Why it’s so hard to disrupt the TV industry
There are a bunch of reasons why snappy upstarts like Netflix haven't made much of a dent in the business of existing TV and cable providers. One of the most powerful is discussed by Sanford Bernstein analyst Craig Moffett in this Bloomberg piece today. Turns out cable companies are among the biggest providers of Internet service to individual consumers and can price Netflix users off the charts.
Cable companies see usage-based billing as a way to limit the appeal of online services like Netflix and Hulu LLC, and reduce the threat from new entrants like Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Google Inc.“It’s the reason why Apple or Google would inevitably be reticent about committing a significant amount of capital to an online video model,” Moffett said. “You can’t simply assume just because you can buy the content more cheaply, you can offer a product that’s cheaper to the end user.”
Netflix and Hulu’s subscription services have driven up Web usage at peak hours once reserved for watching TV. Google, Amazon, Apple (AAPL) Inc. and premium channels HBO and Showtime have also put shows online and followed viewers onto mobile devices like iPads and Android tablets.
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Best geeky correction ever
Janet Maslin reviewed the new Steve Jobs biography in last week's New York Times, prompting this awesome correction
An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated the premise of “Angry Birds,” a popular iPhone game. In the game, slingshots are used to launch birds to destroy pigs and their fortresses, not to shoot down the birds.
Apple’s meaningless miss
Oh my gosh, oh goodness gracious, Apple missed Wall Street analyst expectations for the first time in almost a decade and the stock is in free fall.
Well, sort of.
The miss was entirely about the iPhones. They sold 17 million in the third quarter instead of the 20 million-ish analysts expected. Mac and iPad sales were just dandy. But given the delay and build up for the new iPhone, how surprising is this really? And given the huge sales of the iPhone 4S so far -- not too mention the not-yet-disclosed sale of cheap versions of the two older models -- how long will it be before those same Wall Street analysts start massively hiking their estimates of fourth quarter iPhone sales? And that stock plunge? Takes the share price all the way back to last week.
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Android phone cameras versus the iPhone 4S
PC World has a comparison of photo and video quality from the iPhone 4S and some recent Android phones like the Samsung Galaxy S II and the T-Mobile MyTouch Slide 4G. All three rate pretty well though the iPhone lands third in both photo and video ratings. Important to note that usability, speed and other software features were not discussed.
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Optimism from some developers on Windows Phone 7
Randall Stross is buying the Microsoft revival story after talking to some leading iOS game developers:
I sought out iPhone software developers who have done well with iPhone apps to see what they make of Windows Phone. I was surprised that many are already adding titles for Windows Phone, despite the tiny market share.
"Microsoft has a perception problem. Everyone thinks of them as a distant third, but they've got a good product," says David Roberts, chief executive of PopCap, a games developer whose Plants vs. Zombies game is among the iPhone's top-grossing apps. The company just introduced its first Windows Phone game, Bejeweled Live.