Today, Internet distributed media is everywhere.? Music is bought on the Internet through iTunes, or other services, as opposed to at brick and mortar stores on CDs.? More electronic books are bought on Amazon than physical books.? Movies too, are instantly available on Netflix and on all video game consoles, as well as for purchase and download through iTunes and Amazon.? Despite how ubiquitously available this downloadable media has become, this web commerce of downloadable media wasn?t even embraced by the general public only a decade ago.? Although downloadable media is embraced by the general public today, it was only due to the vision and marketing prowess of particular companies at the right place and time to take advantage of shifting purchasing trends and consumer behaviors.
In music, the first step forward towards making it a consumable media on digital computers was with the creation of the MP3.? It was designed in 1993 and substantially reduced the size of a CD audio file.? ?An MP3 file can be played directly on a personal computer or portable digital music player, [?] or written onto a standard audio CD? (MP3).? MP3 files allowed music, which would usually take up too much space if copied from the CD, to be compressed into much smaller files, without sacrificing too much audio quality.
As soon as MP3s were created, the Internet Underground Music Archive was formed, and within a year, was even featured on NPR?s ?all things considered.? This was the first ever online music store for underground artists to present to the world.? The goal of the archive was to make music available free directly from artist to listener, without the need for middlemen or big record labels.? Record industries even back then were terrified since there was no way to stop the music from being copied and pirated (Iuma).? In 1995 IBM planned on releasing their own their digital music service they called their digital library (International).? However, their efforts would soon die out.? ?IBM and Blockbuster toyed with the idea of using digital-music files to generate in-store CDs tailored to customers? specific preferences. [?] the big labels howled and threatened to withhold their hottest titles.? IBM and Blockbuster quietly let the idea die? (Krantz).
This didn?t stop record companies from trying to sell the MP3s by themselves.? They created strong codes for protecting their own files from being copied, to reduce the ease of which they could be pirated.? According to Atwood, Capitol records was the first major music label to embrace Internet-delivered music in 1997.? They released a few songs over the web.? Some objections were that, though users could then rip the downloaded music on to a CD, CD-R was not readily available quite yet.? Despite this push, they still didn?t plan on selling whole albums (Atwood).
However, MP3 will still causing many legal battles.? Spanbauer reported that Diamond Multimedia was releasing the first portable MP3 player, which would store and player the MP3 files on your computer, as opposed to CD audio files, but it was being held up by the courts through injections (Spanbauer).? An economist article even argued that ripping CDs onto computers was against the law, but made a comment that can now be seen as quite prescient, ?Rather than prosecuting the hackers, the record companies ought to be enlisting them. For one thing is glaringly obvious: the underground music networks are a pioneering a more efficient form of distribution that the record companies would do well to emulate? (The Economist).? Emulate this distribution network is precisely what they would not do, as can be seen by Napster.
It wouldn?t be until Napster, a music file sharing website, than music downloads would begin to become part of the public consciousness.? ?At its peak in 2001, there were as many as 1.5 million people simultaneously sharing files worldwide by using Napster?s software, and Napster had embedded in the consciousness of consumers the idea of downloading songs from the Internet?bypassing the purchase of established distribution forms such as records, tapes, or compact discs.?? (media convergence).? Napster would then be shutdown after a successful court injection by the recording industry association of america, also in 2001.
That same year, the ipod was released, another MP3 player.? It came with iTunes, an easy to use software that would convert your CDs into MP3-like audio files which you could then carry on your iPod.? The iPod was different from earlier MP3 Devices.? It was marketed ?originally touting the ability to put 1,000 songs in a consumer?s pocket, the iPod was easy to use and featured a simple, clean design.? Small white earbud headphones became an iconic trademark of the product in Apple?s pervasive and award-winning advertising campaigns.? With its ease of use and eventual cross-platform compatability, the device gained market dominance beyond any Apple ever enjoyed [?]? (iPod).? Apple and the iPod would be the first visionary company to build the kind of market share needed to dominate the portable MP3 market.
Now according to Encyclopedia Britannica, thanks to Napster, the idea of downloading music quickly caught on, and more file-sharing websites and networks were created, faster than the RIAA could shut them down. ?It took a technology company, Apple Inc., to take advantage of this pent-up demand by launching an online Web site (the iTunes Store) in 2003 to sell songs, [?] for play on the company?s iPod portable digital player media player. [?] By 2006, Apple had sold more than 100 million iPods, and more than 2 billion songs had been downloaded from the iTunes Store, [?]? (media convergence) This was all done legally, and iTunes and Apple became the leader of the music downloading market, despite efforts by other companies like emusic, and real rhapsody, and then later microsoft?s own online music endeavors.? Apple, along with their marketing power, was able to take advantage of this slow and evolving shift among consumers from consuming music offline, to consuming it online.
