Stephen W. Dittmore, PhD

Thoughts on the business of media, professional sport, and college athletics

Is ESPN Charging a Tax on Every American Household? via @MATTatACA > In praise of a la carte

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via dailyfinance.com

Admittedly, I'm way late to the party on this article, but the beauty of social media is that you discover things you had not previously seen.

I know economic models show that a la carte pricing for cable channels is inefficient and will drive many channels out of business, but while I will gladly pay $4.96 for ESPN (or even $10.96) my satellite bill pushes $80 month, and for what? 125 channels that I don't watch, many I don't know that I have. I'd gladly pay premiums for those channels I do watch. My bet is my overall satellite bill goes down.

Springsteen was wrong. There are way more 57 channels with nothing on.

Interesting take on "signature content" from @niemanlab and @kdoctor ; Calls sport network "classic business model of our age"

Although a few days, old, this article posted on the Nieman Journalism Lab by Ken Doctor makes interesting points regarding the importance of "signature content". Doctor points to the sucess of sports websites at creating this "signature content."

we see increased branding of stars at places like Time, The New York Times, Fox News, and ESPN. The sports network may be the classic business model of our age, and in its anchors and top analysts — many initially lured from daily newspapers — it has shown the way for many years now.

And it's not just the printed content. High profile sports governing bodies such as the NFL, the Olympics, and even the NCAA continue to extract large media rights fees from networks as networks seek "signature content". Heck, you could even argue the value in "signature content" spawned the Big Ten Nework, Pac-12 Network, Longhorn Network, etc.

As those prices rise, so do the costs for the consumer as the networks seek fees, something Doctor also addresses in his piece.

Forget “content wants to be free.” Now content wants a fee. And everyone from Time Inc to The New York Times to the Memphis Commercial Appeal to Hulu’s co-owners (Fox, Disney, and Comcast) see gold. They see another digital revenue stream, in addition to advertising or to cable subscription fees. Yet they are increasingly believing they’ve got to up the ante (and Hulu is raising new funds to buy original programming) to compete and to win those consumer dollars.

Sports media has seen tremendous consolidation. Comcast bought NBC Universal and just today, USA Today purchased Big Lead Sports. The era of sports media oligopolies is here and "signature content" is the reason why.

Cundiff, Williams show how athletes should handle themselves in adversity

Billy Cundiff and Kyle Williams were both trending topics on Twitter last night, but for all the wrong reasons. Cundiff missed a short field goal that would have tied the Ravens-Patriots game and was immediately eviscerated as if he had killed Santa. Williams fumbled twice in the late stages of the 49ers-Giants game to put the Giants in a position to win. Neither cost their team a Super Bowl (Scott Norwood) or an NCAA title (Chris Webber) or a World Series (Bill Buckner), yet the comparisons to those unfortunate instances prevail

In the era of finger pointing, Cundiff and Williams have done none of that. Cundiff answered questions from reporters, placing the blame on himself. Deadspin/Slate/NPR reporter/failed NFL training camp kicker Stefan Fatsis offered a trilogy (triumvirate?) of explanations of what went wrong on the kick, how Cundiff is handing himself, and how the scoreboard operator at Gillette Stadium was wrong. Cundiff still says he should have made the kick.

As for Williams, he takes to the air tomorrow with an appearance on the Dan Patrick Show.

Whether it is an organization that makes a mistake, or an individual, most of the public likes to hear ownership of the mistake, not shifting the blame (see Clemens, Roger and his steroid stories). I say most because there are the deranged people who think it is okay to take to Twitter to threaten folks. MLB Network reporter Trenni Kusinerek offers an interesting column on this, including some vicious threats on Williams (H/T @publiside for sharing on Twitter).

I know when I talk to my six-year-old (who wanted the Ravens to win) about sportsmanship and trying your best, I will point to Cundiff. Not the idiots who took to Twitter and wanted to hang Williams. Unfortunately, more of sports is becoming like the latter.
Posterous theme by Cory Watilo
  
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