# Is Google and the Internet a serious 'threat' to DirecTV?



## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

Is Google and the Internet a serious 'threat' to DirecTV?

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*Another Sign the Internet Is Going to Kill DIRECTV*

As it stands today, the NFL Sunday Ticket allows DIRECTV's subscribers to watch any NFL game. It's expensive -- it costs an extra $300 per year -- but it's popular among NFL junkies, those obsessed with fantasy football, and fans that happen to live in different cities than their favorite team.

The right to carry NFL Sunday Ticket does not come cheap. Right now, DIRECTV pays the NFL $1 billion per year for the priviledge -- a figure that's expected to increase once the current deal expires.

Google, with about $50 billion in the bank, definitely has the resources to make the deal. At the same time, DIRECTV's shareholders might not be sad to see it go -- analysts at Citi believe that the deal costs DIRECTV some $300 million each year.

Like DIRECTV, Google could use the NFL Sunday Ticket as a loss-leader, offering it over YouTube as a way to push deeper into the TV realm. The company's latest gadget, the Chromecast, has been somewhat of an overnight success, selling out nearly instantaneously.

The Chromecast, like its rival Apple TV, acts as a way to beam Internet content to a user's TV set. By paring the Chromecast with the NFL, Google would bolster its TV efforts.

But more than that, it's actually better positioned to offer NFL Sunday Ticket.

It wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that there are NFL fans out there that would be interested in such a package, but can't buy it because they aren't DIRECTV subscribers. Perhaps they've signed a contract with their local cable company, or find that bundling the Internet with cable makes more sense than buying DIRECTV.

By freeing NFL Sunday Ticket from a provider -- and offering it up to anyone with an Internet connection -- it should be able to attract more subscribers. Should that occur, it will be yet another example of content moving online.

This overarching trend -- the move to bring content online -- should frighten DIRECTV shareholders. On paper, the company is a tremendous value: It trades with a below-market multiple, generates cash, and buys back stock aggressively. It's even one of Warren Buffett's picks.

Yet, the potential long-term ramifications of paid-TV's move to the Internet could be catastrophic. Unlike a rival such as Comcast or Time Warner Cable, DIRECTV's Internet offerings are largely non-existent. Thus, it's extremely susceptible to Internet-based competition.

Should a Comcast TV subscriber ditch his cable package for Intel's offering, Comcast would still retain that subscriber's business for Internet access. DIRECTV, on the other hand, lacks that luxury.

DIRECTV's management understands the threat. It tried to buy Hulu last quarter, and on the company's last earnings call, said it was disappointed that Hulu's owners wouldn't sell. DIRECTV might've made Hulu into its own Internet-based service, but without it, the company remains vulnerable.

Should Google acquire the rights to NFL Sunday Ticket, it would be yet another example of the Internet becoming the preferred distribution method for content. YouTube is already a dominant video portal, but by pairing it with the NFL, Google could position itself as a major player in the digital TV world.

At the same time, while the loss of the NFL might be seen as a net positive for DIRECTV, the overarching trend is decisively negative. As it has no Internet offerings, DIRECTV is extremely susceptible to online-based competition, like the service Intel is preparing to launch in the near future. Overall, this trend remains in its infancy, but it's something DIRECTV shareholders need to keep an eye on.

Full Story Here

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DIRECTV, Google: The Nitty-Gritty

Google execs may have been meeting with officials from the NFL in a bid to bring NFL Sunday Ticket to Google after the league's current contract with DIRECTV expires in 2014. While the conversation, which is not officially confirmed, would represent little other than a preliminary exploration, it is no secret that the NFL has been seeing significant revenue increases from other broadcasting partners at the same time as DIRECTV is looking to tighten its belt. NFL Sunday Ticket has not been profitable on a stand-alone basis for the satellite provider, but I believe that even with a hefty price tag, Google could make it a moneymaker.

Currently, DIRECTV pays $1 billion per year, but has fewer than 3 million subscribers, who pay between $225 and $300 per year ; the package is costing the company hundreds of millions per year, although it is a key differentiator that attracts business.

*There have been absolutely no indications from Google, if it were to take over NFL Sunday Ticket, as to how it might price the service. What we do know is that Google reports having 1 billion unique visitors to YouTube each month who watch more than 6 billion hours of video. That means that if 0.5% of YouTube visitors were willing to pay $200 for a season of NFL Sunday Ticket, Google could break even on a $1 billion price tag, while cementing a place of legitimacy for its platform.*

One of the realities of the package is that local games are not available -- meaning you have to turn to cable to watch your home team, Monday Night Football, and games on the NFL network. Where I think the true power of the Google option comes into play is the ease with which it could offer multiple options. Google could continue to offer the full package as it currently exists, but because of the programming flexibility it likely enjoys, could offer alternate options as well.

Consumers who do not want to pay for a full year would likely be willing to buy a few games when they are traveling, so as not to miss their home team, or when there are games that have added significance for them. Single-game or single-team options are a fairly complex proposition when talking about satellite, but become far more straightforward when you include the power of Internet programming. While other networks are likely strongly opposed to the NFL allowing fans to "cut the cord," the benefit to consumers and Google could be significant. While this story is in its infancy, Google investors should pay close attention, because nothing will put YouTube on the map as a cable competitor faster than the NFL.

Full Story Here


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## TheRatPatrol (Oct 1, 2003)

> DIRECTV might've made Hulu into its own Internet-based service, but without it, the company remains vulnerable.


I don't get how they would have provided internet service by buying Hulu? What they should have done is bought, or partnered with a cell company for their 4G bandwidth. Weren't they going to do this with Verizon by having a small antenna attached to the dish?



> Single-game or single-team options are a fairly complex proposition when talking about satellite, but become far more straightforward when you include the power of Internet programming.


I don't see how this is complex, D* could have done this all along, just tell the receiver to turn on a certain game or certain team.


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

The elephant in the room is bandwidth caps and overage charges when exceeded. They are here already with some providers and coming from others.

So the question then becomes which will be cheaper in the long run. Cable/sat or IPTV and pay more for the internet bandwidth?? Assuming the difference in price turns out to not be as great as many want to assume, is it worth it to fiddle with the various set top boxes as you go from one IPTV streamer to another? So far IPTV just hasn't gotten anywhere close to the simplicity and elegance of a single box that gets it all as in the case of cable/sat boxes.


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## Richard (Apr 24, 2002)

This article seems to leave out the biggest customer for Sunday Ticket, it's not individual customers, it's commercial businesses.

YouTube is one of the worst streaming providers on the internet, it's hilarious that someone wrote an article suggesting this.


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## Nighthawk68 (Oct 14, 2004)

Richard said:


> This article seems to leave out the biggest customer for Sunday Ticket, it's not individual customers, it's commercial businesses.
> 
> YouTube is one of the worst streaming providers on the internet, it's hilarious that someone wrote an article suggesting this.


That's what I was thinking, all the Sports Bars


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

I hadn't thought about the commercial customers. Think about the bandwidth they would have to have to run a day of NFL on all their screens!!

YIKES!!


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## sdk009 (Jan 19, 2007)

lparsons21 said:


> The elephant in the room is bandwidth caps and overage charges when exceeded. They are here already with some providers and coming from others.
> 
> So the question then becomes which will be cheaper in the long run. Cable/sat or IPTV and pay more for the internet bandwidth?? Assuming the difference in price turns out to not be as great as many want to assume, is it worth it to fiddle with the various set top boxes as you go from one IPTV streamer to another? So far IPTV just hasn't gotten anywhere close to the simplicity and elegance of a single box that gets it all as in the case of cable/sat boxes.


