
Viacom pulls “The Daily Show” offline as a result of contract dispute - shawndumas
http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/07/viacom-pulls-the-daily-show-offline-as-a-result-of-contract-dispute/
======
jrockway
I find this "double-dipping" nature of TV networks somewhat offensive. First,
50% of the programming is advertising (20 minutes content, 10 minutes ads).
Then, they make someone pay for the privilege of delivering that advertising
to my house? It's completely nonsensical because DirectTV is providing Viacom
with a valuable service: fucking satellites orbiting the earth! And then
Viacom wants DirectTV to _pay them_. I just don't get it.

(My bank started doing the "double dip" thing too. Every item in my Bank of
America statement now contains a "relevant" ad. I don't know why this bothers
me, but it does. I already pay transaction fees and interest. Must you also
try to show me irrelevant ads?)

~~~
S201
The networks aren't "double-dipping". Your cable bill pays the cable provider
and ads pay the content provider; different organizations, different sources
of revenue. A much better explanation from a reddit commenter:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pz8kz/til_cab...](http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pz8kz/til_cable_did_not_have_commercials_until_around/c3tgl2g?context=1)

~~~
tptacek
This is like the archetypical great long-form Reddit comment. Reddit has a lot
of pointless craziness, but their highest highs are also way better than HN's.

I'm long since past the point where the words "Great comment explaining this
on Reddit" will get me to automatically click something.

~~~
jrockway
FWIW, the critical "97%" number is made up:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pz8kz/til_cab...](http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pz8kz/til_cable_did_not_have_commercials_until_around/c3thsy6?context=1)

~~~
seanalltogether
If this image is accurate, it seems that a basic cable package is probably 1/5
fees to content providers.
[http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/files/2010/03/cable-sub-
fees...](http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/files/2010/03/cable-sub-fees.png)

------
ChuckMcM
This is the sound of the old dynasty dying. These disputes are not uncommon,
they are getting less uncommon as time goes on. Eventually the 'content'
company like Viacom will demand so much money for their content there will be
no distributor willing to distribute it (because they can't make any money
doing so) and then folks like John Stewart's production company will have a
pull a C.K. Lewis and drop the middle man. Welcome to the real world Neo.

~~~
res0nat0r
If that happens I think we can say goodbye to expensive and well written shows
such as Breaking Bad and the like. A show like that which has been designed to
be played out for possibly years isn't going to ever get off the ground via a
pay as you go per episode, or some type of piecemeal model. There needs to be
a significant upfront capital in place to make it worth the time for everyone
who would be involved. But if some other company somewhere out there can and
will front the money instead, then by all means please do it!

~~~
saalweachter
I'm actually looking forward to that.

I read a lot of golden and silver age science fiction. One of the things I
love about the oldies isn't that they're necessarily better than modern
science fiction, it's that they're _short_. _Creatures of Light and Darkness_
, a fantastic book, is 192 pages. It's a stand-alone story which spans
thousands of years, the better part of the universe, and builds such wonderful
characters. And the author gets you from here to there in 192 pages.

Nowadays, you can't introduce a plot and two characters in 200 pages. 400,
500, 600 pages are the norm. Some of it is style. Sometimes you need 600 pages
to tell a story. But a portion of it is that authors are told, by their
publishing companies, they need to target a certain size to get their books
published, because a book needs to have a certain heft or it will never leave
the shelf. And it's a damn shame, because some of these 600 page monstrosities
could have been a fantastic 200 page book.

Broadcast television also imposes certain constraints upon the show. Some
shows work well with this format, for instance, if the show is episodic in
nature. If the show is trying to tell a particular story, it works less well.

One thing that can go wrong is that not all stories that get turned into a TV
show require 18 hours of video to tell. A lot of filler is added, episodic
episodes which get dropped into the middle of the story arc to drag things
out. If the show's producers and writers are good, they can use these filler
episodes to flesh out the characters and the world. But they aren't always
good enough.

