Aereo is the undisputed leader when it come to my favorite company to write about over the past couple of years. You will remember them as the ambitious startup that aimed to stream live broadcast television and offered cloud based DVR services to subscribers for a small monthly fee. Roll forward to this past Friday, months after the devastating loss they suffered in the Supreme Court, they filed for bankruptcy. Although this seemed to be the final chapter in their short lived history, it doesn’t have to end this way. While the courts ruled that Aereo’s business
model ran afoul of copyright law, the underlying technology, which uses tiny
antennas to stream video to subscribers, could still be very valuable. The reality is that Aereo only foreshadowed a massive industry shakeup that is changing everything about television. As more people cut the cord and switch to on-demand services like Netflix and HBO Go, cable television (as we now know it) will slowly die out as will the lucrative retransmission fees they pay the broadcasters. Apparently I'm in good company with my prediction as Reed Hastings CEO Netflix has thrown down the gauntlet to the traditional television business, declaring it will be dead by 2030.
The latest news that has peaked my interest is this weeks comment from their Lawyers
stating that there is "plenty of interest in the
company’s assets" and asked the bankruptcy judge for an auction to be scheduled for Feb. 17. More: Bloomberg 11/24/14 - Aereo’s Assets Eyed by Possible Bidders, Lawyer Says
In the growing competitive field of Streaming Sticks, Amazon introduced the Fire TV Stick today. Designed to take on challengers like the Roku Streaming sticks and Chromecast dongle, Amazon’s HDMI-based media adapter represents a smaller, less expensive complement to their $99 Fire TV box. The new smaller and even more affordable device sells for
$39 and features access to Netflix, Prime Instant Video, Hulu Plus, Twitch, WatchESPN and a variety of other services right out of the box. Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com founder and CEO, said in announcing the new product, “The team has packed an unbelievable amount of power and selection into an incredible price point.”
The company said the Fire TV Stick has 50 percent more processing power and 2x the memory of Chromecast, and 6x the processing power, 2x the memory, and 32x the storage of Roku Streaming Stick It supporting standards like DIAL allowing users to fling shows from services like YouTube, Spotify, and Netflix (coming soon) from an Android phone or iPhone. They began to take pre-orders today and will
start shipping the new product on 19th of November.
Overall the specs look good and based on Amazon great success with the Fire TV Box, which launched a little more than six months ago and quickly became the best-selling streaming media box on the e-retailer, the Fire TV Stick might be the first product that will be a serious challenger to Chromecast in terms of both features and value. Obviously Mr. Bezos believes he has a winner, the rest of us will have to wait and see how it performs in the real world to be sure. More: TechCrunch.com 10/27/14 - Amazon’s New Fire TV Stick Is A $39 Chromecast Competitor With A Hardware Remote and Variety.com 10/27/14 - Amazon Whips Out TV Stick Against Google’s Chromecast and Roku and/or Twice.com 10/27/14 - Amazon Unveils Fire TV Stick
Television is changing and viewers are embracing and personalizing it as they're consumption habits morph. According
to Adobe's bi-annual Video Benchmark Report, authenticated TV Everywhere
viewing surged 388% in the second quarter compared to the same quarter last
year. Indicating that more people watched more TV online than ever before while programmers witnessed broader use as unique monthly viewers increased by 146 per cent across browsers and TV apps. Although online TV consumption still remains fragmented across platforms, gaming consoles and OTT devices gained the largest percentage of market share and Android apps surpassed desktop browsers as access points for watching TV online.
The
pace of industry consolidation as well as the businesses general move towards IP distribution models were
never more evident than they were this past week. On the heels of HBO's announcement of a plan to offer a Web-based service that doesn’t require a cable or satellite TV subscription, CBS announced that it will launch an All Access video-on-demand service that comes with a $5.99-per-month subscriber fee and has current and past seasons available for viewing. Local CBS television station streams will also be available through the subscription in 14 markets. "It seems pretty apparent that every media company in America is thinking about direct-to-consumer, mobile, digital" said Les Moonves after the announcement. ReCode also reported that CBS is considering an HBO-like service for its premium network Showtime. “We are always looking at ways of expanding our audience and it is certainly something that we have been examining for some time” said Moonves.
What HBO and CBS have done suggests the future of TV will be messier and more confusing in the near-term but ultimately consumers will have more choice of what they watch and how much they pay for it. No doubt this weeks developments suggests an avalanche of
television networks and studios moving quickly to announce online apps and
services. Sony, Dish and ABC all have been developing streaming strategies. And in the way that chattering about changing technology helps propel that change, the HBO and CBS announcements, separated by one day, creates a new momentum. Things are going to change even faster now. It’s a sign that the content business is suddenly racing into the
broadband space. MORE: ReCode.net 10/16/14 - Now CBS Is Selling Web Subscriptions to Its Shows, Too
