Five-dollar TV shows. As news of NBC and Apple's fight over the price of TV shows streams in today -- first with reports that NBC split with Apple, followed by Apple's testy response that it would no longer stock NBC shows -- it's this number that I can't get out my head. NBC wants people to pay $5 to download its shows for their iPods, iPhones, and Apple TVs. Have the network's execs gone mad?
TV shows on iTunes currently go for $1.99. As I said before, I can understand NBC's quest for price freedom -- I see nothing wrong with networks charge more or less than $2 depending on the specific episode or specific show.
Some episodes of some shows, after all, might make sense going for less than $2. If I were NBC I'd put out the brilliant and under-watched "Friday Night Lights" for sale for 50 cents an episode in order to get people interested in it. I might want to charge $2.50, meanwhile, for popular hour-long dramas (on the theory that someone watching an hour of TV on iTunes is missing more commercials on broadcast TV than someone watching a 30-minute show).
But $5!? Can that sticker be motivated by anything other than pure greed? iTunes is a young, fledgling market. Apple has sold more than 50 million shows through the system, generating a great deal of profits for NBC -- but upping the price of all NBC shows to $5 would surely sink the thing.
Is NBC blind to the alternatives? Folks buy shows from iTunes because we get easy downloads for a low price. But most people are also capable of spending a bit of time on file-sharing networks like Bittorrent to get shows for no price at all. In the digital age, that's the balancing act media companies have to master: They need to give people something easy, cheaply, or we'll get our media with a bit of difficulty, for free.
Does NBC not see this? Has greed outpaced rationality? NBC wants us to pay a lot for something that we can get for free instead. What is it thinking?
[Flickr photo by elisfanclub]
The world in the iPod
The microchip that runs Apple's popular music player is made in India, Taiwan, China and Silicon Valley. Is this an example of how globalization works to everyone's benefit -- or a sign that the world economy is about to roll over America?
By Andrew Leonard, Salon
iLove it or iHate it
Is Apple's new blue bombshell a hit or a dud?
By Janelle Brown and Scott Rosenberg, Salon
An end to the Apple turnover
Steve Jobs accepts the inevitable -- and embraces the CEO title.
By Lydia Lee, Salon
Steve Jobs' iTunes dance
Now the Apple CEO says he would gladly sell songs without digital restrictions, if the record companies let him. That's hardly a brave defiance, and besides, I don't believe him.
By Cory Doctorow, Salon
Apple's iTunes sells 5 billion songs, but you don't own them
Why DRM means your music isn't really yours.
By Farhad Manjoo, Salon
Steve Jobs’ 2009 letter to the community about his health.
Terse and obfuscatory, this thing is Jobs all over.
Apple's obsession with secrecy grows stronger
Apple’s decision to limit communication with the media, shareholders and the public is at odds with the approach of other companies, which are embracing online outlets like blogs and Twitter.
By Brad Stone and Ashlee Vance, The New York Times
The Untold Story: How the iPhone blew Up the wireless industry
This 4.8-ounce sliver of glass and aluminum is an explosive device that has forever changed the mobile-phone business.
By Fred Vogelstein, Wired
A list of Steve Jobs' best quotes
An example: "The cure for Apple is not cost-cutting. The cure for Apple is to innovate its way out of its current predicament."
By Owen Linzmayer, Wired
The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs
Fake Steve Jobs tells all in this hilarious and often informative act of fraudulent auto-blography.
Apple Announces New iPhone OS 3.1 at Keynote
Good Vibrations Sold Everywhere