I only have one option where I live. As a Hughesnet sub, we are limited to 20GB a month as opposed to 150GB when we had DSL service before we moved. One D* On Demand program drains our usage for a month. We are constantly juggling between cell and satellite service trying to stay within the monthly limits of both services. We would be totally hamstrung if we had to watch ST from the Internet. 
Of course, the NFL is about the money.


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## joshjr (Aug 2, 2008)

I hate the way the title is worded. The only current threat Google poses would be for Sunday Ticket and I doubt that really. There is already several other threads on this. Why start another one over the same stupid thing. When does this topic not come up when DirecTV's contract nears renewal? Each time Cable and Dish say now. In my opinion, internet is not a very good option at least not if it is the sole option. It has to remain with a provider.


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## joshjr (Aug 2, 2008)

sdk009 said:


> I only have one option where I live. As a Hughesnet sub, we are limited to 20GB a month as opposed to 150GB when we had DSL service before we moved. One D* On Demand program drains our usage for a month. We are constantly juggling between cell and satellite service trying to stay within the monthly limits of both services. We would be totally hamstrung if we had to watch ST from the Internet.
> Of course, the NFL is about the money.


This is a perfect example of why this is a terrible idea. At some point the NFL can piss fans off if they get to greedy. Everyone know's what it takes to get Sunday Ticket now. I can only imagine how this would casue ISP's to raise rates even more or the complaining from individuals about overages and the sports bars that cant get Sunday Ticket. What a mess. How about thanks but no thanks. There is a perfect setup for Sunday Ticket now. Work with DirecTV to allow an internet option while still being available to its existing customers.


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

I would agree. If I wanted NFLST, then I'd be with Direct because it is the simplest way to have it.

Fortunately for me and my wallet, I'm not that big of a football fan!


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## PCampbell (Nov 18, 2006)

You can get Directv any place that has LOS. There is a lot of rural areas with slow or no internet. As for Google TV it is just another way to get the same thing like a new cable co etc.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

ST over the internet is just not practical today. Streaming live content that people want and expect to watch live is totally different than streaming movies or videos ala Netflix or Youtube. Football fans expect to watch the games live to the second. If it was even 30 seconds behind, think about all the "spoilers" there would be for your ST game(s) if you have a game on cable/sat/OTA at the same time, or are talking/texting with a friend who is at the game.

Netflix and Youtube work as well as they do because they buffer content ahead of where you're watching, so you don't see the minor and major hiccups that are a fact of life for the internet. If you're watching live, you can't buffer, so you'll be exposed to all those hiccups. When they happen you either have to miss some action or it has to pause and then you're no longer watching live.

No one has ever attempted to do something like this with live content, and there's no way the NFL is going to take the risk of being the first, no matter how much money Google dangles in front of them. It would do tremendous damage to the league if their most ardent football fans were forced off a solution that works pretty well for one that would work less well even for those with a 100Mb FIOS connection, let alone the people with poor or no broadband options.

I could see Google trying to make some deal where they have the rights to sell single games, but I doubt they'd be interested in selling the full ST package the NFL does over the Internet, or that if they are the NFL is willing risk the backlash if it doesn't work as well as Google might hope. It doesn't matter how many smart people Google gets to work on it, they can only control what happens up to the time the packets leave their control. Once it is out on the Internet, it may pass through a half dozen different providers on its way to your house. But the angry guy who is having problems watching his team is still going to blame the NFL for being greedy and making the deal. The NFL doesn't take risks like that.


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## longrider (Apr 21, 2007)

I have to agree that IPTV is still not ready for the masses. First you have the fact that while maybe 80% of the country has broadband probably only 10% of that is good enough to stream live TV. Then you have the fact that if that 10% all used their capability at the same time it would kill the providers. I can use my service as a perfect example, I live in the country but am lucky enough to have a 10MB fixed WiMax service. However the backhaul off the tower/access point is maybe 50 - 100 MB but there are several hundred subscribers served off that tower. This works as usually only a very small percentage are using heavy bandwidth at any one time. You get a hundred people watching a game and you are now down to 1MB per person. 

On the non technical side, I 100% agree that there is no way the NFL would risk angering that many customers


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## RAD (Aug 5, 2002)

When I see these articles mention how many residential customers have NFL-ST and the pricing they always seem to ignore the commercial customer. Here's the pricing from the DIRECTV web site:



> *FCO*
> 
> *New Customer 1-Pay*
> 
> ...


 Link http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/business/bars_restaurants/sports

So how many sports bars are out there in the US paying these prices? What are all the casino's and sports books paying? Those commercial accounts have to contribute to what they're paying the NFL.

And as others have mentioned, not every place has an internet connection available to them that would allow for them to stream 6 or 7 games in HD at the same time, and if they did could a small mom and pop sports bar afford a connection like that if they can get it?

I can see Google paying to be the online NFL-ST content delivery company while DIRECTV or whomever handles the non internet distrubution.


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## Diana C (Mar 30, 2007)

A $300 million dollar loss on Sunday Ticket is based solely on the direct ST revenue versus the $1 billion license fee to the NFL. Once you add in the basic subscription fees paid by residential and commercial customers that subscribe to DirecTV specifically for ST the results are very different. Sunday Ticket is a gold mine for DirecTV. There is no way they will let it go.

Secondly, the reports of the death of linear TV service are greatly exaggerated. Sure, lots of 18 to 28 year olds don't subscribe to PayTV services, and get their entertainment via the Internet and video games. However, MANY of them are mooching off their parents accounts. They get access to HBO-Go, Hulu, Netflix and other services because they login with their parents' credentials. Once they have to pay for all these services on their own, they will find that a traditional pay TV subscription looks a lot more attractive.

Finally, the real price of entertainment is controlled by the content owners. Just look at the conversations going on between people like Apple, Intel, Google and ESPN...ESPN will be happy to sell them their content for an Internet based service - but it has to be part of a bundle, just like their current deals with cable and satellite. If there is no cost savings, or at least a way to avoid big ticket items like ESPN, then the delivery inconsistencies of Internet distribution will make these services unattractive.

It will be a decade at least before Internet delivery of entertainment is really viable, and even then I think it will have an uphill battle to displace cable and satellite.


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## SledgeHammer (Dec 28, 2007)

Can't comment on sports since I don't watch 'em. The internet has LONG AGO killed pay channels, movies and adult. Only a moron would pay $7 for an HD PPV they have to watch in 24 hours, or $20 for an hour of porn when there are SO MANY other (legal and "illegal") options. Then again, there are people who pay for free porn on the internet, so what do I know? .

In terms of movies, you can watch unlimited movies "legally" from Netflix for the price of one DirecTV PPV movie. That alone killed it.


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## sdk009 (Jan 19, 2007)

SledgeHammer said:


> Can't comment on sports since I don't watch 'em. The internet has LONG AGO killed pay channels, movies and adult. Only a moron would pay $7 for an HD PPV they have to watch in 24 hours, or $20 for an hour of porn when there are SO MANY other (legal and "illegal") options. Then again, there are people who pay for free porn on the internet, so what do I know? .
> 
> In terms of movies, you can watch unlimited movies "legally" from Netflix for the price of one DirecTV PPV movie. That alone killed it.


I would strongly disagree. Please refer to my comment earlier in this thread. I would use all of my monthly allotment by watching one Netflix movie. Not everyone lives in an area with DSL and/or fiber service with virtually unlimited Internet usage available.


