Just a small point on the buying out of all the rights. Merely because
programmes would be available free would not totally kill off other
forms of money raising based on the product. After all, a significant
portion of worldwide broadcasters would still be after syndication
rights. DVD sales are probably also workable, at least on a small scale,
as there is some added value in a physical collection, with properly
printed menus, perhaps accompanied by a small book or some other value
increasing items. Whilst the DVD sales aren't going to be the revenue
stream they once were if the material is freely available, I think some
small amount of the market will still be there.
Also some of the BBCs material is useful educationally, which may make
the DVDs profitable in some places abroad without the internet
infrastructure necessary to obtain the free materials. Additionally,
DVDs may still be saleable outside the UK due to a lack of awareness of
the material being available for free on the BBC site. Lastly, if there
were to be communities established to help benefit individual producers
(I'm thinking specifically of the natural history unit etc.), then you
may find people are willing to either donate extra money, or buy
specific DVDs to aid in the content of that department.
Just because something may be available for free does not entirely mean
you kill the market for selling the same thing. I agree it makes it more
difficult, especially on non-commercial terms.
If the BBC were to think more strongly about going down the route of
free online downloads of all material, I'm sure that a public
consultation, perhaps on a wiki based format may come up with some
revenue generating ideas which have not been considered already.
With regards to the sport aspect, I'm not so sure the BBC would lose
coverage of the Olympics etc. After all, the olympics is supposed to
encompass the world, and hence a freely available catalogue of the games
might well add value to the bid to get the games rather than reduce.
BBCi is already making strides in showing perhaps less popular sports
such as snooker online. Whilst the most highly commercial sports,
specifically football are likely to object to free online distribution,
many sports are likely to care a lot less. Especially with some if some
GeoIP provision is put in place (and this is a slightly lesser evil than
DRM - though perhaps could be extended to include somehow those abroad
who have valid TV licenses).
Perhaps a bit rambling, but just wanted to say that free content may not
kill the commerciality of programmes entirely.
Tom Loosemore wrote:
> Apparently today's rights-holder production companies believe that
> DRMcan stop "the mass market" from sharing works. Probably not;
> simplymaking the works "All Rights Reserved" does enough damage to
> thepotential for the mass market, by criminalizing businesses that
> findways to monetise the Internet.
One might also say "criminalising businesses who get rich off the
creativity of others" :)
The point, to me, is simple: DRM doesn't work. It doesn't stop anyone
taking your content for free. Therefore, work out business models which
don't rely on DRM.
and, yes, the licence fee could be one of them - see Creative Archive
passim, or OFCOM's ideas for a new Public Service Publisher using a
Creative Commons commercial sharealike licencing model.
however, if the BBC were to adopt such a 'buy all rights in
perpetuity' model, it would mean making far, far fewer programmes,
since each programme would have to cost more (*much* more in many
cases) to compensate rights holders for the reduction in secondary
income from repeats, DVDs, overseas sales etc. We'd also probably lose
any stars the moment we made them (Gervais, etc) cos they could make
more than we could afford upfront commercially. And we'd lose all
sport. And the Olympics.
But hey, making far fewer programmes may not seem the end of the
world, since everyone only really likes a few programmes, and it's all
going on demand anyway so why worry about filling linear schedules,
right?
Then you realise that everyone != people like us, both in terms of the
programmes they like, and more importantly, in terms of their
likelihood to use the internet.
Everyone pays for the licence fee, and so everyone deserves to get
value from it.
So you need a wide range of programmes to cater for people's
increasingly fragmented tastes, and a variety of delivery methods to
cater for a range of tech capabilities.
41% of the UK population didn't use the Internet last month. We reckon
up to 20% of them *never* will. They'll pop their clogs before they
ever do anything on demand.
They pay for the BBC too.
Right now I find it hard to justify reducing the range of programmes
that 41% enjoy, just so the 5% of the population who regularly share
TV programmes over the internet can get *even more* value from the BBC
And incidentally, that 5% ('geeks like us') already gets far, far,
more value from the BBC than the 41% who are not online.
It's a balance. And we know that balance will shift over time,
possibly quite quickly once the current teenagers grow into adults.
For me, the long game is clear. You can now copy and share digital
media at near zero marginal cost. That's a miracle in terms of
increasing the value you can get out of *any* media, and in the long
term business models which make use of the ability to copy and share
will win.
The licence fee could be one such business model. But the argument is
about the balance between investing in linear vs making the most of
on demand.
The short game is also ruthlessly simple. The only way to get
programmes out and retain the current range and diversity of BBC
programmes is to use DRM. I might not like that, but I'll defend the
decision to do so in today's context.
Restating the case in terms of dogmatic absolutes isn't adding much to
the argument - dogmatic absolutists are very easy to pigeonhole and
ignore. Argue with ruthless logic, based on the core purposes of the
BBC.
If the BBC went non-DRM, bought out rights in perpetuity, thus made
fewer programmes, how could it do so on a way that meant 41% did not
lose out in order to give the 5% even more value?
And I hereby trump Ian's ORG badge-waving: the only person who
donated £5 a month to ORG before me was the guy developing their site.
;o)
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