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As you may have heard, Time Warner is experimenting with a new pricing scheme in which they limit the amount of data users are allowed to transfer each month over their cable internet service.

They claim that this is to manage costs.  But as Dave Burstein (of DSL Prime) said, that’s not really it at all.  That’s the same reason that Comcast gives for their throttling nonsense, which clearly hasn’t gone over well with heavy ‘net users.

But if that were the real reason, why would Verizon be so anxious to give me 20mbps in both directions and not throttle or limit a single thing?  Well let’s see… what other possible reason could Cable companies have to stop you from downloading large files like, oh I don’t know… TV shows and movies?

Fact is… cable companies have an opportunity here that they are wasting because they want to cling to a Cable TV and PayPerView-based business model that is quickly being eroded by iTunes, Xbox, Amazon, Netflix, etc.

But instead of capitalizing on this change, by offering users more of what they need in order to leverage it (ie. faster speeds) for a reasonable price increase, they’d rather discourage you from using these new IP-based offerings.

I guess they saw how well fighting the digital trend worked for those other media companies and decided that they can alienate their customers and lock them into outdated business models with the best of them.

Fortunately, some of us have viable alternatives.  And with moves like this, companies like Verizon with FIOS will have even more people lined up to pay them for service.

Following up on my last post, Walt Mossberg himself decided to drop by my comments section to justify his position. As I said in another comment answering his, I believe his explanation that the 50% difference in cost includes the price of an add-on WiFi adapter to be quite reasonable. However, the article makes no mention of that and in my mind it’s just as reasonable for any reader to believe that figure is in error.

What’s more, I still believe his response to my initial e-mail was uncalled for, and that his suggestion that I should apologize to him is rather absurd. However, I’ve been wrong before. So rather than arguing any further, I’ll simply the share the e-mails in question and let you decide who overreacted.

From: Brandon Paddock
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 1:34 PM,
Subject: Question about Apple TV article (error?)

Hi there,

I’m curious about this quote from your Apple TV article.

“But the comparable Xbox costs 50% more than Apple TV, is much larger and stores only half as much material.”

Where does the 50% number come from? I would think the Xbox 360 with equivalent functionality would be the Core System, which is priced identically to the Apple TV box ($299). I say equivalent functionality because as far as I’m aware, the Apple TV doesn’t yet store anything on its hard drive, and its primary purpose is to stream data from an iTunes-equipped PC. As a bonus, the 360 can be equipped with a hard drive at a later date (possibly a much larger one) and play games and DVDs.

However, more concerning is that the 50% number doesn’t even make sense for the most expensive Xbox 360 system, which is priced at $399 (thus a 30% number would make more sense, or you could just be clear and say $399). Thus I have to believe the 50% number to be in error. If not, I’d be interested in a clarification of where it came from.

Thanks,
Brandon Paddock
http://brandonlive.com

From: Walt Mossberg
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 1:42 PM
To: Brandon Paddock
Cc: Katherine Boehret
Subject: Re: Question about Apple TV article (error?)

Boy, you really have to read more carefully before accusing people of error. The $299 Apple TV has a 40 GB hard disk and can sync with any Mac or Windows computer, storing the media from those computers, PLUS stream from five more Mac or Windows computers and stream directly from the internet.

Next time, READ the article before emailing.

Walt

Walt insists he read my message “word-for-word” before responding. Doesn’t look that way to me, though.

This afternoon I was reading an article about the new Apple TV device written by Walt Mossberg and Katherine Boehret of the Wall Street Journal.

As I was reading it, this line jumped out at me:

But the comparable Xbox costs 50% more than Apple TV, is much larger and stores only half as much material.

50% more? Where did they get 50%? The Apple TV is $299, and the most expensive Xbox 360 is $399. By my admittedly hasty calculation, that appears to be about 30% more, not 50. Curious about the origin of this figure, I clicked the “Email” link at the bottom of the page and politely inquired about it. I concluded my message, “Thus I have to believe the 50% number to be in error. If not, I’d be interested in a clarification of where it came from.”

I also suggested that a comparison between the Apple TV and the equally priced Xbox 360 model might be more appropriate than they had suggested - as the main functionality of the Apple TV doesn’t make use of its 40GB hard drive, making it of questionable advantage with the current software. Surely the Xbox’s ability to play games and DVDs (plus support any resolution including old TVs and the top-end 1080p) could help balance out that largely ethereal advantage.

