Daily Nonsense

Amazon is selling the MP3 only version of the new U2 album for only $3.99!  This appears to be the same content offered by iTunes for $9.99.  You can get this great deal by clicking this link: U2 – No Line on the Horizon

U2 – No Line on the Horizon

Something I found on boingboing this morning.  Thoughtful discussion on how the convergence of TV and the computer didn’t really result in a new appliance.  The apparent winner of the war is the computer which has been refined to supplant traditional TV distribution.

Although the advent of some of the devices that stream NetFlix does lay the foundation for an argument for a newer convergent appliance, they are the exception and not required to take advantage of the rich online content.

The incentive to figure out the technologies is not limited to the youth.  I’m a 51 year old man who streams NetFlix through a PlayOn server into a PlayStation 3 80GB and from there into my HDTV.  The incentive to use the Watch Instantly content on a screen bigger than my laptop was all it took.

Funny how this discussion mirrors the whole MP3 & music industry brouhahas in so many ways, staid and uninventive massive corporations trying to force a product down the throats of a demographic that want more than the ‘Top 40′.  It should be clear to almost everyone at this point that the consumer really makes the rules, not the mindless and faceless corporations.

Why TV Lost: a merry jig on the gogglebox’s grave

Posted by Cory Doctorow, March 3, 2009 11:48 AM | permalink

Paul Graham’s "Why TV Lost" is a sweet little schadenfreude bomb lobbed at the telly people, half neener-neener and half keen analysis and every word of it is lovable:

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…

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…

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.

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal described how TV networks were trying to add more live shows, partly as a way to make viewers watch TV synchronously instead of watching recorded shows when it suited them. Instead of delivering what viewers want, they’re trying to force them to change their habits to suit the networks’ obsolete business model. That never works unless you have a monopoly or cartel to enforce it, and even then it only works temporarily.

Why TV Lost (via Negatendo)

[Thanks, boingboing]

Help Van Mausing eradicate zombie mice.

With a tag line like ‘You’re hallucinating. Might as well enjoy it.’ it’s kinda’ hard to go wrong.