At the urging of a friend, I dove into the show Breaking Bad earlier this summer. I was immediately hooked. As I wind down to the final episodes of the current season, I’m convinced the show was written as one big meditation on karma; karma not as some universal scorecard, but as the simple truth that we cannot escape the consequences of our actions, however big or small.
As a result, the show is gritty and often uncomfortable to watch, but completely and utterly absorbing. If you enjoy thoughtful storytelling with depth and gravity, it’s worth the time.
Source: tvovermind.com
The social future of television
Ethan Zuckerman:
Herkko [Hietanen of the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology] sees a near-fatal embrace between content providers and cable companies. They’re co-dependent, and scared of alienating one another. But this dependency can limit innovation in services. We’ve seen less development around on-demand video, the ability to watch on demand than we might expect than we might expect. Instead, we’ve seen “enhancements” like DRM and the broadcast flag, and heavy litigation against anyone entering the markets. Basically, we see a lot of intelligence added at the center of a network, with dumb, constrained edges that are prevented from innovating.
This is the most succinct analysis of the state of television that I’ve seen in some time, and describes precisely why I no longer participate as a TV “viewer.” Those exceptional few shows that I simply love I’ll acquire via iTunes or, failing that, BitTorrent, with no ads, no hassles and relatively good portability, so long as I can connect the display to my laptop.
In short, I’ll pay you for good content if you get out of my way and let me. For the rest, I just don’t bother any more.
This is why I won’t throw out my analog TV or retire its rabbit ears any time soon. Analog broadcast has gone mute, but the longest-running TV show in the universe — the cosmic radiation of the Big Bang — is still playing and I might want to tune in from time to time.
Source: sfgate.com
As with print-based media, Internet-based distribution generates only a tiny fraction of the revenue and profit that today’s incumbent cable, broadcast, and satellite distribution models do. As Internet-based distribution gains steam, therefore, most TV industry incumbents will no longer be able to support their existing cost structures.
Source: Business Insider
