Tag / Google

by Frank Maduri

Collapsing Net: Verizon Swallows Up Yahoo

The news that media/telecom giant Verizon has obtained the core businesses of Yahoo for over $4 billion comes as no surprise. The deal had been in the works and the Verizon executive leadership had been interested and stated that interest for months regarding the potential acquisition of Yahoo.

The component that I think myself and others in the general public have with this deal is two-fold: the huge companies seem to just get even larger, and one of the last big names from the glory days of “the Net” has gone by the wayside.

This news is just further evidence that the world is changing and that the technologies and methods of communicating are shifting away from the traditional ways we had once utilized the internet (email, news sites, blogging) to an even faster paced use of social media sites, instant messaging applications, Instagram, and Snapchat.

In fact, part of the Yahoo business portfolio which was very attractive to Verizon in this transaction was the social media platform called Tumblr (which I have a blog site called “The Write Path”) which will be folded in to the stable of other Verizon owned websites with targeted advertising planned for that millennial demographic which frequents the platform.

Verizon, which purchased AOL previously, will most likely merge Yahoo with AOL in a combination of two former internet powerhouses to compete against Google and Facebook. That being stated, the expectation from Verizon and everyone else with knowledge of that industry is not that Verizon anticipates surpassing those two behemoths, it is the fact that being in that top tier with the amount of advertising dollars floating around is still a great spot to land in.
It is estimated that about one billion users a day visit some portion of the Yahoo family of websites. In my own experience, having written several contributing pieces for Yahoo through their freelance news division, the sites have a network of really devoted users. That was the main driver behind this deal for Verizon: the ability to get that many users looking at their mobile advertising. The number of loyal users for Yahoo properties enabled them to leverage a better deal from Verizon than was initially anticipated.

The other winner out of this deal is the NFL and football fans because Verizon streams games on Sundays and they can expand their reach with Yahoo as the NFL looks to sell streaming rights to their other live game packages. That is going to be an interesting development to watch closely in the coming months.

The demise of Yahoo is sad to me on a personal note because I have been a loyal user on their site since the beginning and have worked for them as a contract writer for a period of time as well. The concept for the company and the brand was very well thought out at one point, for many of us, Yahoo was our introduction to the wide world of the internet and to search engines.

It has now gone the way of so many other companies or brands in America, it has been consolidated by a bigger company. The company changed the way we all did things and it changed our collective lifestyles. It will now evolve into something else as the internet and social media makes a new turn into a new area of which is still yet to be determined. It is the nature of things, but it is still sad to see another iconic brand go away.

The internet has shaped how we get information: news, restaurant reviews, recipes, and stock market reports. It evolved into social media and the next step will probably be one of further customization and networking of people together in a unique platform. It will be interesting to see how Verizon reinvents Yahoo to adjust to those changes in the terrain.

by Frank Maduri

Television Wars: The Future of Home Entertainment

The rapid technological advancements in the mass media are causing a shift in the way in which the general public will utilize their home entertainment. The advent of Apple TV changed the landscape when it hit the market, and other streaming services and content providers are looking to continue to shape the market in the future.

 

In order to compete in the marketplace with Apple, Google launched their own product, Google TV, back in October 2010. In the years since then, the number of content providers and subscription services for the distribution of television programs and movies exploded. Google has since renamed their product after their “Chrome” product platform.

 

Now the landscape is crowded with systems such as Aveo, Roku, and Slingbox as well as subscription content providers in Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Direct Video. These products and services coupled with the telecom companies’ movement into the television market with products such as Verizon’s FIOS, and AT&T’s UVerse, and the television wars have officially begun.

 

All of this content is transmitted by a signal today, and these companies and service providers are going to compete for the right to send their signal to your home. It happens every day if you have cable television service through a company such as Comcast, and you receive calls and emails from Verizon trying to entice you to switch to their FIOS service.