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## Satelliteracer (Dec 6, 2006)

SledgeHammer said:


> In terms of movies, you can watch unlimited movies "legally" from Netflix for the price of one DirecTV PPV movie. That alone killed it.


Well, definitely didn't kill it. Netflix has more tv than movies. PPV business is a strong force for most distributors because it provides the titles sooner, higher quality (better bit rate, etc) to their large screen tv. If someone is willing to wait, is ok with smaller device or softer image on a larger device and had the bandwidth, then certainly there are solid competitors out there.


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## sregener (Apr 17, 2012)

slice1900 said:


> Football fans expect to watch the games live to the second. If it was even 30 seconds behind, think about all the "spoilers" there would be for your ST game(s) if you have a game on cable/sat/OTA at the same time, or are talking/texting with a friend who is at the game.


Um... That doesn't happen now with NFL Sunday Ticket. It's a 3/4-second hop up and down to a geosynchronous satellite. And encoding the game into MPEG2/4 and decoding it on the other end isn't instantaneous either. I remember talking to my parents on the phone and having them say, "Oh no!" and on my screen, the ball hadn't even been snapped yet. 3-5 seconds delay. Google might be able to beat that with Internet-based delivery.

But we're at a practical issue here, which is why Internet streaming is so popular and broadcast hasn't gone away. The problem that exists for most people is that they don't want to all watch the same thing at the same time, or at least so few that even a couple hundred channels does not cover the vast majority of viewers. Hence, streaming makes the most sense because it gives you access to a lot of programming choices, and you control which one you watch when. However, few people watch sports programming after the fact. I do, but that's beside the point. What you have is 8 or fewer games that a large population wants to watch at the same time. This is exactly what broadcast does best - deliver one product to a large number of people simultaneously.

Streaming doesn't make sense for football compared to satellite delivery, because the sheer bandwidth required to send the same bits out to a few hundred thousand customers at the same time is huge. Even with distributed computing, you're talking about sending a huge load of duplicate data.

I agree with others who say pay-per-game would be trivially easy for satellite. Easier, in fact, than it would be with Internet streaming.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

sdk009 said:


> I would strongly disagree. Please refer to my comment earlier in this thread. I would use all of my monthly allotment by watching one Netflix movie. Not everyone lives in an area with DSL and/or fiber service with virtually unlimited Internet usage available.


How much of your 20gb does one Netflix movie use? We're using Netflix & Amazon Prime more and more here and have yet to hit our 250gb cap. I'm talking between the three of us at least 60 minutes per day, and usually more. Also throw in at least 6 to 10 VOD's from D*.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

sdk009 said:


> I would strongly disagree. Please refer to my comment earlier in this thread. I would use all of my monthly allotment by watching one Netflix movie. Not everyone lives in an area with DSL and/or fiber service with virtually unlimited Internet usage available.


I just found this on Comcast's (not who I use) support site:

*Netflix Movies (HD)*: These guys are around 3.8Mbit, which means it's about 3600MB for a 2 hour HD movie.
*Netflix Movies (SD)*: Each of these movies are around 500-700MB each, depending on the length of the movie.
*Netflix TV Shows (HD)*: A 30-minute TV show will be about 1500MB.
*Netflix TV Shows (SD)*: A 30-minute TV show will be about 400MB.
If you do the math, that means you can stream about 3 seasons of Entourage and 40 movies in HD. However, that's not to account for standard Internet usage, so with YouTube, Facebook, and all of the other things you and your household may use, that's looking to drop the number down to about 20 HD movies, which is still a substantial amount for most people.

*Not even close to your claim.*


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## sdk009 (Jan 19, 2007)

Athlon646464 said:


> I just found this on Comcast's (not who I use) support site:
> 
> *Netflix Movies (HD)*: These guys are around 3.8Mbit, which means it's about 3600MB for a 2 hour HD movie.
> *Netflix Movies (SD)*: Each of these movies are around 500-700MB each, depending on the length of the movie.
> ...


I don't give a rat's behind what Comcast claims, I am using Hughesnet and I see the results for myself in real-time. We have a 20gb monthly allotment, and two hours of Netflix uses about a third of that allotment. You seem to forget, the consumption is based on download speed and through put. Hughesnet slows way down in the evening, because of traffic. We share the bird(s) with all the other subscribers, not just my neighbors as is the case with fiber or DSL.


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## Diana C (Mar 30, 2007)

Athlon646464 said:


> I just found this on Comcast's (not who I use) support site:
> 
> *Netflix Movies (HD)*: These guys are around 3.8Mbit, which means it's about 3600MB for a 2 hour HD movie.*Netflix Movies (SD)*: Each of these movies are around 500-700MB each, depending on the length of the movie.*Netflix TV Shows (HD)*: A 30-minute TV show will be about 1500MB.*Netflix TV Shows (SD)*: A 30-minute TV show will be about 400MB.
> If you do the math, that means you can stream about 3 seasons of Entourage and 40 movies in HD. However, that's not to account for standard Internet usage, so with YouTube, Facebook, and all of the other things you and your household may use, that's looking to drop the number down to about 20 HD movies, which is still a substantial amount for most people.
> ...


Well, at 1.8 gigabytes per hour, and a 20GB cap, he'd only be able to watch about 11 hours of TV per month, assuming he did nothing else on the Internet at all...certainly not a viable option.


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## KyL416 (Nov 11, 2005)

Athlon646464 said:


> I just found this on Comcast's (not who I use) support site:
> 
> *Netflix Movies (HD)*: These guys are around 3.8Mbit, which means it's about 3600MB for a 2 hour HD movie.
> *Netflix Movies (SD)*: Each of these movies are around 500-700MB each, depending on the length of the movie.
> ...


Your math is off, that would put him way over a 20 GB allotment. At most he could do 5 HD movies which will put him at around 17.58 GB if you use 1 GB = 1024 MB. And even then, with VBR encoding the size isn't the same for every movie, an action movie with a lot of rapid movement and explosions will likely be larger.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

sregener said:


> Um... That doesn't happen now with NFL Sunday Ticket. It's a 3/4-second hop up and down to a geosynchronous satellite. And encoding the game into MPEG2/4 and decoding it on the other end isn't instantaneous either. I remember talking to my parents on the phone and having them say, "Oh no!" and on my screen, the ball hadn't even been snapped yet. 3-5 seconds delay. Google might be able to beat that with Internet-based delivery.


I realize it is a bit behind the people in the stadium now. However, you're wildly off with your 3-4 second claim. Directv's hop up to and back down from the satellite only adds 0.25 seconds what Google would have (~45k miles round trip to the Directv bird and back down to your dish) because Google would have all the other delays for encoding, satellite transmission from the stadium identical to what Directv (or your local TV station) has.


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## SledgeHammer (Dec 28, 2007)

sdk009 said:


> I don't give a rat's behind what Comcast claims, I am using Hughesnet and I see the results for myself in real-time. We have a 20gb monthly allotment, and two hours of Netflix uses about a third of that allotment. You seem to forget, the consumption is based on download speed and through put. Hughesnet slows way down in the evening, because of traffic. We share the bird(s) with all the other subscribers, not just my neighbors as is the case with fiber or DSL.


I don't mean this as an attack or anything personal, but the vast majority of the US has broadband. The latest study says 70%+. Yeah, so theres 30% of the US who chooses to live in remote areas. So obviously streaming is not an option for you. Do you get US Mail? Netflix sends out DVDs & Blurays too. Those would be unlimited for $8/mo (the price of one DTV PPV movie) -- well, 1 or 2 at a time or whatever. Not as convienient as PPV I'll admit. I'm willing to pay extra for my convienience, but not 800% more. Living in an actual town or city is a small price to pay for unlimited internet access I would think .


