Why TV Lost

Rarely do you see things put so susinctly. Sometimes I could just kiss Paul Graham, but that would be kind of weird and creepy. :)

He captures the inevitability of the TV vs. Internet war, the sheer obviousness and the magic and slaps it all down in a few hundred words like it was meant to be.

From: Why TV Lost

About twenty years ago people noticed computers and TV were on a collision course and started to speculate about what they'd produce when they converged. We now know the answer: computers. It's clear now that even by using the word "convergence" we were giving TV too much credit. This won't be convergence so much as replacement. People may still watch things they call "TV shows," but they'll watch them mostly on computers.

What decided the contest for computers? Four forces, three of which one could have predicted, and one that would have been harder to.

One predictable cause of victory is that the Internet is an open platform. Anyone can build whatever they want on it, and the market picks the winners. So innovation happens at hacker speeds instead of big company speeds.

The second is Moore's Law, which has worked its usual magic on Internet bandwidth. [1]

The third reason computers won is piracy. Users prefer it not just because it's free, but because it's more convenient. Bittorrent and YouTube have already trained a new generation of viewers that the place to watch shows is on a computer screen. [2]

The somewhat more surprising force was one specific type of innovation: social applications. The average teenage kid has a pretty much infinite capacity for talking to their friends. But they can't physically be with them all the time. When I was in high school the solution was the telephone. Now it's social networks, multiplayer games, and various messaging applications. The way you reach them all is through a computer. [3] Which means every teenage kid (a) wants a computer with an Internet connection, (b) has an incentive to figure out how to use it, and (c) spends countless hours in front of it.

This was the most powerful force of all. This was what made everyone want computers. Nerds got computers because they liked them. Then gamers got them to play games on. But it was connecting to other people that got everyone else: that's what made even grandmas and 14 year old girls want computers.

After decades of running an IV drip right into their audience, people in the entertainment business had understandably come to think of them as rather passive. They thought they'd be able to dictate the way shows reached audiences. But they underestimated the force of their desire to connect with one another.

Facebook killed TV. That is wildly oversimplified, of course, but probably as close to the truth as you can get in three words.

youtube, free speach and the tyrany of private public spaces, v2

"Youtube. This account is suspended."

This is a story we're starting to see time and time again. Youtube deleting user accounts completely without any due cause being given to the owner of the account. Traditional media companies abusing the DMCA to silence critics.

It's an issue I've written about before.

As covered on newteevee Pubdef.net "an online destination for video reports from St. Louis and the state of Missouri published by Anotonio D. French, a newspaper reporter who was frustrated with local news coverage" had his entire youtube account deleted on accusations that one of his videos violated Channel 5 St. Louis' copyright.

The video (embeded below) was critical of Channel 5's unsubstantiated claims that an local alderman took bribes in a realestate swindle. Was it fair use or copyright infringement? View it below and be your own judge.



Pubdef has re-hosted the video on his own site. Of course the majority of the other 200+ videos are gone. You can read his original post over on pubdef.net.

What disturbs me most about this is it's hard to feel sorry for the guy and his readers when he apparently has gone right back to hosting his videos on youtube under the the new userneame PubDefTV. Dude! Move to a reputeable host like blip.tv!

youtube, free speach and the tyrany of private public spaces

Let me just start at the end,

F*ck youtube.

Ever day I become more appalled by youtube's complete disregard for it's users.

Sooner or later people are going to realize youtube is a complete tyrant that has no respect for their freedom of speach or right to fair use.

Youtube is one tyrant putting other tyrants, namely big media companies, concerns over individuals right to free speach and fair use. I don't understand how there hasn't been a mass exodus from youtube. Enough already. Vote with your feet people and leave. There are far better video hosting sites. Two of my personal favorites are blip.tv and vimeo.com. Most importantly though, host your own vlog.

I'm not calling for a boycott here. I just wonder why there hasn't been more backlash. I hear more and more cases about DMCA take down abuse on youtube every day and I wonder why people don't do the obvious thing and simply leave youtube.

Case in point, I just stumbled on a nice little post by Washington DC vlogger Kenya Allmond about the deletion of one of her videos by youtube. Apparently it was just 3 minutes of her friend singing along to a few lines of a prince song as they drove down the road. She has reposted it without sound to see if youtube delete's it again.

Yesterday I received a lovely notice from YouTube indicating that one of my videos was removed due to copyright infringement. The notice also stated that repeat incidents of copyright infringement would result in deletion of my account and all the videos uploaded to said account.

What was the video? Did I record something from TV and post it? Did I rip a DVD and post it? It was none of these. It is a video of the boyfriend lipsyncing to Prince’s “Kiss”.

Excerpt from: Kenya Allmond: In My Own Words � YouTube Video Removed for Copyright Infringement

Great eh? How absurd is it that a person can't even share a clip of their friend singing a song while driving down the street? Why do people still use youtube again?

This may seem trivial, but it's not. It's a basic free speach issue. Our right to be secure in our ability to communicate with and share our personal moments with whomever we choose. Video is the new frontier of free speach. Just as you can quotes from a book we need mechanisms and established methods for quoting or referencing in video.

Let's go over some key points:

• youtube doesn't even bother to review DMCA take down merits



• youtube often simply deletes videos and even whole accounts without pre-warning



• youtube not only deletes the video but all the comments, discussion and related material that go with it... effectively "disappearing" it (sort of like a corrupt regime might "disappear" political dissidents) so no record exists of potential wrong doing, not even how many videos youtube has "disappeared".



• once deleted accounts and videos often can't be resserected even though clearly the reason for doing so is often flimsy and unstated



• youtube automates the process for big companies to take down literally anything they feel like regardless of merit



• youtube doesn't even bother to tell you who requested a take down, why, nor offer you any due process



• often videos are deleted without review simply because the title mentions an artist, show or movie



• often videos are taken down because someone sings, quotes lyrics from, or even plays a song



• youtube is extremely quick to respond to take downs without review but very slow to respond to DMCA counter notices

All this adds up to one thing. Youtube really doesn't respect its users. They've put big media's interests far above citizens rights to free speach and fair use. I encourage people to go find someone who does respect their rights. Like Kenya use a better video host like blip.tv or vimeo.com, and host your blog on blogger.com or wordrpress.net or even your own domain.

Meanwhile on a respectable video host vimeo.com, a site that respects it's users freedom of speach and fair use the hot meme for over a year has been "lip dubbing" with 1114 vidoes as of this writing. Put a song on the ipod and lip sync the lyrics into the camera as you listen along. Clearly on youtube the majority of these lip dubbing videos if not all would be removed.



This is Nagi. from Knock Knock and Vimeo.