Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Hulu Plus, Land Lines and Live Sports

 

OK, so the phone companies raped us for years, and we couldn't do anything about it. Sure, we could have refused to have a phone at all, but with kids, that's not really practical and frankly not safe. Then cellular phones started to work properly and were priced competitively... and I haven't had a land line in 2 years.

Hulu Plus and Netflix and all the other streaming media is beginning to challenge the cable companies that are $%@#&! us in the @$$. Although the vast majority of feedback on the Hulu Plus is that it is crappy, the crackin has been released. All it needs now is for Steve Jobs to perfect the delivery mechanism with enthusiastic flare, approachability and elegant aesthetics.

I'd cancel my cable today if it weren't for the importance of live broadcasts. Seeing live TV just sooths me and reinforces the existence of an ongoing reality.

Breaking news is important. We're in 2 wars, terrorists hate us, oil flows into our lakes, earthquakes, landslides, forest fires, celebrities aren't wearing panties... We need to be on top of this stuff. How long till they install the Emergency Broadcast System onto YouTube or Facebook? Statistically, it might reach more people on porn sites and chatroulette. 

A couple of weeks ago, there was an earthquake in Toronto. People were tweeting while it was still rumbling. The Wikipedia page was up before the aftershock came. It was amazing how quickly crowdsourced information became available to everyone.

Sporting events are essential to see live. Rooting hardly makes sense by itself let alone for an event that has past. That's just foolish.

 

ESPN3.com is doing a great job with the World Cup. They are not just meeting the standards of the best cable broadcast money can buy, they are exceeding it... by a mile. But, they can only broadcast events that are under contract by Disney/ABC/ESPN.

[[posterous-content:pid___1]]

 

Can't get Penn State games contracted to the Big Ten Network. Smaller, proprietary media brokers will gum up the works for a while, but I for one am not going to pay for 500 channels just because I want Big 10 games or Boston Red Sox games (for much longer).

 

Boy, we're close though. And I wonder if the cable companies can feel it yet.

 

Posted via email from Max Spiegel's posterous

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