Now, while it took until around 2004, 2005 before consumer attitudes would change from buying CDs to buying music off the Internet, it would take even longer for consumer attitudes to change from buying physical books, to buying e-books.? The earliest e-books were available on e-readers back in 1993, the same year the MP3 was created.? according to Popular Science at the time, NEC had developed a digital book player that could play e-books off of old floppy disks, and went on to release the equivalent of electronic paperbacks (Electronic books).? ?The industry for buying and selling e-books first emerged as a mainstream business in the late 1990s, when companies like Peanut Press began selling book content for reading on PDAs, [?] However, in the aftermath of the dot-com crash of 2000-2002, e-books did not find wide acceptance by the publishing industry, and investment in e-reading devices and e-book technologies subsided? (e-book).? Thus, once again, thanks to publishing gatekeepers, similar to the music industry, wide e-book adoption would not come about.
Despite these setbacks, e-books did have its fair share of early advocators.? Tanaka was at first skeptical but upon further examination, considered a good idea.? Her article in newsweek discussed different tablet electronic book tablets at the time, this was in 1999.? Her main complaint was the weak selection of books these e-readers had access to, in addition to the e-books being quite expensive.? ?Rocket eBook users can choose from about 700 digital books; SoftBook offers 100? (Tanaka).? This was before the dot-com crash, and after, the idea for online books wasn?t going anywhere.
E-books were still being sold throughout the 2000s, but it wasn?t a mainstream commodity.? ?In 2000 Amazon.com began selling electronic books, or e-books, typically priced at $9.99? (Amazon.com). Despite the lagging sells of electronic books, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.com, had a vision, planned on changing those habits.? In 2007 he released the Amazon kindle, another e-reader device like its predecessors, but also had new technology that allowed its text to be more like a book in that it involved e-ink, hence it wasn?t an LCD, but a malleable ink screen.
Such a move was unprecedented and quite risky, As Morrissey would report in Mediaweek, many doubters of the kindle would cite the sluggish growth of the e-reader market over the past decade.? Those who predicted it to flop would end updating their words.? ?The Kindle was a fast success. It sold out in five and a half hours and was out of stock until spring of 2008. [?] Much like the iPod did to generic MP3 players that came before it, the Kindle created a seamless, dead-simple system that made getting a book a snap thanks to a wireless download system backed by Amazon?s recommendation engine.? (Morrissey).? According to Encyclopedia Brittanica, The industries resurgence was due to Amazon.com releasing the kindle in 2007, ?after which sales of e-books in the United States grew rapidly? (e-book).? Jeff Bezos would go on to be marketer of the year in 2009 according to Mediaweek (Morrissey).
Unlike music, e-books did not have a clear pent-up market for its demand.? Music had the success of Napster upon which Apple would build its flagship music store and line of iPods.? The market for e-books was sluggish at best, precisely why so many predicted the kindle?s demise (Morrissey).? The kindle was not the first nor the last e-book reader, as other companies have created their own, like Barnes & Nobles?s nook.? However, ?What made the kindle different was having the marketing power of Amazon.com to distribute titles.? A vast selection of electronic books, as well as many newspapers, magazines, and blogs, are available for the Kindle.? The device?s wireless capability enables users to buy and read material anytime? (kindle).? So unlike Softbook in the 90s, Amazon used their marketing prowess to create the largest selection of available e-books, long before their kindle was ever released, having first sold e-books back in 2000.
Jeff Bezos was able to usher in his vision, bringing e-books into the mainstream of Internet media consumption.? The ultimate turning point of this technology and media consumption is right now in 2011, for now they actually sell more e-books than physical books.? ?While Amazon did not release specific sales numbers, it said it has sold 105 Kindle e-books for every 100 print books since April 1? (McNeill). E-book sales have now surpassed physical book sales, as consumers are shifting their tastes and habits from physical to digital books.
Now with books and music being ushered into digital Internet consumption, by Amazon and iTunes respectably, there are still many other forms of media that are being made available through the Internet.? Wikipedia has created the free online encyclopedia, albeit, not a credible source for a research due to its evolving nature.? The question is to ask is if there is an Apple or Amazon in the wings to usher in TV, movies, newspapers, and all other forms of media into Internet Consumption.