 

“Binge watching”

 

I have written about the evolution in the medium of television in the past, but I was thinking about all of these changes again over the Christmas/ New Year’s holidays when I had some time to unwind and watch a couple of movies.

 

It is still incredible to me that through a service such as, Amazon Direct, you can watch whatever movie you want in their catalog, or you could “binge watch” a television series you may have never seen before from the start of the series all the way through to the end, in sequence, with no commercials.

 

This approach to watching a series is the new trend in television viewing, and the broadcast networks as well as the cable, satellite, and telecom providers are increasingly aware of this viewer preference. They are providing their viewers or subscribers with several different ways to “binge watch” their favorite programs through video-on-demand services, streaming of both old and new episodes on the network website, and providing access to the show via subscription content providers such as Netflix or Hulu.

 

This method of viewing an entire season or an entire series run of episodes is very appealing to Americans, who like the freedom to watch whatever they want, at whatever time they want to watch it. The days of “appointment TV,” when you had to be home at a certain time on a certain night because the show was something the viewer could not miss, are over. The average person is too busy today with all of the new technology and the demands of their respective careers or families for that approach to be viable anymore.

 

In this case the network and cable television broadcast companies got it right to capitalize on the marketing of these new platforms available to stream content and expand the viewership of their programming. These same executives have missed the mark at other points and have alienated viewers in the past. The networks, at another point in time, would have considered restricting access to their programming to their own detriment; though they continue to favor subscription services rather than Aveo and some other services that tend to provide the content for less money.

 

Some say the networks were smart to provide their programming content via the Internet and other platforms. However, I think they really had no choice because if they did not provide the content, they would have lost many viewers, so they did so for their own survival.

 

In fact, some people have already “cut the cable cord” and are using these other devices and services rather than paying for a cable or satellite service for television in their homes.

 

Original Programming

 

The other trend which will also serve to further accentuate the competition for viewers is the push toward the development of more original programming for the new age outlets such as Netflix, Amazon Direct, and Chrome TV.   The appeal for the high profile actors and actresses in Hollywood to sign on for original programs on these new formats is two-fold:

  1. The content providers have lots of cash to shell out to produce their own programming and pay the stars associated – so money is a key factor
  2. The rules for the content they can produce are different than if they did a mainstream show on a major network or a basic cable program. The rules for what they can display are similar to a series produced for a premium tier cable channel such as HBO or Showtime. That freedom from normal regulatory constraints is very compelling to certain stars to be able to work on a show that is unvarnished and bold.

 

Some of these programs have been successful already in their limited runs, which has only served to fill the pipeline with more concepts for future development. Netflix recently announced that they are developing original programming for children, which opens up a whole new avenue to market their service to families.  Amazon is working a few new original programming concepts as well.

 

The two other recent developments that have further continued this trend of original programming is the news of the Disney deal with Netflix, and the potential for exclusive sports programming moving to these new media service providers.

 

The Disney deal with Netflix will eventually provide for Disney movies to be available exclusively through a subscription to Netflix in probably about four years from now. However, Disney owns Marvel Studios and the rights to most of their comic book characters. Marvel and Netflix will be producing at least four original series, each focused on a single character, for release in the near future (www.usatoday.com).

 

The recent announcement by the NFL that they are strongly considering the addition of another tier of playoffs is rumored to be driven by the strong interest and deep pockets of Apple TV and Google to land the digital rights to sporting events, particularly the NFL (www.money.cnn.com).

 

These types of digital rights deals are going to be the future of professional sports viewing as well, and it serves as another reminder that the world is rapidly changing. The business activity and marketing campaigns have also made it abundantly clear: these changes are here to stay.

 

In addition, as these properties continue to advance they will get monetized differently, and as some have seen with certain programs on Hulu, you will have commercial interruptions on certain programs. The advertising agencies and the networks will find ways to deliver their sponsor’s message as these services grow more prevalent in the future.

 

So whether you have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Direct, or all three services; I hope you enjoy the viewing options for content that they provide because in the future it is only going to get bigger and better.