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## sregener (Apr 17, 2012)

Athlon646464 said:


> How much of your 20gb does one Netflix movie use? We're using Netflix & Amazon Prime more and more here and have yet to hit our 250gb cap. I'm talking between the three of us at least 60 minutes per day, and usually more. Also throw in at least 6 to 10 VOD's from D*.


Movies are compressed using optimal compression routines, which can't really be done in real-time. But let's assume they could be.

Broadcast 1080i (CBS) really needs almost 19Mbps in MPEG2. That works out to approximately 1.9MB/second. Or 114MB/min. Or 6.8GB/hour. So you can get 36 hours of that quality of video in if you do nothing else with your Internet. MPEG4 is better, dropping the requirement to about 3.4GB/hour, and doubles the time to 72 hours under your cap. 720p is closer to 15Mbps, so you can watch more of Fox.

However, the real rates for Netflix and Amazon are closer to 8-10Mbps for HD, which is why you can watch over an hour a day and not hit your cap.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

KyL416 said:


> Your math is off, that would put him way over a 20 GB allotment. At most he could do 5 HD movies which will put him at around 17.58 GB if you use 1 GB = 1024 MB. And even then, with VBR encoding the size isn't the same for every movie, an action movie with a lot of rapid movement and explosions will likely be larger.


Not my math at all - I clearly quoted Comcast in my post. And in another post I gave you my experience with caps.


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## JohnBoy (Sep 9, 2011)

MLBTV streams @ 4.5 mbps on the PS3 with decent quality and they show thousands of games throughout the year.

So I dont see how the NFL would have any problems doing it how the mlb does it and they only show games once a week...

Its best to ask someone who has bandwidth caps restrictions and also has mlbtv on how they manage.


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## maartena (Nov 1, 2010)

The numbers are a bit blurry. Is the 0.5% counted towards traffic in the U.S., or traffic global? Youtube's traffic in the United States is only a portion of its global presence. Also, one needs to know that these kinds of contracts are going to be geographically based. A football lover in Canada is not likely to be able to subscribe to a Youtube NFL channel, and you are also not likely to be able to even watch it with your U.S. account if you are visiting other countries abroad.

I also think they will probably not reach the 0.5%, maybe not even 0.1%, for the simple reason that youtube is SO widely used world wide. I also think that most football lovers, will just want to plop down on the couch, and watch the game. And more importantly, switch to the OTHER game during commercial breaks and swap back and forth. They arent going to want to bother with streaming, and they sure as hell aren't going to be happy if the NFL watcher's three teenage daughters are all online during the game.... 

So, its a nice ADDITION for people frequently traveling inside the US, but not a REPLACEMENT.


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## sregener (Apr 17, 2012)

JohnBoy said:


> MLBTV streams @ 4.5 mbps on the PS3 with decent quality and they show thousands of games throughout the year.
> 
> So I dont see how the NFL would have any problems doing it how the mlb does it and they only show games once a week...


MLB.TV sends out about 1.1 million games a week. I'm guessing an NFL regular season game would be vastly more popular, and they'd all be on one day of the week, over only 6 hours.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

sregener said:


> MLB.TV sends out about 1.1 million games a week. I'm guessing an NFL regular season game would be vastly more popular, and they'd all be on one day of the week, over only 6 hours.


Exactly. How many streams would be required for NFLST, when you have "fewer than 3 million" subscribers, and most watch more than one game, those with man caves have more than one game on at once, most sports bars have all the games on. That's probably 10 million simultaneous streams, maybe more.

How many simultaneous streams does mlb.tv deliver? If they're only doing 1.1 million games a week, they aren't doing even 1% of what would be required for NFLST. And at 4.5 Mbps they are cutting back on quality versus what Directv delivers for NFLST. The two are not even comparable.

Let's say they compressed it down to 4.5 Mbps like mlb.tv. For 10 million simultaneous streams that's 45 Tbps. I tried to find out what the peak bandwidth usage across all broadband subscribers in the US is to see how it compares, but couldn't find any numbers - only percentages of a whole in articles listing Netflix as using 1/3 to 1/2 of it during the evening peak. Best guess I could make based on Netflix reporting that it delivered 4 billion hours in Q1 2013 is that Netflix would be averaging 33 Tbps if all the streams were HD (which they aren't, so the real figure is much lower, but that would also be average and not their peak in the evening)


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## photostudent (Nov 8, 2007)

lparsons21 said:


> I hadn't thought about the commercial customers. Think about the bandwidth they would have to have to run a day of NFL on all their screens!!
> 
> YIKES!!


I do not see way it an issue. It is all coming through the same cable. It is all digital bits. Bits is bits, either Internet or cable. If I can watch five different shows at my home via cable then a bar can stream five different football games. Of course the simple answer is for Direct to also sell Sunday ticket to cable subscribers. Many people do not have access to satellite service.


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## Doug Brott (Jul 12, 2006)

photostudent said:


> I do not see way it an issue. It is all coming through the same cable. It is all digital bits. Bits is bits, either Internet or cable. If I can watch five different shows at my home via cable then a bar can stream five different football games. Of course the simple answer is for Direct to also sell Sunday ticket to cable subscribers. Many people do not have access to satellite service.


Cable TV charges by package while Cable Internet charges by bandwidth (and also places limits on capacity). Additionally, the Commercial establishment would need to get "Cable" Internet to go with the claim of "bits is bits" and I'm not sure that is necessarily available at every bar that would want to show NFL games on Sunday. In any event, infrastructure would have to change at bars for this to even work for them.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

photostudent said:


> I do not see way it an issue. It is all coming through the same cable. It is all digital bits. Bits is bits, either Internet or cable. If I can watch five different shows at my home via cable then a bar can stream five different football games. Of course the simple answer is for Direct to also sell Sunday ticket to cable subscribers. Many people do not have access to satellite service.


and even if bits are bits, what makes the difference is the encoding method


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

photostudent said:


> I do not see way it an issue. It is all coming through the same cable. It is all digital bits. Bits is bits, either Internet or cable. If I can watch five different shows at my home via cable then a bar can stream five different football games.


No, that is not true at all. Go learn the difference between broadcasting and point to point transmission.


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## 1948GG (Aug 4, 2007)

There are several things going on here, that would make/break such a proposal. Many have brought up that the length and breath of internet access across the U.S. in general, is really pretty piss poor. So even if we're talking DirecTV level of HD distribution (say 8-10Mb/s for a single channel) that is about double what even 50% of people have access to, either through DSL or cable.

And of course, there's all the 'caps' and such, and the cost of that access. Which brings up the second big thing... cost.

Now, one can figure that the 'Wrath of Khan' pricing model will perhaps come into play. And what, some are probably asking, what the **** is 'Wrath of Khan'? Of course, the move (1982). But before it was released on VHS, the 'typical' movie was selling at between $50-100 or thereabouts in the market. Paramount decided that they wanted to 'goose' the sell-through, and priced 'Khan' at $29-35 or so (can't remember exactly what it was) but about 1/2 to 1/3'rd that of a typical VHS movie.

Folks came unglued. It was 'sold out' across the country. Paramount made a killing. A light builb went off over their heads, 'hey if we drop the price we make up the amount we wanted to in VOLUME'. No ****. Marketing 101.

So, here we have NFL/ST, but no real way to market it in volume across the Internet 'as it exists today'. Through DirecTV you have 100% (or close to it, obviously there are places in big cities with coverage problems just like there is way out west with those things called 'trees'). But it's pretty close to 100% coverage. If folks want it today, they can pretty much get it anywhere.