I received a response within 10 minutes from Mossberg himself, which normally I’d find to be quite impressive. Unfortunately, what I got was an unprofessional flame mail that didn’t address my concern. Instead, it very rudely suggested that I was too uninformed to comment on the Apple TV. He said that if I thought there was an error, it was because I didn’t read the article “carefully” enough. He concluded his message saying, “Next time, READ the article before emailing.”

Perhaps Walt should take his own advice and READ his e-mail before flaming a concerned reader. Even if the error wasn’t in plain sight, his response was uncalled for. Who knows, maybe he’s just having a bad day. That still doesn’t excuse such an unprofessional response from someone of his supposed journalistic integrity. Walt, you need to chill out. Maybe someone needs a vacation?

DailyTech has a report that ATI has been misleading consumers with their claims that their video cards are “HDCP-ready.”

True or not, one thing has been made clear:  The entertainment industry doesn’t have a clue.

They claim that rampant piracy is hurting their bottom line, and that despite thier best efforts (suing customers, installing viruses and rootkits on your PC, enforcing anti-consumer DRM policies) - consumers still download movies, TV shows, and music from illegitimate sources.

So what’s there next brilliant move?  Make it so that your computer will be forced to down-scale High Definition content that you paid for.  Meanwhile, pirated copies will be available that play in full resolution on any PC.

Does this sound backwards to anyone else? 

Seriously… what genious came up with the idea that they could beat piracy by making pirated copies better quality than what you can buy at the store?  You can’t encourage piracy and then complain about it.  But that’s exactly what they’re doing.

I think it’s time consumers started looking out for their own interests.  Speak up against the HDCP requirements.  Don’t pay for crippled content.  Don’t let them hold your content hostage and extort you for more money to buy new “approved” HD hardware.  It’s wrong, and it’s up to consumers to fight it.

Chris pretty much hit the nail on the head.

See, there’s a reason bit torrent and other P2P services are so popular.  And it’s not the ”free” part that makes it so.

You see, there have always been pirates and illegal bootlegs.  Well, at least as long as there have been VCRs.  And there’s very little you’re going to be able to do to prevent a very small group of crooks from trying to profit from illegal copies of popular works.  At the very least, they’ll use a camcorder and point it at a monitor to make their copies.  Hell, they’ve done that in movie theaters for years.

So why is P2P a big deal?  Accessibility.  It’s easy and it’s convenient.  People feel more like criminals when they watch the 5 minutes of warnings on a DVD than when they click on a link and get what they want.

How should the movie and TV industries compete with the likes of Bit Torrent?  By offering us something better.  What do I mean?

Movies:

• I want to pay you money for the movies I want to see.  I want to pay you for an HD copy that I can download from a fast server that will play on my Media Center, my Xbox 360, my phone via ORB, or maybe an iPod Video (if I had one). 
• Don’t make me wait.  If I can get something I want sooner by another means, I probably will.  We Americans are impatient folks.  If you’ve got the movie ready to watch, I don’t want to play your little games.  I don’t go to movie theaters because I like being surrounded by annoying high school kids, paying out the ass for soda and popcorn, or to experience audio and video that’s inferior to my home theater system.  I do it because that’s where you release them first and it’s really my only option most of the time.

And for TV:

• Would I pay Time Warner $2 to watch one TV show?  No.  So why would I pay Apple that? 
• I pay Comcast $50/month or something for digital cable.  Plus $10/month for HD DVR.  Companies like Apple shouldn’t be trying to get me to pay piecemeal for shows I’m already paying a subscription for.  They should be offering me a better subscription.
• An online TV show service could so easily replace cable TV for me entirely.  And I’d love it.  IPTV is great for live events, sports, etc.  But for most of the TV I watch, who the heck wants to simulate a broadcast scenario when it should be as easy as downloading a goddam file.  Who needs to worry about CableCards, DVRs, and all that junk.
• How would I do it?  Start by making good shows.  Then make the first 2 episodes of the season completely free to download.  Then charge me for the rest of the season.  Include some targetted advertising if that’s what makes this possible.  I would be more than happy to pay for seasons of SG-1, Atlantis, 24, Firefly, Battlestar Galactica, Family Guy, American Dad, The 4400, Lost, and so on. 
• Hell, you could make a Cable box that works like this.  I could sample shows on demand, then when I find something I like - press a button to buy it, kind of like how Microsoft’s Xbox Live Marketplace works.  Those shows could be automatically downloaded (in an HD MPEG4-like format so you can fit lots on the drive), and I could watch them whenever I want.  The cablebox could be a server with something like Orb or Slingbox so that I could get to my favorite content remotely.

Hell, with a bigger hard drive… the Xbox 360 could do this.  What a coup that would be.