Blackhacker

Kuro5hin.org

Over the last few days I’ve been collecting information about what people would shell out for a pay-per-episode (not pay-per-view) series. Compared to four years ago when I last pondered this question, people seem much more willing to spend a little to get good entertainment, which in itself is a massive shift of opinion. But in the process of gathering this data, I think I may have discovered that you can only ever charge $1 for anything online, no matter how much it costs to make…

The thing is: if $0.99 is your starting point, how do you deal with differing levels of quality? If Futurama is worth $0.99, what is a bad episode of Alias going to cost? $0.75? If it’s that, you’ll have to increase your audience to compensate (which doesn’t seem likely since it’s a bad episode). But if you keep it at $0.99, the audience will feel like they’re being ripped off if certain episodes don’t meet their standards. In this system there is an implied level of quality that the producers of content must meet or exceed to stay in business. You’re only as good as your last episode, and that becomes even more severe in a pay-as-you-go scenario.

I was ranting about this a little while ago. ActuallyI was rantimg for this. I think this is the kick in the pants that the Media Industries need to bring quality back and cut the crap.

Check this!.

Berkeley, CA (March 10, 2005) - Online record label Magnatune and Samsung spinoff Hana Micron today launch TunePlug-a reusable USB Flash Drive that will feature 10 complete albums from 10 leading Magnatune artists as MP3 files. The newest way to distribute music, TunePlug offers consumers a simple way to experience emerging music on an easy-to-use, transferable information device.

This looks an innovation to distribute music and other digital media. It make so much sense I can’t think of a good reason why main stream media have not thought of this.
dap: Creative Commons

NY Times

Comcast, the nation’s largest cable company, said yesterday that it would offer its customers a video recorder service from TiVo, news that helped send TiVo’s shares up nearly 75 percent.

Investors had soured on TiVo lately, on fears that its pioneering service for digitally recording and playing back television programs was being eclipsed by house brands offered by satellite and cable companies.

Negotiations with Comcast broke down last summer, and DirecTV, which has been TiVo’s largest source of new customers, has said it is building its own video recorder system.

I wouldn’t stop the Tivo deathwatch. The Comcast deal doesn’t pay as much as the DirectTV which DTV is going to let run out. Anyway I hope sombody buys them and continues to offer there service, at least long enough for me to get in on the action.

Sony is going though some stuff right now, with a new CEO, and problems moving over priced AV & PC hardware. One bright spot for Sony has always been gaming aka The Sony Playstation. Sony is FINALLY going to try to extend it game console dominance into the portable area. Portable gaming has been owned for more than a decade by Nintendo and it’s Game Boy. But now Portable Sony Playstation is here .. almost here anyway. Walt Mossberg from WSJ has a review.

Next week, Sony will release in the U.S. a flashy new portable audio and video device that some believe could mark the start of a resurgence for the beleaguered Japanese electronics and entertainment giant. The $250 Playstation Portable, or PSP, already a hit in Japan, could become Sony’s first iconic portable, personal product of the digital era — Sony’s equivalent of Apple Computer’s iPod.

Mossberg found issues with the music/video playback & PC integration features. But Mossberg being outside the core demographic for his product doesn’t understand this shot across the bow of the Nintendo GBA. The other features are just value added features to justify the $250 price tag. Don’t know if it will work. We’ll see.

Update:
A more comprehensive review of the PSP is at engaget. I won’t summarize it here ’cause its way long but it might prove more useful to hard core gamers than Mossberg.