Friday, August 02, 2002

oh, well, another place to burn those minutes that will never exist again

The Useless Pages. Oh what a wealth of mindbending links to absolutely nothing worth reading.
posted by lee on 08/02/02 at 05:45 AM

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Yesterday’s News - for a price

WSJ.com - Major Business News: ABC Starts Charging Viewers For Video Clips on the Internet

"In a sign of the growing pressure on media companies to make money from their online efforts, Walt Disney Co.'s ABC News will no longer allow users free access to video clips on its Web site.

"Instead, ABC News Wednesday will begin charging visitors a $4.95 monthly fee to view news programming on its Web site, ABCNews.com. ABC News will also greatly expand the range of news programming to include full broadcasts of "World News Tonight With Peter Jennings" and "Nightline," as well as a 30-day archive of those shows and other material, rather than the more limited selection of short clips that was previously available on the site. The expanded programming also will be available through RealOne, a package of news and entertainment offered by RealNetworks Inc. for $9.95 a month."

But, so as not to alienate its TV affiliates, you can only view today's news tomorrow.

Why would I want to pay for stuff I can watch for nothing on TV? Or view the same story ad infinitum -- there are very few exclusives these days. I have a hunch ABCNews.com isn't going to make enough on this to justify the expense of redesigning the website and programming (or contracting) transactions capabilities to accomodate this change.

ABC also said they quality of the video would be better. Maybe -- but it'll probably take so long to download you'll forget what it is you were going to watch.
posted by lee on 08/02/02 at 05:27 AM

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