Blog @ Digital Bazaar

Where does your entertainment dollar go?

The short road to Collaborative Content Distribution

There are several things that are needed for Collaborative Content Distribution to become successful:

• The content providers must start offering their content to more than just the cable providers. Exclusivity is no longer in the best interest of the content creators.
• A technology platform, Bitmunk being a prime example, must be created that can remunerate the proper parties accordingly. These parties include content creators, content distributors and content customers.
• Services must be launched via the Internet that allow television-like shows and lineups. When it comes to television, content is king.

Let us review what Collaborative Content Distribution achieves:

We can clearly see that

• Collaborative Content Distribution is far more efficient than traditional content distribution models.
• There is no advertising required to make Collaborative Content Distribution more cost effective than basic cable services.
• All of the technological hurdles have been successfully navigated.
• The only remaining issues are ensuring that the older business models and corporations can have a smooth transition to the new Collaborative Content Distribution models.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this analysis on Collaborative Content Distribution as much as I enjoyed writing it. The world has entered a brave new frontier in digital content distribution and the industry is not as far from the goal as it may seem.

About the Author:

Manu Sporny is the CEO and President of Digital Bazaar, Inc. – creator of the Bitmunk digital content distribution service. He spends most of his time trying to make the world a better place through Digital Bazaar. December 2006 is here. Being an avid snowboarder, he is spending an increasing portion of his time wondering how many inches of snow will fall this winter – as he longs to shred some sweet, sweet, powder.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License. If you would like to post the story in full or in part, including modifications, on your website, magazine, blog, or any other form of media, make sure that you state that this was an article written about Digital Bazaar and Bitmunk by Manu Sporny, CEO and President of Digital Bazaar, Inc. If possible, include a link to the original article.

References

1. The Free Software Movement
2. Netcraft Web Server Survey
3. Time Magazine: Rebels and Leaders: Linus Torvalds
4. Reference Deleted
5. Cable Programming Reaches 85% of All Television Households
6. Expected Consumer Benefits from Wired Video Competition in California
7. TNS Media Intelligence Reports U.S. Advertising Expenditures Increased 3.0 Percent in 2005
8. American Time Use Survey – Average House Per Day Spent on Primary Activities
9. Average Home Has More TVs Than People
10. NATO Statistics for Box Office Grosses
11. Video Rentals and Sales Revenue Statistics
12. DSL strikes a chord with frugal shoppers

3 Comments

1. This is an extremely wonderful and well thought out essay. I would love for everything to happen like that, and to tell you the truth–if we are ever able to build this model I will GLADLY pay $20-$30 more to keep commercials out of my life.

   On the other hand, I don’t see this happening. I hope I am wrong. What you are proposing is to cut out the middle man, who gets at least $92 Billion a year to provide us with "entertainment". With this much money on the line, I really don’t see the big telecom just "giving up" their content. They will surely put up a hell of a fight to preserve the old model. Just look to what they did to "a-la-carte" model that was just floating around a couple of years ago.(ability to buy only cable channels that you want). This had an overwhelming support among the Congress and the General Public who is sick of paying $100 a month to basically watch their 3 or 4 favorite channels. There were even hearings on the Hill scheduled. And what happened? Poof! GONE! Not even a peep.

   Comment by BrooklynNY — December 12, 2006 #

2. It’s not so much the networks that control the conent of our favorite entertianment shows on tv as much it is the companies that advertise. It’s sort of scary that a cat food or plastic company has a lot of control over our favorite sitcom or reality show!

   Comment by Luke Schmucker — January 23, 2008 #

3. Hi,

   I am looking for an open source solution that I could install on my own server so I can distribute my music my self without giving away precious % to middle sites, plus getting paid in 60 plus days…

   Anyone knows of something like that?

   Thanks in advance,

   Thierry Deruelle
   http://www.dztd.ca

   Comment by Thierry Deruelle — May 23, 2009 #

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