A fascinating week for the digital media industry with Endemol revealing “banker” tendencies by delivering @33% of profits from buying back their own debt from hedgefunds, ITV appoint a new CEO, Sky deliver very strong results plus go 3D and the IPad is launched to mixed reviews.

A few numbers to throw into this – ITV revenues in the first 9 months of 2009 were £1.9 billion, Sky’s recently released 6 month revenues were £2.9 billion…….but wait for it Googles UK revenues in the first 9 months of 2009 were £1.9 billion and the Apple app store having launched in 2007 with 11 apps is now running to 140,000 apps and is estimated to generate £1.5 billion per year.

In no time at all the app store has taken a bit slice of the content revenue pie and the consumer clearly loves it as the IPod touch is likely to soon overtake the Iphone in sales terms and its major USP is the app store.

The rate of growth of Google and the App store is amazing and outside of the highly specific and clearly well executed Sky model the remainder of the traditional UK media industry is left paddling around in the detritus.

The Ipad opens the possibility of digital text and video being delivered to the consumer on a paid for basis – which might actually generate profit for content owners. This is in contrast to the YouTube model which neatly leaves most content owners out of the equation.

Interestingly, very recently YouTube have started to approach their content partners to see if they can offer £ to secure rights and recently secured a deal with the Indian Premier League. However, very few YouTube partners make decent revenues from their channels and it seems that being on the app store offers a much better chance of monetizing content.

Perhaps the app store offers content owners the chance to make £ from their efforts in the digital age and the Ipad offers an interface that will work for text and video. Clearly piracy reamins an issue but Apple look like they have moved one big step closer to an economic model for content owners.

xping.pubsub.com/ping

Originally posted here:
Has Apple delivered the digital content model ?

xping.pubsub.com/ping

Read the original post:
Let’s Play Monopoly

In the midst of all the current excitements (bankers, politicans, Blair being found out, sharks in Cape Town etc) it is quite a challenge to focus on a fairly dry piece of legislation that reaches the Committee Stage in the House of Lords on the 26th January – the Digital Economy Bill.

However, this piece of legislation, however it is finally framed, will shape the creative industries in the UK for many years to come. A key area is the extent to which the ISP’s will be held accountable for “turning a blind eye” to persistent illegal use of their networks as well as the requirement to disconnect persistent offenders. The outcome of this Bill will impact on the profit and loss accounts of the ISP’s so much lobbying over lunch no doubt.

Fundamentally if profit cannot be made from originating and distributing content then as an industry it will scale back – and once the Pirates have bled the archive dry – the content industry will have been decimated. It is not a reasonable argument to suggest that this is simple the evolution of an industry – ripping off copyright is simply illegal but being facilitated by new technologies. This Bill is an opportunity to help the UK creative industries prosper in the digital age.

Charles Dunstone argues against an Orwellian nightmare of ISP “snooping” – but that may be because he is providing a great platform for the illegal filesharers with generous bandwith offers and he has no financial exposure to the content producers.

Google must also be brought into this discussion as YouTube, AdWords and Adsense are all weapons commonly used by the Pirates to market and monetise their streams. In the main the Pirates generate income by using the Google advertising platform – this could easily be stopped by Google and the ill gotten gains re-directed to the content producers and rights holders.

Hopefully the legislators and politicans are not all too old and corrupt to create a fair framework for the content producers, ISP’s and consumers to co-exist in the new digital world – but time will tell.

xping.pubsub.com/ping

Read more:
Digital Economy Bill

News reaches me that Global Mix has put its CDN business into liquidation, but aims to persevere with its services business.

xping.pubsub.com/ping

Excerpted from:
Out Of The Mix