Until Google wants to fiber-wire the whole of America (in lots of places they will be barred do to EXISTING laws and regulations in states and municipalities), and a few Trillion bucks later, they can do what satellite does.

Really, DirecTV is cost effective against most cabelcos anyway, so as I pointed out, it's already at 99+% (potential) penetration anyway. And as to huge bandwidth folks like Google Fiber, FIOS (both Verizon and Frontier), I don't understand why they don't partner with DirecTV and forget about running their own 'TV' service, which they are at a distinct disadvantage to the huge cablecos (Comcast et. al.), and put the DirecTV bitstream on their fiber service.

DirecTV already has IP based DVR/Receivers running on large apartment/condo complexes around the country, it would be a minor bit of engineering to junk their current problematic 'tv service' and go with Direct.

But meanwhile, folks on internet service through other vendors, forget about it. You think folks like Comcast are yelling now with the pitiful amount of bits flowing through their service because of Netflix? This would really get them going at hyper levels.


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## Gocanes (Jul 15, 2007)

slice1900 said:


> ST over the internet is just not practical today. Streaming live content that people want and expect to watch live is totally different than streaming movies or videos ala Netflix or Youtube. Football fans expect to watch the games live to the second. If it was even 30 seconds behind, think about all the "spoilers" there would be for your ST game(s) if you have a game on cable/sat/OTA at the same time, or are talking/texting with a friend who is at the game.
> 
> Netflix and Youtube work as well as they do because they buffer content ahead of where you're watching, so you don't see the minor and major hiccups that are a fact of life for the internet. If you're watching live, you can't buffer, so you'll be exposed to all those hiccups. When they happen you either have to miss some action or it has to pause and then you're no longer watching live.
> 
> ...


ESPN3 does live games over the internet. As far as delay goes, DirecTV is at least 10 seconds behind really live. Watch a game on DirecTV and listen to the radio broadcast simultaneoulsy and you will see this easily.

The reason that high quality HD live broadcast over the internet isn't practical is because very few residential customers have an ISP that can provide the continuous 5+ Mbps bandwidth required for even 1 stream. The oversubcription rate in the network design is too high. Dedicated IPTV services like FIOS/Uverse stream the TV content on a dedicated closed network. They don't stream it over the internet. The TV content comes from servers which are networked to the home in a way that doesn't require crossing over into the internet backbone.


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## jacksonm30354 (Mar 29, 2007)

SledgeHammer said:


> I don't mean this as an attack or anything personal, but the vast majority of the US has broadband. The latest study says 70%+. Yeah, so theres 30% of the US who chooses to live in remote areas. So obviously streaming is not an option for you. Do you get US Mail? Netflix sends out DVDs & Blurays too. Those would be unlimited for $8/mo (the price of one DTV PPV movie) -- well, 1 or 2 at a time or whatever. Not as convienient as PPV I'll admit. I'm willing to pay extra for my convienience, but not 800% more. Living in an actual town or city is a small price to pay for unlimited internet access I would think .


While 70%+ might have "broadband". All "broadband" is not created equal. Many can't get more than 1MB-3MB service in their area. And that is not just in rural areas. That might be sufficient for 1 SD stream, but what about homes that have multiple tvs? A large part of the 70% doesn't have access to the fast broadband necessary.



Athlon646464 said:


> Not my math at all - I clearly quoted Comcast in my post. And in another post I gave you my experience with caps.


The OP does not have Comcast and it's 250GB limit. He has HughesNet with a 20GB limit. Your math works for Comcast, but not HughesNet.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

jacksonm30354 said:


> The OP does not have Comcast and it's 250GB limit. He has HughesNet with a 20GB limit. Your math works for Comcast, but not HughesNet.


You missed my point by taking the stats I quoted out of context. I was using Comcast's stats to refute an earlier post claiming that 1 Netflix HD movie would put him over his limit.

The math they use works for any connection, including AOL dial-up.


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## KyL416 (Nov 11, 2005)

jacksonm30354 said:


> While 70%+ might have "broadband". All "broadband" is not created equal. Many can't get more than 1MB-3MB service in their area. And that is not just in rural areas. That might be sufficient for 1 SD stream, but what about homes that have multiple tvs? A large part of the 70% doesn't have access to the fast broadband necessary.


And the people who have no other option but satellite isn't just limited to rural areas in the middle of nowhere. We live in a populated suburban area where most of the lots are about half an acre, only three houses from the main road which has cable service. The local cable company refused to wire our block unless we either get half the block to sign up for service our we personally pay for the run at $1000 per 100 feet, the latter option also meant that if we do that, there's no stopping our neighbors from signing up the day after it's installed and not having to pay thousands of dollars up front like we would have had to. DSL didn't become available until 2006, we're still limited to just 3mbps down/768kbps up, and Verizon has no plans to upgrade our area to newer technologies like ADSL2+ that would support 6mbps+.

Of course when the cable company provided details to the FCC for their broadband map they just gave them their franchise area and didn't omit the multiple blocks they refuse to serve, so the map is full of false data for our area when it comes to what speeds are available.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

While 70%+ might have "broadband". All "broadband" is not created equal. Many can't get more than 1MB-3MB service in their area. . 

.
Which begs the question, how can they call this "high speed"?


Sent from my iPad using DBSTalk


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## keyoctave (Jan 9, 2005)

Just have to add my 2 cents on this...

I live in what some would call a rural area but only a 20 min drive to a small city. I live in a housing development that is not served by cable. Its DTV, Dish or OTA if you want to watch programming. In fact, the county's (that I live in) only cable company (Charter) does not even offer high def to its customers. They do get high speed internet with no limits. There is Verizon 4g service in my area but it is weak at my house. I have a sprint tower only 0.3 miles from me, so I use a 3g modem (they have not upgraded to 4G yet) hooked to a router for my internet. This costs me $80 a month with a 12Gb limit! I can pay $50 a month for 6Gb but that really cuts down on what you can do. How in the hell can people in this kind of situation be able to stream anything? And don't say 'move somewhere else'. It seems the internet service providers only care about where to make the most money and leave large area's in the country with sub-standard service costing a lot more to obtain.
I really don't feel the least bit sorry when some of you ***** about your 'slow' 3 meg unlimited download speeds. I only wish!!


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

peds48 said:


> Which begs the question, how can they call this "high speed"?


If it's faster than 56k dial-up service then they consider it "high speed." They still use the 1990s as a reference. :grin:


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## wingrider01 (Sep 9, 2005)

peds48 said:


> Which begs the question, how can they call this "high speed"?
> 
> Sent from my iPad using DBSTalk


could be limited to a 56K dial up, yes there are those still in existance


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## jdskycaster (Sep 1, 2008)

To answer the original question. Yes. The bottom line is money talks and the likes of Google, Apple, Intel and others have more of it in their coffers than ever before. 

Does the NFL care if some percentage of Direc's customers cannot access NFLST? Absolutely not! If they did then they would also give a rats behind about the millions of customers with Dish or cable that also cannot access it. Will Direc lose NFLST? Probably not they are just now going to have to pay a little more dearly for it and possibly accept larger losses (or smaller gains depending on whose numbers you believe). I personally agree with those that feel there is room for more than one player in this game. Direc with NFLST and someone like Google offering more limited packages online.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

3 Reasons Why Google Won't Steal Sunday Ticket From DIRECTV

http://youtu.be/6I4B0x-mFmU


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## TBoneit (Jul 27, 2006)

ha!
The point that Google could only provide Sunday ticket is Bogus as I see it. Most of the people that would watch it via Google most likely have An antenna or basic cable or some other way of getting locals.

