Last year stories started circulating about a Microsoft plan to integrate pay TV into Xbox Live. Reports claimed they were close to finalizing deals with companies including Time Warner, the BBC, and HBO.
However, it now appears they weren’t as close as originally reported and their plans have been put on hold indefinitely. It seems TV executives weren’t impressed enough to offer terms acceptable to Microsoft, and the deal fizzled.
Citing an unnamed media executive personally involved in the negotiations, Reuters says Microsoft got so far as demonstrating their TV platform in action, but ultimately decided the price of programming was too high. Their source reportedly said, “They built Microsoft TV, they demoed it for us, they asked for rate cards but then said ‘ooh ah, that’s expensive.”
Combining this new information with previous reports about Microsoft TV, it appears their plan was to provide both Netflix-style video on demand, but with more current content, and a traditional (but web-based) pay TV service. In addition, they seemed to be considering producing exclusive content of their own.
Of course this is nothing new or shocking. Like so many other industries built around legacy technology, they have fought nearly every attempt to develop new business models.
Network executives have licensed TV series to Netflix with key episodes missing, demanded Hulu block viewers who chose to watch their free shows (and commercials) on TVs instead of computer monitors. On the other side of the equation, cable providers are punished if they help paying customers extend TV service beyond the living room.
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Result for: video on demand
Amazon has begun selling TV episodes for 99 cents a piece, just hours after Apple announced that they would begin offering 99 cent rentals on recently aired shows.
Disney and Fox shows, such as “Glee,” “Lost” and “Bones” are now available via Amazon Video On Demand for 99 cents.
When you purchase the episodes, they are yours to keep. You can download them and they never expire. You can also stream them indefinitely.
Shows from other broadcasters, such as AMC, still cost $1.99, however.
The ability to download is only available on Windows PCs and TiVO HD boxes, but you can stream the shows on Macs, HDTVs, Roku boxes and more.
Result for: video on demand
Sony has launched their own challenge to Apple’s iTunes this week, dubbed Qriocity, which will be an unlimited, cloud-based music service available via the PlayStation 3 and other Internet-connected devices such as HDTVs and Blu-ray players.
The service will go live by the end of the year, giving users a chance to stream millions of songs in the cloud.
Besides the PS3, the service will be available on Sony portable media devices, Sony Blu-ray players, Sony home-theater systems, 2010 Web-enabled Bravia HDTVs and Windows PCs.
“We are excited to offer our customers high quality, cloud-based entertainment experiences across many of Sony’s network-enabled devices,” says Kazuo Hirai, president of Sony’s networked products and services group. “Services ‘powered by Qriocity’ will revolutionize the way that users play, listen, watch, share, communicate, learn, discover and create their digital entertainment content.”
Sony has said it will expand the Qriocity “Video on Demand” service which launched in April in the U.S. to France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the U.K. in the fall.
The video service has content from 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, Lionsgate, MGM, NBC Universal, Paramount, Sony, The Walt Disney Company, and Warner Bros.
