The Mouse Starts to Roar as a Channel Changer

By Jim Barthold

Here's a news flash: Television viewers don't need a television to view television. Some, in fact, don't even want one. According to a Consumer Internet Barometer produced by The Conference Board and TNS, a pair of custom research companies, lean-forward online viewing is starting to gain ground at the expense of those who build their content and networks around couch potatoes.

"This really is just a wake-up call that the traditional means are not the only means, and we're beginning to see initial signs that people are willing to take their TV viewing to the PC or whatever downloadable or streamable model is available," said Lynn Franco, director of the Conference Board Consumer Research Center.

Drilling down a little deeper as the marketing folks are wont to say, it seems nearly two-thirds of the people surveyed like the ability to carry and watch content on portable devices while a stunningly low number – about one-third, according to the responses from 10,000 households nationwide – don't want to watch commercials. We'd have thought those numbers might have been reversed, having watched that serial Nissan Sentra ad once too often.

Video-on-demand can appease the personal convenience part of consumer demand, but "doesn't play into portability, and that could be an area that grows in years to come," said Franco, and it sometimes even includes commercials.

The mighty mouse

Franco advised this-generation content delivery providers dealing with next-generation content viewers "to approach consumers through a variety of different means that put the power in the person handling the remote or the mouse."

While broadcasters are, to some extent, embracing the portability and personalization aspects of content with their Web-based replays and cable operators have long pushed as much content onto VOD as possible, there's another area that's promising to cut through the traditional video delivery like a high school linebacker shredding the paper wall the cheerleaders are holding. Independent TV shows, available only on the Internet, are starting to gather their own cult status.

The champion of Internet-based cults, Jeff Pulver, who made VoIP a household term and VON a force, has noticed that trend and is jumping into it with both feet via Network2, a compilation and presentation of the best independent TV shows available only on the Internet. The Pulver-backed site features a guide to episodic programming that ranges from reality shows like "Alive in Baghdad," where citizen journalists cover the war, to "Fearless Cooking," where Gloria Piper cooks anything for your viewing pleasure – including on a future show, we understand, cable's goose.

Network2 is an Internet-based mini-cable system that pulls independent content together in one place to make it easy for viewers to find.

"The beauty and value of the Internet as a distribution means for television is instead of having to go after blockbusters, instead of asking how many millions of people you're going to look at, you can go after the people that really are going to respond as an audience," said Chris Brogan, community developer for Network2.

Katie Couric, whose nightly newscasts are pushed over the Web, will probably never answer an e-mail she receives about something she said or read, but Brian Conley, who produces the Baghdad show, most likely would. In fact, Brogan counts on it.

"This is insanely personal product," said Brogan. "The idea of putting independent producers in the driver's seat means that no one can tell us who should or shouldn't be on the platform and what shows we should or shouldn't watch."

Who's gonna pay?

For now, Network2 is free, but that's unlikely to continue if it picks up steam, and you can figure there will eventually be some cost-based model – perhaps even, shudder, advertising – added to it. It's also pretty much targeted to a user with a computer or portable device, but that, too – and this should frighten traditional video content delivery guys – is changeable because the end devices have ways to connect to the Internet, ironically through the broadband connection being delivered by the cable or telephone company.

"They can watch this on their 60-inch plasma screen and be as comfortable as anyone watching your standard cable product, but they're watching what they choose to watch," Brogan said.

Brogan was quick to differentiate the programming, which is vetted by Network2 before it goes on the site, from more freewheeling content from players like YouTube. Still, it is unmistakably unprofessional compared to the scripted fare available from the large broadcast and cable networks, as rare as scripted shows are becoming.

That difference might not matter when it comes to attracting and losing viewers, said Franco.

The eyes have it

"If consumers are going online to watch this, then it becomes a question of time – time away from traditional means to watch the untraditional, whether it's professional or not," Franco said. "In that sense, it could cut into viewing," she said.

Remember when cable TV was all about TV running over a coaxial cable?

- Jim Barthold