The Point about Google being disruptive to the status Quo? How is is Google providing Sunday Ticket significantly different that DirecTV doing so.

Nothing there that made me think Google would not or could not go after Sunday Ticket.

One point that was wrong is that there is a Decent infrastructure these days.

I have no knowledge of the inner workings of Sunday Ticket, Having said that Is there anything to Stop the Cable companies from forming a new company backed financially by the cable industry to bid for and outbid DirecTV?
Or as a alternative Include Dishnetwork as a partner to provide it to areas they do not cover?
Or as a method to drive up the price to empty the DirecTV coffers?

Or Google and Dishnetwork with Dish once again offering it in Areas with bad Internet coverage. Especially With Dishes Investment in Wireless bandwidth.

I expect that All the D* and Football fans will disagree with me of course.

TBoneit


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## Mildred (Sep 19, 2013)

Just got an account here because I came upon this thread and wanted to share my $.02.

----

Yes, the internet in general will kill DirecTV's business, though it will be a slow slog, as DirecTV, Dish, Cable, and content providers all do their best to stymie death of their golden goose.

We have finally already reached a critical mass of cord cutting (http://variety.com/2013/biz/news/cord-cutting-no-longer-a-urban-myth-pay-tv-operators-drop-316000-subs-in-past-year-1200574763/). Cable subscribers are clearly on the way down, and substantially, and satellite is now bleeding year over year. This trend is accelerating and will continue. Admittedly, we are VERY early days in this, but I think the tea leaves have hit a special point and cable & sat providers now can no longer live in denial about where things are heading.

Focusing on the tiny number of satellite internet users misses the big picture. Most people have broadband, and it is almost universally capable of streaming HD video.

Usage caps are a red herring. Few people have them, and although there has been some experimentation with them, it's inevitable that bandwidth will get cheaper over time, as it always has. When Time Warner tried usage caps in my area a few years back people went ape over it and TW was forced to capitulate. Now I may be on the cusp of having residential fiber optic (and this is rolling out slowly over the country).

An increasing number of people are cutting the cord not due to economic reasons, but partly on principled ones, or just a general sense that $70-80+/month for locals (which are free over antenna) plus a couple of channels they watch is not a good use of money.

AppleTV, Roku, Chromecast, SimpleTV, Aereo, just a few of the products that make this all far less painful than it used to be. And you've Netflix putting out top-tier self-made series themselves, Amazon putting out its own series, and Hulu as well. This trend will continue.

Unfortunately for people who don't cut the cord, the remaining costs are shared among them. I recently dropped DirecTV but was one of the "lucky" ones this year to note a new $2 "regional sports fee". I never watch sports on TV. I hate charges like that. Now they don't have my $2. When more people leave they are out X * $2, and ultimately will have to spread the loss out among existing subscribers, raising their $2 to something higher.

Cable & Satellite costs are going up, in direct contrast to increasingly ubiquitous high speed internet and alternative options.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

Mildred said:


> Just got an account here because I came upon this thread and wanted to share my $.02.


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## KyL416 (Nov 11, 2005)

TBoneit said:


> I have no knowledge of the inner workings of Sunday Ticket, Having said that Is there anything to Stop the Cable companies from forming a new company backed financially by the cable industry to bid for and outbid DirecTV?


They already have one, it's called iNDemand, they provide Center Ice, Extra Innings, League Pass, Direct Kick along with PPV events and movies to most cable providers.

However their sports packages are severely lacking compared to DirecTV. MLB and NHL share the same 14 SD and 9 HD channels so dual feeds are rare and on busy nights you have games not carried in HD and late games joined in progress. NBA and MLS share 10 SD and 9 HD channels too. Very few cable systems have the bandwidth to offer all 18 HD feeds and only offer the packages in SD with 1 or 2 HD feeds.



Mildred said:


> Now I may be on the cusp of having residential fiber optic (and this is rolling out slowly over the country).


Verizon customers would beg to differ, they stopped the rollout of FiOS in new regions several years ago. The only new areas are ones that are part of existing franchise agreements they have yet to complete like portions of Philly, NYC and Boston. There's still many areas stuck with their 3mbps DSL service with no plans to expand the rollout of ADSL2+ that would support 6mbps service and no alternative like cable as an option.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

I guess nobody has seen this...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/24/us-internet-speed_n_3645927.html

To be the most "powerful" nation in the world, there is no excuse (yeap, capitalism) to be #9. :nono2:


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## FLWingNut (Nov 19, 2005)

I love these doomsday scenarios. Radio was going to kill live music, TV was going to kill the movie industry, the VCR was going to kill commercial TV, Blockbuster was going to kill the movie industry, and the Internet was going to kill Everybody...

While the 'net has, indeed, changed the way traditional media (newspapers, magazines, radio, the record industry, TV) do business, all those businesses are still with us. As it will be with pay TV. Some of us have no desire to start acquiring multiple boxes for different platforms, worrying about data caps, having to work to find the shows you want, etc. There will always be the appeal of having your TV entertainment choices integrated in one box, with a guide you can search with a delivery system that is reliable. 

Having said that, I not anti-internet. Far from it. I use it daily, it has a ton of wonderful uses. For me, though, I can't say it will ever replace TV>


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

Well, print media is a shell of what it once was (perhaps a perfect storm of dishonest and biased reporting and the internet), and the music industry is still trying to figure out the best way to deal with reduced profits given the new distribution paradigm.

In both cases it has taken years to get to where we are today. I believe we really are seeing the beginning of the end of the cable/sat monopoly though. 

Oh, and DVD replaced VHS. Blue-ray was supposed to replace DVD, but it hasn't happened. My bet is that both will die a slow death like the CD has as folks turn to streaming or downloading movies.


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## Bambler (May 31, 2006)

Yeah I agree. Media companies are already preparing, adapting and trying to figure out what might be the best model possible. You don't have to be a visionary to realize the possibilities, to rid themselves of one provider with a static customer base. They just need to figure out a way to fully monetize it, to find that audience, and eventually consolidate it (which I'm sure they will) and things will really take off. 

The technology might be slightly behind, but I also agree that bandwidth will increase over time as cable and telecom companies realize people want more, and the way we view TV through the internet will only get better, it's inevitable if past technological innovation is any indication. 

People who think otherwise will use confirmation bias until they realize it's already happened.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

Athlon646464 said:


> Well, print media is a shell of what it once was (perhaps a perfect storm of dishonest and biased reporting and the internet), and the music industry is still trying to figure out the best way to deal with reduced profits given the new distribution paradigm.
> 
> In both cases it has taken years to get to where we are today. I believe we really are seeing the beginning of the end of the cable/sat monopoly though.
> 
> Oh, and DVD replaced VHS. Blue-ray was supposed to replace DVD, but it hasn't happened. My bet is that both will die a slow death like the CD has as folks turn to streaming or downloading movies.


DVD replaced VHS with an essentially identical technology from a usage standpoint. The form factor was different, the quality was higher, but people still bought/rented things to insert in a player and watch on a TV. Claiming that's a change is like claiming that plastic grocery bags replaced paper bags...people still use them the same way.