A second thing that can go wrong is that you don't always know when to end
your story. A show may get renewed for two or three or four seasons, and if
you finished telling the story in the first season, you now have to come up
with a completely new story for season two, or reveal that by a fiendish twist
your story wasn't actually finished in the season finale like you thought it
was. This isn't always as ... _satisfying_ as it could be. Other times, you
have to keep putting off finishing the story at the end of each season, which
turns entire seasons into filler. This carries the additional risk that you
may get canceled in season three and never finish the story you started in
season one.

I'm generally looking forward to the death of big media producers, because I
think the quality of entertainment will go up once people are freed from the
constraint of telling all of their stories in twenty to twenty-four 22 or 44
minute episodes.

~~~
waterlesscloud
I agree with you that there are stories that are better suited for alternate
formats.

But I don't think the death of the big media producers has anything to do with
that one way or the other.

The markets for that kind of thing aren't the same markets the big media
folks, so the new markets can grow regardless of the old ones. Kickstarter and
the like are the likely funding venues, online is the likely distribution
mechanism.

Toes are being dipped. Jane Espenson just funded a season of her webseries on
Kickstarter. Dan Harmon and Charlie Kaufman just launched a kickstarter for a
$200,000 art film project yesterday. Those are some names who have enough
clout to get things done otherwise. But maybe not enough to get the things
they want done most (almost no one has that kinda clout). Kickstarter helps
them get some of what they want.

Don't count on the big media producers dying out, by the way. They're smart,
they're connected, and they are survivors. They've been through more startup
like situations than almost anyone in silicon valley, and they're the ones
that lived through it. Don't underestimate them. TV and movies won't be like
the music business. They saw it, and they learned the lessons, even if you
don't think they did.

------
Canada
<http://thepiratebay.se/search/daily%20show/0/99/0>

~~~
JonnieCache
For that matter, <http://thedailyshow.com>

Very strange.

~~~
harshpotatoes
Well, it appears that episodes are no longer visible through thedailyshow
website. But... <http://www.hulu.com/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart> Seems to
work fine.

~~~
runn1ng
Outside of US, hulu.com doesn't work at all.

------
bluedevil2k
Daily Show is on vacation this week anyway, and these things usually get
resolved in a couple of days. A lot of posturing on both sides, with the
consumer ultimately losing.

------
mkr-hn
There's a "your provider dropped your favorite shows" scuffle every six
months. It's a negotiating tactic. This is no more newsworthy than the "suit
is back" story: <http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

~~~
georgemcbay
This _is_ noteworthy because of Viacom pulling down the show from the
Internet, which impacts _everyone_ (well, everyone who would want to watch The
Daily Show on the Internet) and not just DirecTV subscribers.

Usually I'm totally neutral about these sorts of spats, but Viacom crossed a
line here. In the grand scheme of things, this is nothing to pull the
pitchforks out over, but my opinion of Viacom is now far worse than it was
before hearing about this and this issue wouldn't even otherwise impact me
since I don't watch The Daily Show on the net and don't subscribe to DirecTV.

Bad PR move, Viacom. You should probably consider firing someone over this
because whoever made this call is not good at their job.

~~~
mkr-hn
I'm not 100% sure but I think pulling shows from the web is also a normal part
of this.

------
mathattack
Seems like a lose-lose situation for two old media firms fighting for
relevancy.

------
riordan
Yet isn't this precisely DirecTV's point?

One of DirecTV's core claims has been that online streaming of TV content
undermines the value proposition of for-pay television [1]. I get that having
your most vocal, most internetty users channel their anger toward your
opposition is a powerful negotiation tactic, but this seems like it has a
strong potential to backfire against Viacom.

[1] [http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/directv-
via...](http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/directv-viacom-
dispute-may-affect-access-for-20-million-customers/)

------
beedogs
Off their website, you mean.

It's still on all the same torrent sites it's always been on. And that's the
way anyone outside of the US and Canada has been forced to acquire the Daily
Show for years.

