Spotify almost works properly as a centralized platform because almost all music is on there. But I know a few albums that aren't, and it's too bad.
For Netflix, I have a subscription. But guess what I do when I want to watch the latest Walking Dead or Game of Thrones. I want it convenient, preferably legal, but most of all convenient.
The BBC has such an extensive and amazing back catalogue of content they wholly own. Why they don't chuck it on iPlayer is beyond me. I know they have it all on a digital platform internally already, format is not an issue.
Because they would devalue new productions. The more license-payers watch old movies, the less they will watch Top Gear or Strictly or whatever it's supposed to be big now. This would mean less interest in new productions, less stuff sold by BBCWorld (or whatever it's called these days), less money going around... like all companies and organisations, the BBC wants to grow, not to stall.
Even today, I was reading that one Black Mirror episode for which the closing song was just so on had licensed it for 15 years. Which is a long time but hardly forever.
Which is quite common (Scrubs for example has had to re-edit library music into most of it's episodes for most uses, instead of the original tracks).
If you own the song, seems like you'd want to avoid leaving money on the table. I wonder how common relicensing is vs. editing.
No it doesn't. The BBC wholly owns virtually nothing.
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603125500/htt...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/contributor_rights.shtml?chapte...
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2010/nov/25/bbc-archive-onli...
And more importantly, the things it does wholly own, it very rarely knows, legally, that it does wholly own, as the records aren't reliable. So it would involve a vast amount of legal time and risk to investigate.
The infuriating thing is, we’ve already paid for it. Anything BBC should be “free” to anyone who had paid their TV license in the last year it was broadcast. We own it already, it’s sheer extortion to make you pay full price for a DVD.
No you didn't. For the example, the BBC typically only pays independent production companies (which is about 40% of their output) a fraction of what the content costs to make because the indie retains distribution rights afterwards and can make up the rest with sales. Same with scriptwriters, or actors.
It's a combination of price and convenience. There's some upper limit to the monthly price you (and everyone else) is willing to pay for content.
In jurisdictions where it is available it's often only available as a part of a larger cable package. If you're signed up with another provider that's pretty inconvenient also.
There is a well worn cartoon on this topic that sums up the position of many quite well [0]
When this comic came out(2011) HBO Now (confusingly separate from HBO Go) did not exist.
EDIT Actually, I'm going to put aside disingenuity for a second.
I actually have the closest equivalent of HBO with my provider, it's called "Sky Atlantic" and it's only available through Sky, of course.
So I'm fully paid up and legit as far as GoT is concerned but only coincidentally. If a competing network were to start showing $competing_popular_tv_show you can be guaranteed I wouldn't be switching, or taking on a second subscription ...
Take my $$$ by all means, but if you get greedy you'll get nothing.
It wasn’t the price that moved me away from HBONow, it was their lack of convenience compared to a torrent rig.
It ended up being HBO’s design was more for themselves rather than me (“we want to show you ads” vs “you want to watch your shows”). It was still very old in its philosophy of content.
Netflix however is awesome because it’s very UX focused.
Ultimately, I think only OSS/pirate are closest to the use desires.
Except for the thousands of A/B experiments that incessantly drive you to spend every ounce of attention on Netflix. E.g. the auto-playing preview that starts whenever you stop moving the active selection. It strongly encourages you to start playing the thing rather than being thoughtful about whether you actually want to or not. Personally I hate this - it drives my anxiety nuts - and I find HBO's tactics much less user-hostile (although agreed the ads for HBO's own content are outright stupid).
I find the Netflix UI, especially the one for Xbox utterly slow and too jammed with information. Its not that great.
There is indeed an upper limit for everyone. If I need to pay >50 euros/month and still get ads, no thanks.
click
"To access HBO GO℠, you must reside within the fifty states of the United States of America."
Some time ago while traveling I actively tried to find a way to pay to watch Game of Thrones. I failed miserably.
Also I really don't like having to have and manage subscription for various providers, nor do I like to be locked in with one. I would love to have a single subscription or even better pre-paid option somewhere which can be used across services and my money gets distributed accordingly.
Same with news media. I would be more than willing to pay a set amount per year for consumption, but I'm not willing to pay that amount exclusively to you.
I think stuff like Netflix, Spotify, Steam, etc have proven that when content is priced right and delivered in a convenient manner folks are more than happy to pay.
News media is one of the worst for not figuring out how to adapt. I'd love to read some newspapers, watch a couple news networks, etc - but i'm not willing to plop down $100 a month and deal with a bunch of different apps to do this so I stick with online.
What isn’t convient about HBO Now (assuming you are in the USA)?
Pay a monthly, automatically recurring, fixed fee is convenient. Out of sight, out of mind.
What is inconvenient about subscribing to HBO Now? You have to do more work to find/download an episode of GoT compared to streaming via HBO Now. Or you could stream the episodes from Prime. Same with Walking Dead. There are rarely inconvenient streaming options.
1. All clients suck immensely.
2. The catalog is really poor.
3. DRM. I don't think you could describe inconvenient better than with those three letters.
If I could pay, say $30 a month, to legally pirate (not from any official source even) any movie/series I want I'd pay that in a heartbeat ($30 is still more than I consume if I were to buy it in a store). But now I don't have any service because it isn't worth it. I don't get the convenience and I don't get a decent catalog and I would have gotten it with DRM.
And that's just me. The masses of non-tech-savvy people out there don't want to deal with pirating things. For these people, paid services are far, far superior.