So Project Kangaroo, the video on demand joint venture, has been bounced for ever, and the shareholders are not going to appeal the decision of the Competition Commission.
Some market analysts like Enders believe that ITV, the BBC and Channel 4 have got off lightly, as they argue that it would have cost the companies more to run than they could generate in revenue, from advertising, pay-per-view or subscription. Certainly it wouldn’t have been easy money – advertising revenue is on the slide across the board, and the BBC’s iPlayer has reinforced the notion that you can get great quality video content from respected brands on the internet which is free at the point of use.
As for alternative aggregators, there are no other big success stories in the online video marketplace. While the Apple video solutions are as elegant, as you would expect, they are not as successful in the video market as they are in music. Specialists like Joost and Babelgum are also struggling to make their mark, and with the demise of Kangaroo there will be no pressure on the broadcasters to make their content available.
Whatever business you are in it starts (and ends) with the customer. So when it comes to video, what do customers want?
They want to watch great video content, easily found and easily delivered. iPlayer makes it look simple, although the promotional might of the BBC gives it a huge leg up on the way. YouTube, in terms of traffic, is even more popular amongst TalkTalk users. By comparison, 4oD and itv.com are much lower profile, despite being well executed and with some great content available.
However, searching for what you want is tricky. Let’s say if I’ve missed the first transmission of the new Minder. I’ll miss it altogether if I look for it on itv.com, since it’s a Five title. If I Google it, I have to wade my way through all the references to the old George Cole/Dennis Waterman series before I stand a chance of finding what I want. Some new entrants like 123webtv are trying to improve searching for video on the web, but even then they only provide a link to the appropriate service.
So the Competition Commission’s decision leaves our customers with a harder task to find video content online, with no focal point for a broad range of UK content and no incentive for the broadcasters to make their content available to other providers.
Could they not have let them run the service for a period and then review it? If the launch costs were up to £30m, as has been suggested, then the shareholders would have had every incentive to ensure that they would fulfil competition provisions after 12 months! This would have had the double benefit of not only creating a new service from the UK’s foremost providers, but also giving the other services a chance to compete if they were given access to broadcaster content.
However, all is not lost. There are a number of initiatives we are considering which may go towards giving customers what they want in terms of accessing the best video content available online – so watch this space…
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Anonymous
TalkTalk Blog Team