The Internet succeeds where it can drop the price down to zero. That's what killed newspapers, not biased reporting (if you think newspapers are biased now, Google 'yellow journalism' and see what real bias is - by comparison the newspapers today are way way better) News, by definition, cannot be copyrighted, because you cannot copyright facts. Facts are free on the Internet, with a much bigger degree of slant in both directions than you can get from any newspaper thrown in as a bonus! That's why newspapers are in big trouble. Music was free for a while, thanks to Napster, even though it wasn't legal many didn't know/care at the time. The only reason the labels agreed to let Apple set such a low price and sell per song which later became a model for all music downloads is that they were competing with 'free' and knew they couldn't charge what they did for CDs and expect enough people to choose it over free but illegal.

Television is different, because even though it is legal to tell someone the score of a game or what happened in the latest Mad Men episode, people want to actually watch the program not just see reports of it. The internet can't drop its value to zero. Yes, there are illegal downloads, but it is much easier to police now than it was during the days of Napster. People might eventually switch from cable or satellite to a set top like Apple TV or Roku that lets them order seasons, assuming the sports leagues are willing to let them stream it and the Internet can handle the load of 100 million people streaming the Super Bowl at once. But we're not there yet, so the cord cutters are those who don't like TV too much and assign a low value to it. The people paying $150/month for TV aren't the ones cutting the cord, unless they lose their jobs and need to make serious cutbacks.

Whether cable/satellite go away as distribution models and are replaced by the Internet will depend on what the content owners want to do. They will sell their stuff in whatever way they think will make them the most money. At the moment, it is bundling a lot of stuff together and making people who don't care about sports pay for them anyway. In the past they keep increasing prices and people keep paying for it, so they will keep doing it until they ending up losing more in terms of lost subscribers than they gained in terms of more money per subscriber. The Internet is an alternative means of selling their content, that's all. It is not particularly efficient to send the same bitstream to millions of people individually instead of to thousands or millions of people at once, so ending up with the Internet as a distribution model will only happen if that inefficiency is overcome by being able make more money that way.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

^^^

Good spin. However, my point was the basic 'you can't stop progress'. I never said content would be free. But imho delivery systems *are* going to change. That was my only intended point.


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## FLWingNut (Nov 19, 2005)

And my point is that there are a ton of people who don't want to be that proactive in finding content. The current model is simple, and that's an attractive point for many.


Sent from my iPhone using DBSTalk mobile app


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## JoeTheDragon (Jul 21, 2008)

commercial locations are big with directv and lot's of them have ST and other sports packs as well.

Also lot's of them that have HD use component switcher systems some even have the sound boxes that you can put on the table top and you can pick the feed that you want sound on.

Lot's of the IP boxes do not have component out.

Also bandwidth can be an issue with pulling down 8-16 HD feeds at the same time to one site much less more places on the same node / others when not use an multicast system.


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## mike1977 (Aug 26, 2005)

It'd be nice if this threat brought a change...channels would go back to a M-F schedule with more variety, reruns of shows would be uncut, advertising over a show would be eliminated and bumpers would be back in style.


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## acostapimps (Nov 6, 2011)

Cable and Satellite is losing ground to illegal downloads and legal stream sites primarly torrents sites plain and simple, But then what happens if cable companies decides to raise prices for broadband internet and start usage caps and crack down illegal downloading sites, then what?


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## Joe Tylman (Dec 13, 2012)

peds48 said:


> I guess nobody has seen this...
> 
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/24/us-internet-speed_n_3645927.html
> 
> To be the most "powerful" nation in the world, there is no excuse (yeap, capitalism) to be #9. :nono2:


This also has something to do with it:

http://geography.about.com/od/europemaps/a/europe-countries-area.htm

http://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/infopage/usabysiz.htm


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## Satelliteracer (Dec 6, 2006)

peds48 said:


> I guess nobody has seen this...
> 
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/24/us-internet-speed_n_3645927.html
> 
> To be the most "powerful" nation in the world, there is no excuse (yeap, capitalism) to be #9. :nono2:


Geography and size. Look at the size of those nations in front of the US. Much, much, much smaller. The US is still a very rural country in many parts and it is not economical to provide speeds to some parts of the country. That is a big part of it. We also have many times the population of some of those countries in front of us. For a country our size in population and geography, we are a clear #1 by a wide margin.


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Which city in the U.S. has speeds of 500Mbs for $25/month? I don't think geography and size has anything to do with that. The only solution is competition because without it there's no reason to offer faster speeds.


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## 242424 (Mar 22, 2012)

Athlon646464 said:


> Is Google and the Internet a serious 'threat' to DirecTV?


I sure hope so......


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## Satelliteracer (Dec 6, 2006)

pdxBeav said:


> Which city in the U.S. has speeds of 500Mbs for $25/month? I don't think geography and size has anything to do with that. The only solution is competition because without it there's no reason to offer faster speeds.


I disagree. Who is going to spend money to build out the infrastructure if there are no people to buy the product? There's a reason there are few cable tv systems in rural parts of this country and why UVERSE or FIOS won't run lines in many places...it isn't profitable and would take years and years to get there. In my opinion, but I've heard this stated often in the industry.


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## HerntDawg (Oct 6, 2008)

Satelliteracer said:


> I disagree. Who is going to spend money to build out the infrastructure if there are no people to buy the product? There's a reason there are few cable tv systems in rural parts of this country and why UVERSE or FIOS won't run lines in many places...it isn't profitable and would take years and years to get there. In my opinion, but I've heard this stated often in the industry.


I was very happy in the late 90's when AT&T offered cable internet in my "rural" town.


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## longrider (Apr 21, 2007)

I know it is economics as I have been in that fight for years. I live just outside a small rural town. About 4 years ago Qwest offered DSL in town but only to locations within 3 miles of the CO (no RTs) Town is only a mile wide but the CO is on the other side so no luck for me. Comcast has fiber running down the highway about a 1/4 mile from my subdivision but they refuse to wire the subdivision. After analysis I unfortunately have to agree, there are 40 2-1/2 acre lots. It would take 3 miles of hardline to serve the neighborhood and half the homes would take 200 -300 feet of RG11 for the individual drop. The area is not new, developed in the 90s so anyone who wants pay TV already has satellite. Rather hard to pay for the construction with 25 - 30 internet customers and 5 or so TV customers


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

HerntDawg said:


> I was very happy in the late 90's when AT&T offered cable internet in my "rural" town.


Sure, but that ain't happening this decade in rural spots, many towns, nor in some smaller cities.

How big is your town?


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Satelliteracer said:


> I disagree. Who is going to spend money to build out the infrastructure if there are no people to buy the product? There's a reason there are few cable tv systems in rural parts of this country and why UVERSE or FIOS won't run lines in many places...it isn't profitable and would take years and years to get there. In my opinion, but I've heard this stated often in the industry.


I don't disagree with the situation in rural areas, but I'm talking about in cities. Competition is so limited that there's little incentive to update antiquated infrastructure.


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## slice1900 (Feb 14, 2013)

longrider said:


> I know it is economics as I have been in that fight for years. I live just outside a small rural town. About 4 years ago Qwest offered DSL in town but only to locations within 3 miles of the CO (no RTs) Town is only a mile wide but the CO is on the other side so no luck for me. Comcast has fiber running down the highway about a 1/4 mile from my subdivision but they refuse to wire the subdivision. After analysis I unfortunately have to agree, there are 40 2-1/2 acre lots. It would take 3 miles of hardline to serve the neighborhood and half the homes would take 200 -300 feet of RG11 for the individual drop. The area is not new, developed in the 90s so anyone who wants pay TV already has satellite. Rather hard to pay for the construction with 25 - 30 internet customers and 5 or so TV customers


Well, the situation is the same with running electric lines and phone lines to remote places. Its most definitely not profitable to run wire and poles down miles of country roads to serve a handful of farmers or ranchers. Laws were passed requiring they be served, the people in the cities are essentially subsidizing the people in the countryside via some small taxes/fees tacked onto your electric and phone bill that pay for this.

