Comments on: Canadian public TV to try out BitTorrent

Following closely on the heels of Norway, the CBC will release high-quality, DRM-free copies of a major prime-time show.

[streamOG]

Chris,

While a good piece of entertainment, your article seemingly glosses over the much more important issues at play here.

CBC is going to give away free content. That's amazing. Such a novel idea. What are they going to do to make money to generate revenue so they can afford to pay their people and expand their business?

This is the same tired old dreck that "Free" writers like yourself conjure up and it just continues to fall flat. I would suggest you take into account some basic business regiment and think about how to generate revenue. All the desire for free content in the world won't put food on the plates of CBC's employees.

Regards,

Christopher

[csoghoian]

CBC is paid for by Canadian tax dollars. They don't need to turn a profit, they just need to keep their viewers happy.

And they can always embed ads in the BitTorrent files.

[ricksterto]

Seems the old comment by streamOG was removed....maybe we should note that streamOG is the CEO of a company that provides DRM software. Taking this into account, the comment is hardly surprising. The old model of delivering content is the only model that works for his company.

And yes, CBC is funded from public / taxpayer money. And they don't resell their programming (at least not to any great extent) through DVD box sets.

Oh by the way, lack of DRM material won't put food on the plates of employees of BuyDRM will it streamOG?

[decmo]

I think this is a good move by the CBC. It gives the public a chance to view some quality programming and maybe bring back some viewers to CBC. Give the viewers a taste at their leisure and if they like it, it'll bring back some viewers. Increased viewership will bring back advertising dollars and benefit everyone in the long run.

[John W. Cowan]

StreamOG: Are you aware that CBC makes no money on its content? What puts food on the plate of CBC's employees is the Canadian taxpayer plus CBC's advertising revenue. I hardly think that making their content available over the Net will cannibalize either of those sources.

[Mergatroid Mania]

I'm a Canadian.

CBC employees get food for their tables out of MY pocket. As long as my taxes don't go up, I could care less what they do with their content.
streamOG, are YOU a Canadian? Maybe the comments should be left to them, since they PAY for the CBC whether they want to or not. So, if your question is "What are they going to do to generate revenue?" the answer is "Get their revenue from taxpayers, like they already do".

I suggest you take into account some basic business regiment and realize that a business that runs off of government handouts can do anything they want, since they aren't paying for it anyway.

I'm with the group of people in my country that believes the CBC should be privatized. The days of governments paying for news/information/entertainment media should be long over.

As a matter of fact, I don't think it's quite fair to even call the CBC a business at all, is it? Since there is no risk in running it, and any shortfalls will just be paid for by the government, how can it be called a business? Don't businesses generate profits?

Chris Soghoian shouldn't be so hard on the US networks (at least not for this reason), after all they have to pay for everything themselves, unlike the CBC.

I'd be more concerned about the networks thinking their shows are worth not only $1.99, but the ill will they generate from the way they make them available. DRM on an episode of a network television show is just insulting. People who want to collect shows will get their copies from cable or other sources. They only inconvenience people who might want to make a copy to show their friends, or play on another media. Just how many copies of The Colbert Report do they think people want?