Copyright is so quaint.

~~~
kalleboo
Full episodes on their website play fine in any country there's no local
distributor making claims on the show. I've watched online episodes on their
site in Greece, Japan, etc. Well, until now that is.

------
user49598
_"Viacom has decided to take a service away from all Internet users in its
attempt to punish DirecTV"_

Thats the blindest, most ambitious goal you could possibly have with the
internet. Lets all get serious for a sec:
<http://thepiratebay.se/search/the%20daily%20show/0/7/0>

And besides, the Viacom streaming player is terrible and low quality. If
anything, this is going to remind people of the Hi-def, no-ad world they could
be living in.

------
fpgeek
I don't really have an opinion on the underlying dispute, but, to me, this
sounds unprecedented in a good way. Viacom expects to generate meaningful
additional pressure on DirecTV using the people who watch the episodes online
already plus the inevitable "DirecTV refugees". That's a marker of the growing
significance of watching TV online. I'd say that's a positive development
overall.

~~~
colanderman
I think it's a boneheaded move. The "DirecTV refugees" have eyeballs they
could be selling advertising to, cutting out the middleman (DirecTV). Instead
they're turning those refugees away at the border.

~~~
qwert321
Online advertising is such a small revenue stream for a network like Viacom
that they have no incentive to put anything online at all. They only use
online streaming as an experiment to test new forms of revenue. So far, it
hasn't been showing itself to be a worthwhile endeavor anyway so why worry
about the slight dip in revenue if it will help you accomplish your goal of
getting more money from DirecTV.

~~~
ebiester
Ah, but if everyone from DirecTV is coming online, there's suddenly a larger
audience, and higher fees cn be negotiated.

On the other hand, that also increases costs for Viacom and it doesn't support
the overall stable of shoes.

------
krschultz
This is kind of strange. Wouldn't it enhance Viacom's negotiating position if
people are watching directly rather than through DirecTV? i.e. Viacom can
point out that people don't need DirecTV and that will make DirecTV cave.

~~~
yock
I doubt it. If Viacom is financing the hosting of the online content, then
online viewers cost them disproportionatly more money than those who watch on
cable and satellite. Viacom would have only the ads insertted into the
streaming video to recouperate those costs and (maybe?) earn some profit.

------
Roritharr
Wow. I started watching the show on their site about three years ago with ads
which started to get targeted to my german origin about a year ago.

Guess what options i'm left with now.

~~~
rhizome
Guten Tag, Dailishowfan!

------
darrenkopp
So first Viacom shakes down Netflix, now they shake down DirecTV, who wants to
guess that in a few months dish or Comcast gets the same treatment?

~~~
khuey
Why couldn't they start with Comcast? Nobody would feel bad for them.

------
0003
The videos are not pulled. The trick is to stop the browser from loading the
popup -- similar to the nytimes.com popups.

~~~
mattmillr
You can close the popup after the announcement finishes and watch the excerpt
videos, but if you go to the Full Episodes page, there is a notice that full
episodes are not currently available.

~~~
0003
Interesting. I am able to access the full episodes.

------
debacle
The title of this article is very linkbaity.

------
ck2
Now imagine what would happen if these dinosaurs were allowed to charge
different rates for different providers going through the internet.

------
cheap
Personal Opinion: I'm going to call Comcast tomorrow and demand they do the
same thing. I can't stand Comedy Central or anything Viacom has ever done. TV
is for morons.

~~~
beedogs
[http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/01/26/28-not-having-
a-t...](http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/01/26/28-not-having-a-tv/)

~~~
pbhjpbhj
> _Generally this makes them very boring and gives you very little to talk to
> them about._ //

What I find depressing is that watching other people have lives is supposed to
be interesting but trying to have a life yourself is "very boring"; I'm boring
because I'm poor, socially inept and don't have time for leisure activities -
not because I don't watch broadcast TV.

