content consumption we haven't yet dreamed of.

Only if the majority of viewers agree with your philosophy in 10 or 20 years' time.

The continuing success or otherwise of our linear channels is completely dependent on how many people watch them.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

I think Chris must have a really mind blowing job taking all of his mental energy, MM. He is clearly brain dead by the time he sits himself down in the sofa!

Forgive me, Chris, but it does sound rather strange. I'm surprised you have sufficient energy to cope with channel hopping at the end of the day.

---------- Post added at 14:01 ---------- Previous post was at 13:59 ----------

Channel hopping is such a waste of time. If you actually find a suitable programme, you're in the middle of it.

It doesn't take a lot of forward planning to ensure a really good quality viewing experience.

You dismiss channel hopping as a waste of time, but I personally have found a lot of programmes that I have become a fan of purely through channel hopping while bored. Stargate and Babylon 5 spring to mind. Also Buffy The Vampire Slayer to some extent. Actually with Buffy, I had been told by friends I would enjoy it, but they made it sound like a teenage angst type show (like The OC or Beverly Hills 90210), so I figured I wouldn't be interested. Then, while surfing, I watched a few minutes of one episode, and was hooked. Now, I think it's probably in my top 10 favourite TV shows of all time.

You can mock all you want, but the fact is I personally find it quite relaxing in the evening to turn the TV on, and just watch something WITHOUT having to do the (admittedly minimal) amount of thinking required for any on demand service. Yes, you have the recently watched shows list, and "My Shows", but it still requires thought. As the Netflix's recommendations, no matter how long I spend fine tuning their recommendations, 90% of the time, it still recommends I watch shows or films that are of absolutely no interest to me..

---------- Post added at 17:05 ---------- Previous post was at 17:01 ----------

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

Only if the majority of viewers agree with your philosophy in 10 or 20 years' time.

The continuing success or otherwise of our linear channels is completely dependent on how many people watch them.

That's the one true thing you've said. The continuing success of ANY TV platform is dependent on how many people watch it.

[denphone]

Originally Posted by Stuart

You dismiss channel hopping as a waste of time, but I personally have found a lot of programmes that I have become a fan of purely through channel hopping while bored. Stargate and Babylon 5 spring to mind. Also Buffy The Vampire Slayer to some extent. Actually with Buffy, I had been told by friends I would enjoy it, but they made it sound like a teenage angst type show (like The OC or Beverly Hills 90210), so I figured I wouldn't be interested. Then, while surfing, I watched a few minutes of one episode, and was hooked. Now, I think it's probably in my top 10 favourite TV shows of all time.

You can mock all you want, but the fact is I personally find it quite relaxing in the evening to turn the TV on, and just watch something WITHOUT having to do the (admittedly minimal) amount of thinking required for any on demand service. Yes, you have the recently watched shows list, and "My Shows", but it still requires thought. As the Netflix's recommendations, no matter how long I spend fine tuning their recommendations, 90% of the time, it still recommends I watch shows or films that are of absolutely no interest to me.

This.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Stuart

That's the one true thing you've said. The continuing success of ANY TV platform is dependent on how many people watch it.

And that was the whole point of this thread!

When I watch my grandkids confidently finding their entertainment with a remote and the TIVO, it's awesome. They don't have the patience to select linear channels and wait for what they want to see.

In 20 years time, the 9 and 4 year olds will be 29 and 24, and there's a generation before them who are already hooked to the new ways of watching TV. And they will be in their late fifties!

That's why I cannot see the linear channels being profitable in the years to come.

[harry_hitch]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

And that was the whole point of this thread!

When I watch my grandkids confidently finding their entertainment with a remote and the TIVO, it's awesome. They don't have the patience to select linear channels and wait for what they want to see.

In 20 years time, the 9 and 4 year olds will be 29 and 24, and there's a generation before them who are already hooked to the new ways of watching TV. And they will be in their late fifties!

That's why I cannot see the linear channels being profitable in the years to come.

So your grand kids don't watch anything live on TV? No Cbeebies or whatever kids channels there are on linear TV? Nothing live after school? The 9 year old does not watch anything live on linear TV in the evening?

Do they simply plonk right down in front of Netflix et al and watch the limited supply of old shows on there?

On a lighter note, are you secretly brain washing them into thinking linear tv is not the future?

[Mad Max]

Originally Posted by Stuart

You dismiss channel hopping as a waste of time, but I personally have found a lot of programmes that I have become a fan of purely through channel hopping while bored. Stargate and Babylon 5 spring to mind. Also Buffy The Vampire Slayer to some extent. Actually with Buffy, I had been told by friends I would enjoy it, but they made it sound like a teenage angst type show (like The OC or Beverly Hills 90210), so I figured I wouldn't be interested. Then, while surfing, I watched a few minutes of one episode, and was hooked. Now, I think it's probably in my top 10 favourite TV shows of all time.

You can mock all you want, but the fact is I personally find it quite relaxing in the evening to turn the TV on, and just watch something WITHOUT having to do the (admittedly minimal) amount of thinking required for any on demand service. Yes, you have the recently watched shows list, and "My Shows", but it still requires thought. As the Netflix's recommendations, no matter how long I spend fine tuning their recommendations, 90% of the time, it still recommends I watch shows or films that are of absolutely no interest to me..

---------- Post added at 17:05 ---------- Previous post was at 17:01 ----------



That's the one true thing you've said. The continuing success of ANY TV platform is dependent on how many people watch it.

Oh look, another mod backing up the other mod, how strange!