Friday, September 21, 2007

NBC to Offer Free TV Show Downloads That Expire After a Week

NBC Universal has announced plans to offer many of its TV shows for free download to PCs for a week following their initial broadcasts. The service will come with several restrictions. Downloaded TV shows will only be viewable on Windows-based PCs, and will expire after seven days; users also won't be able to fast-forward through commercials, or transfer them to disk or another computer. NBC eventually plans to let consumers pay a fee for downloads that could be kept permanently, and transferred to devices like the iPod. The company is also gearing up to launch Hulu, its online video distribution joint venture with News Corp., which will also offer its TV programs, along with movies and video from other partners, for free on a streaming, ad-supported distribution network.

Related Links:http://tinyurl.com/2555dw (NBC announcement)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/20/business/media/20nbc.html

2 comments:

Unknown said...

i think this is very clever, and will help consumers become accustomed to watching extended video on the small screen. because it retains the commercials, nbc keeps its advertisers happy

DMT said...

I agree. It gives the consumer options. A few book publishers are experimenting with free ad based books, which won't work for every author, but some authors might be willing to try a business model like this.