Although there is not a clear device that have ushered in movies and TV to be downloaded, these Internet media options are gaining popularity, partially due to the gatekeepers embrace of them, not leaving it to another company to master.? Unlike music and ebooks, movies do not have a clear defined history of ushering in its own consumption, unlike ipod for downloadable music, and kindle for downloadable movies, but there are devices that are slowly still bring these media consumption options to the masses.
One reason for the delay in access to movies over the Internet is in the lack of availability of high speed Internet.? Korea provides a great example of what broadband Internet access.? ?Although movies and videos on demand are still pie in the sky in the U.S. because of slow download speeds and high costs, they are a reality in Korea.? For just 80 cents, you can download a Korean hit movie of the ?90s in not much more than a minute. ?What Apple?s iTunes is doing to music in the U.S. now, broadband did to movies and TV archives in Korea two years go,? says Lee Jae Woong, CEO of Daum, Korea?s largest Internet portal (Shameen).? That was back in 2003, and thus movies were readily available in 2001 thanks to their high-speed Internet access.
As far back as 2000, there were efforts to release movies for legal download over the Internet, thus using a new distribution platform, unlike DVDs, or VHS.? ?In what could prove to be a groundbreaking deal for online film distribution, Disney?s Miramax Films will make 12 movies available for payper-view downloads through SightSound.com.? Miramax becomes the first major studio to take the plunge in presenting feature-length films on the Web [?]? (Tedesco).? Unlike the recording industry, due to the slow growth rate of broadband Internet access, the movie and TV industries had more time in preparing for Internet distribution of their media content, however, that didn?t mean it was all that popular to begin with.
Back in 2002, NPR had a commentary titled ?Internet Services to download movies not all they?re made out to be.?? He went on to say in the commentary about Movielink, a web pay-per-view download movie service, ?The idea behind Movielink is cool, but you have to wonder, do people really want this?? (Commentary).? He then went on to complain about how his computer was fast enough to play the movie and it kept freezing.? The potential was there though, and a few visionaries saw it.? While this NPR commentator asked why download a movie, when you can just get it from Netflix, another reporter asked the opposite and wondered how Netflix would compete, once movies become more readily downloaded.? ?[?] from the Internet front, Netflix could go extinct when customers are able to easily download movies over high-speed Internet connections, a service known as Internet-based video on demand? (Freeman).? Little did he know how quickly they would evolve.
2007 would be a turning point for online movies as many different firms embraced different forms of viewing movies and TV shows on the Internet.? Movies and TV shows were first available to purchase and download off of iTunes in 2006, and by 2007 had begun to establish a wide selection.? Hulu was founded, and Netflix began to offer streaming movies as part of their services.? Unlike endeavors in other forms of media, ?On March 22, 2007, NBC Universal and the News Corporation Ltd. announced the creation of Hulu? (Hulu).? Hulu provided streaming TV shows over the Internet, and unlike music and books, the very people who created the TV shows and movies were the ones who created this service, which didn?t allow a new company to come in and take over the market like Apple and Amazon did to music and books.
Netflix has now become a leader in streaming movies, and with the success of their streaming services, ?In 2010 Netflix introduced a streaming-only plan that offered unlimited streaming service but no DVDs? (Netflix).? It can be argued that Netflix now leads the way in streaming movies, by having the largest selection, being viewable and all forms of digital products including Blu-ray players, iPhones, Game Consoles, and iPads among others, in addition to the traditional computer.
While movies have not established a clear case for download consumption as opposed to blu-ray disks, user-generated video content has found a home base at youtube.com.? And through user submissions, many movies do exist on youtube, albeit illegally, due to users who uploaded them.? ?By the summer of 2006, Youtube was serving more than 100 million videos per day, and the number of videos being uploaded to the site showed no sign of slowing down? (Youtube).? With youtube, now anyone can create their own video, and upload it for all the world to see. with shows like Tosh.0 being revolved completely around viewing on and making jokes on the different hilarious videos that are uploaded every week.
While downloadable books and downloadable music achieve mainstream success on the Internet today, it would have not been had visionaries not seen the potential to capitalize on such emerging trends in consumer behavior.? While music and books have transitioned the market into their digital counterparts, movies and tv are still on their way, while tv shows are available the day after they air on sites like hulu, there is still room for more innovation and vision.? One can imagine a day where rather than have cable, all TV channels become available through Internet channels.? Glenn Beck has started this trend by creating his own online network, which he is charging $4.95 a month for, similar to premium cable channels like HBO (Schuker).? Will others follow suit?? Perhaps Netflix may become it?s own television cable provider. Only time will tell as downloadable movies and TV shows compete with DVDs and Blu-Rays, just as downloadable music competed with CDs.
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