Over on Scripting News, Dave echoes something we’ve been saying in our house for a few weeks now:
I missed this week’s West Wing, so I fired up my BitTorrent client and downloaded the latest episode, and 25 minutes later I was watching it, without commercials. While I love the West Wing, and didn’t want to wait for the rerun (to be aired months later) it’s not right to get the show without commercials. So, why don’t they offer a legal version of the show, for BitTorrent download, including commercials, maybe even special commercials for people who watch the stuff on their computers.
In the US, Battlestar Galactica is airing on the SciFi Channel. In the UK? Well, I have no idea. In our house, we’d pay £3/week to download the most recent episode—compressed, it would be around 350MB. There are three of us who really enjoy it, and considering a “season” is only half a year or so, that would be roughly £60 in almost pure profit—per interested household, per season—if we were able to download, legally, a Battlestar episode the day after it aired. Since advertisers might not like that, I’d be willing to wait a week, even.
Is this possible right now? No. Instead, the episode magically appears in our household. We watch it, without commercials. The DVDs of the show won’t appear for months after the season ends (if then), and it may (or may not) air on some premium channel next year.
It’s a no-brainer—make the content available at a reasonable price to consumers, and they will buy it. Unfortunately, powerful, greedy white men control the entertainment industry; I don’t expect them to “get it” anytime soon.