Wednesday 28 March 2012

As if I ever had any doubts that getting out of the Yellow Pages business was a good idea:
Are Yellow Pages Toast? Four Years Later We Review Ad Value

Just to pat my own back, my timing for fleeing that particular sinking ship was impeccable. But as for whether my new ship is sailing toward an iceberg, there are lots of interesting developments happening every day. But so far none of these signs so far seem to augur certain doom or certain success. This piece is just another example of how the competitive landscape for TV is ever shifting:
Xbox Live Adds HBO Go, Comcast VOD

Monday 5 March 2012

Seems like the media can't quite make up its mind about Netflix. Either the company is getting into bed with cable MSOs, or it is about to be "crushed" by the likes of Comcast. Regardless, there is one thing that everyone does seem to agree on: Apple is going to remake the TV industry in its own image. And in the process, the computer company from Cupertino is going to "embarrass hardware makers, stiff content providers, destroy cable companies."

While I think it's true that Apple does have a strong motivation to disrupt television as we know it -- and customers have been demanding TV that costs less and doesn't suck quite so much -- I also think that Apple will find the TV industry less disruptable than the music industry that they first tackled in the early 2000s. There are a lot of powerful vested interests in TV that will fight back hard when threatened, and in general, the end-to-end value chain of getting content to consumers is much more complex for TV than for music, with a lot more players along the way who won't want to be squeezed out.

Thursday 1 March 2012

Hot on the heels of revelations that Google+ is a virtual ghost town, here's a new report claiming that there are less than 1M Google TV devices in use. It seems like Google has been trying to pivot for the past 5+ years, with few successful examples of gaining widespread traction outside of its core search and advertising products. Can anyone say Innovator's Dilemma?