Theoretically the same could be done for broadband, but there are a lot of reasons (aside from the obvious political ones) why implementing such a law would be quite difficult.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

Satelliteracer said:


> I disagree. Who is going to spend money to build out the infrastructure if there are no people to buy the product?


Bingo! you are correct. these are only a small portion of the subs. even in big cities, we are very limited when it comes to internet. how come google can provide gigabit speeds, but nobody else though of that!.....


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## Joe Tylman (Dec 13, 2012)

peds48 said:


> Bingo! you are correct. these are only a small portion of the subs. even in big cities, we are very limited when it comes to internet. how come google can provide gigabit speeds, but nobody else though of that!.....


Gigabyte speeds have been around before Google even existed as a company they didn't create anything new. As to why are they doing it? Because they have the cash to burn and in the long run they will know everything about you to sell advertisements. How many households are currently serviced by Google fiber service? What is the roll out rate for Google Fiber? What is the projected return on it for the next 5 years? Define what you mean on limited when it comes to internet. You may want to read http://commercialobserver.com/2013/09/survey-ranks-u-s-cities-based-on-average-internet-connection-speeds-and-new-york-doesnt-fare-well/ and http://gizmodo.com/americas-internet-inequality-a-map-of-whos-got-the-b-1057686215. People confuse the internet with bandwidth. Bandwidth has gotten cheaper but internet bills continue to increase each year.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

Joe Tylman said:


> Gigabyte speeds have been around before Google even existed as a company they didn't create anything new. As to why are they doing it? Because they have the cash to burn and in the long run they will know everything about you to sell advertisements. How many households are currently serviced by Google fiber service? What is the roll out rate for Google Fiber? What is the projected return on it for the next 5 years? Define what you mean on limited when it comes to internet. You may want to read http://commercialobserver.com/2013/09/survey-ranks-u-s-cities-based-on-average-internet-connection-speeds-and-new-york-doesnt-fare-well/ and http://gizmodo.com/americas-internet-inequality-a-map-of-whos-got-the-b-1057686215. People confuse the internet with bandwidth. Bandwidth has gotten cheaper but internet bills continue to increase each year.


But you are missing the point. There is no reason why cities such as NYC, LA and such do not have average speeds of >100Mbps. the technology is here. and there is no reason why of our mobile Internet infrastructure is well, so 1930s.... oh wait, there is a reason, CEOs, and big brass of these companies wants to keep (horde) all of their cash instead of investing this back on their companies and yes that means their employees as well!


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## longrider (Apr 21, 2007)

peds48 said:


> But you are missing the point. There is no reason why cities such as NYC, LA and such do not have average speeds of >100Mbps. the technology is here. and there is no reason why of our mobile Internet infrastructure is well, so 1930s.... oh wait, there is a reason, CEOs, and big brass of these companies wants to keep (horde) all of their cash instead of investing this back on their companies and yes that means their employees as well!


This is really a topic for another thread but I did want to touch on it. While I agree that modern business management is way too focused on the short term and quick return on investment the simple fact is you still have to make your money back to justify spending it. The unfortunate fact is that the incredible expense of building out the infrastructure to the home to provide 100M+ service is just not justifiable even with taking a few years to make your money back. This is where the fact we don't have the population density even in the cities that other countries have is actually a negative fact.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

longrider said:


> This is really a topic for another thread but I did want to touch on it. While I agree that modern business management is way too focused on the short term and quick return on investment the simple fact is you still have to make your money back to justify spending it. The unfortunate fact is that the incredible expense of building out the infrastructure to the home to provide 100M+ service is just not justifiable even with taking a few years to make your money back. This is where the fact we don't have the population density even in the cities that other countries have is actually a negative fact.


I understand, but when most companies report billions of $$$$ of pure profit, it should not be invested back on he CEOs but rather on the paying customers by providing better service. I will give you an example, AT&T had the iPhone exclusivity for three years, but yet, it was Verizon who invested first to have a network, including LTE support, that can appropriate handle the iPhone. So while AT&T survived on the backs of iPhone customers for three years, they did nothing to improve the service until Verizon came aboard


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## Spike (Jul 4, 2007)

I'm wondering where the next new internet technology will come from. Are we that far away from having a wireless "cloud" based community through out towns, cities, and regions all around the country? Will there come a day where the internet will surround you almost everywhere using some new technology like cell phone towers used to be? And if that happens, it would not be impossible to have high speed internet access just as much in rural areas as in the cities. We are already seeing hotspots in coffee shops, restaurants, and places like that. All we need is someone to take that hotspot mentality and begin to design new technologies that apply that techology to whole communities. If that happens, anything can happen from there in terms of wireless streaming for things like tv, radio, magazines, newspapers, and the web within that community. And whoever comes up with that technology is going to be a multi-mulit-billionaire. The explosion of technology isn't going to taper off. It is going to keep on expanding and growing. The sky is the limit! Who knows. Everything appears to be heading in that direction.


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## TheRatPatrol (Oct 1, 2003)

Don't we sort of already have that with 4G?


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## Spike (Jul 4, 2007)

TheRatPatrol said:


> Don't we sort of already have that with 4G?


Kind of, but think bigger. Imagine. You've just moved into your new home. Wireless internet is part of the home already. Here is your home's password. Now, go use it.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

Maybe sort of like this?

http://www.dbstalk.com/topic/207998-att-ceo-talks-up-plan-for-lte-broadcast-video-network-remains-light-on-specifics/


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

Spike said:


> I'm wondering where the next new internet technology will come from. Are we that far away from having a wireless "cloud" based community through out towns, cities, and regions all around the country? Will there come a day where the internet will surround you almost everywhere using some new technology like cell phone towers used to be? And if that happens, it would not be impossible to have high speed internet access just as much in rural areas as in the cities. We are already seeing hotspots in coffee shops, restaurants, and places like that. All we need is someone to take that hotspot mentality and begin to design new technologies that apply that techology to whole communities. If that happens, anything can happen from there in terms of wireless streaming for things like tv, radio, magazines, newspapers, and the web within that community. And whoever comes up with that technology is going to be a multi-mulit-billionaire. The explosion of technology isn't going to taper off. It is going to keep on expanding and growing. The sky is the limit! Who knows. Everything appears to be heading in that direction.


until the business model that we currently have gets disrupted, this is not likely to happen. We need Companies lie T-Mobile and Sprint to to overtake the big two


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## KyL416 (Nov 11, 2005)

Unless they can do it with no cap or an almost impossible to reach cap so you can still download and stream HD videos from Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, Amazon or Vudu, along with watching live streams for hours on an almost daily basis from places like MLB.tv, ESPN3, NHL Game Center or LiveStation, along with a low latency so you can use applications that require near realtime reaction (i.e. online gaming or some time sensitive things like stock trading software used by some businesses), it will never be a replacement for an actual Cable/DSL/Fiber connection.


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

KyL416 said:


> Unless they can do it with no cap or an almost impossible to reach cap so you can still download and stream HD videos from Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, Amazon or Vudu, along with watching live streams for hours on an almost daily basis from places like MLB.tv, ESPN3, NHL Game Center or LiveStation, along with a low latency so you can use applications that require near realtime reaction (i.e. online gaming or some time sensitive things like stock trading software used by some businesses), it will never be a replacement for an actual Cable/DSL/Fiber connection.


It's a business decision, not a technical one. All of the problems you listed are relatively easy to solve technically.


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