CBC talking to Rogers about providing content for the cableco’s VOD service

The Canadian Broadcasting Corp. is working on packaging CBC programming, beginning with its news shows, for offer on a video-on-demand (VOD) basis on Rogers Cable Inc.’s digital cable platform. Mark Hyland, director of broadband and digital services at CBC English Television, says the public broadcaster won’t apply for its own VOD licence, but needs to have its content provided on an on-demand basis in the changing broadcast world. "We’re hoping to have a CBC tier on VOD that we would package and brand. A lot of our stuff I would like to see for free on digital," Hyland told Canadian Communications Reports in an interview at the International New Media Festival in Prince Edward Island last week. "CBC is interested in VOD where people can go look at all of our current affairs programming at any time. I don’t think that VOD will take off when it’s a nickel and dime thing (paying a small amount for each program chosen). I think it has to be a flat fee for all you can eat." Free programming part of Rogers VOD offeringRogers Cable Inc. says its recently launched VOD offering will include three distinct categories: movies-on-demand, free programming, and subscription-based VOD (SVOD). Canada’s largest cableco launched its VOD service commercially in the third week of August in an area covering 530,000 homes passed in central Toronto (CCR Update, Oct. 17/02; CCR, March 1/02). Rogers executives noted during a conference call with analysts last week following the release of its third quarter financial results that a number of programming providers have approached the company with proposals for SVOD, which the cableco intends to launch before the end of the year. Shaw Cableystems announced that it plans to launch the country’s first SVOD service next month in Calgary (CCR Update, Oct. 17/02). Rogers told analysts that its VOD service averaged two buys per subscriber in the two-week period in August following its launch. That number jumped to an average of 2.5 VOD buys per subscriber in September and should be even higher in October. Rogers’ VOD service currently includes about 330 titles.Hyland cited the example of someone wanting to build a deck being able to access a how-to video on the topic when ready to proceed with actual construction, rather than on some arbitrary Thursday at 8 p.m. when it might be programmed to air. He told participants at the festival that getting into VOD was one way the CBC was dealing with a broadcast environment increasingly reliant on viewer demand for choice. A proliferation of new channels, offering more choice, and key technologies such as the personal video recorder (PVR) and VOD, are leading to on-demand television, he noted. "Users have more choice than ever before and that is only going to increase," Hyland said during a Viewers in Charge workshop he led on October 17 at the festival. "And the other thing is that it makes it very competitive for the players in that business, and overall it leads to diminished profits and consolidation." TV-on-demand could eventually "bust the notion of prime time," Hyland believes. He cites a study that revealed that 70 per cent of recorded shows were watched outside of prime time. "If prime time doesn’t mattter, what does?" he asked. "We as broadcasters have to start looking at other ways of doing things. Because the idea of spending time on an amazing production and giving people one chance at one specific hour in their busy schedule to see it is not enough. We can’t be thinking of one specific hour of programming that has come to an end. We have to fragment with the audience as it fragments. This will be an evolution; it won’t happen overnight." Another factor contributing to choice is the lower economic barriers to entry into broadcasting, which is allowing more people to produce low-budget programming, he said. He cited the example of ZeD – a second response by the CBC for viewer demand for choice – and pointed out that the contributed portions of the program can easily come from the general public because they can afford to shoot on cheaper digital video and/or produce flash animation on the computer. ZeD debuted last week on the CBC network, after a pilot in March and April. With the show, viewers can submit works they have created to a ZeD web site. The shows are voted on by the general public, with the most popular being considered for airing on the hour-long show. Five per cent to 10 per cent of the program, which airs daily in the evening, is chosen from submissions by Canadians. However, Hyland points out, "In the TV world, user choice seems to be related to tougher conditions for broadcasters. I think that CBC has some amazing stuff on this season, but certainly our overall share is going to stay the same or decrease because of the overall audience fragmentation. We have to come up with ideas to deal with these changes in the broadcast world." For more details about ZeD, see the Nov. 29/01 issue of CCR affiliate publication Canadian NEW MEDIA.

CBC talking to Rogers about providing content for the cableco’s VOD service

Broadcast | October 24, 2002

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