It's a huge year for TV's future. Yet for all the excitement about Web-first soap operas, data-driven programming and the disruption of broadcast, the Internet TV "inflection point" that 2013 has become is just the beginning. A Trojan horse is slowly rolling into town, and it's bursting at the seams with data. Wheeling it along is none other than Google. 

Indeed, if the data-fueled success of Netflix's House of Cards is as crucial to TV's future as many believe, what Google is most likely planning will make the transformation we've witnessed so far look like early innings in a very long ball game.

First, though, a caveat: Google has said almost nothing about its plans for taking on the TV market, and I don't have any new inside information to offer on that front. What follows is instead a giant thought experiment — a plausible (to me, at least), fact-based extrapolation of just how thoroughly Google could disrupt the TV industry should it put its mind to it. And should users consent to its plans.

TV's Future Hinges On Content, Data and UX

Whatever TV looks like in the future, it will be built atop three crucial components: content, intelligence and user experience. A fourth element, known as actually making money, hinges heavily on the "intelligence" part — which is to say, data. 

The industry is collectively still figuring out the user experience part. Apple is rumored to have "cracked" the interface problem, but until Steve Jobs's prophetic words find a home in reality, we're stuck with the puzzle's most promising pieces: the likes of AirPlay, Roku and a small army of creative video app designers. 

That leaves the content and intelligence parts, which are what Netflix is purported to have mastered with House of Cards and what Amazon hopes to mimic with with its own Internet-first TV pilots. Hulu has taken its own stabs, but has yet to score a House of Cards-sized hit.

For the last few years, Google's YouTube has also invested quite heavily in original, TV-quality programming for Internet audiences. It, too, is still trying to find its Kevin Spacey. But it's likely only a matter of time before everybody's buzzing about the new show on YouTube, much like we've long chattered about double rainbows and finger-biting babies. 

Google will find its killer content. It will do so in part by leveraging the very thing that gives the company an advantage in just about any space it enters: all that data. 

YouTube: A Burgeoning Trove Of User Data

An absurdly funny standup routine by Louis CK? Thumbs up. A mini-documentary about 3D-printed guns? Consider the "Watch Later" button tapped.  Every music video I ever wanted to see? YouTube has them too, and designating my favorites is effortless. With every tap of each of YouTube's buttons — thumbs up, add to a playlist, watch later and, most importantly, "play" — I'm feeding fresh data to the world's biggest video site. Which, in turn, it uses to build out personalized recommendations, not unlike the special sauce Netflix used to wipe out Blockbuster.

Of course, the data on Netflix's servers is a bit more useful when it comes to recommending long form, Hollywood-caliber video to its users, since that's what Netflix specializes in exclusively. It's the type of knowledge Google will presumably get better at building as its selection of professionally-produced video expands. 

What Google Knows - And Will Know - About Us 

In the meantime, Google is building out a much richer profile of its users than Netflix and Hulu could ever dream of creating.

Outside of YouTube, Google knows a great deal about us. Just how much it knows varies depending on how heavily you use Google's services — and how finely you tune your privacy settings.

For me, that data includes my browsing history (across devices), email, documents, voicemails, eight years of search queries, detailed location data from Maps, a limited view of my schedule from Google Calendar (I mostly use iCal) and a smattering of other data points from the more than 25 different active services tied to my Gmail account/ And I'm not even an Android user.

These services don't all swap data freely — and my Google Drive may well contain no information that's of value to YouTube. But collectively, these services build out a rather richly-detailed general profile of who we are, what we do, where we go and what we enjoy. In theory, YouTube has the capability of knowing not just what Netflix knows — what we watch, when we skip, how we rate — but also quite a lot about who we are in general. 

In the future — if Google's master plan unfolds accordingly — this will all be buttressed with social insights. As its social efforts ramp up, our list of Gmail contacts becomes much more informative: who's in which circles? What do they +1? Who do I trust? 

Google+ is still the exclusive domain of early adopters and media geeks, but in time the company intends for it to become a viable alternative to Facebook and will eagerly ingest all of the social data points that come with that distinction. You can catch an early glimpse of how Google intends to use social data in the next iteration of its Maps interface, which will leverage your social connections to provide recommendations about where to go next. Think Google Now for your physical location. 

How Google Could Use This Data To Win At TV

Similarly, we may one day see Google Now for TV. That is, anticipatory content recommendations fueled by your viewing history, social connections and insights inferred from a complex tapestry of data points from across services and devices. 

Recommendations are important (indeed, cracking this code certainly helped put Netflix in a position to win with House of Cards), but they're only the beginning of what's possible when television is fueled by very, very big data. As its video efforts ramp up, Google — like Netflix before it — will be able to factor in mountains of user data to determine not just what to recommend, but what content to buy the exclusive rights to, or even produce outright. 

Unlike other Internet TV shows, these new premium productions will sit within the world's biggest repository of online video. Sure, much of it is garbage, but the sheer scale of the material it has on hand increases Google's ability to smartly serve up relevant, worthwhile videos to people who come to check out its new shows. Not to mention how easy it would be to rope YouTube's casual, cat video-watching users into clicking the play button on their next big TV-style program. House of Cats, anyone?

In the fall, Nielsen is going to start factoring Internet viewing stats into its decades-old TV-viewing measurement methodology. It's a move that's widely viewed as being both long overdue and symbolic of where TV is heading. If you ask me, Nielsen isn't going far or fast enough to stay relevant. The further companies like Google move into the TV space, the less sense the old, panel-based methodology for tracking makes sense. 

In a recent post on the Monday Note, Frédéric Filloux argues that the sample-based method Nielsen uses to track Web user activity is ripe to be upended by Google's far more sophisticated mechanisms, which even go so far as to use statistical pairing to filter out repeat visitors that may be coming to the same site from multiple devices. Filloux is referring to Web tracking, not TV viewership — the traditional part of which Nielsen is uniquely capable of measuring.

But his argument carries over into the realm of online video and usage, which Google is far better at measuring than Nielsen is. As more viewers turn to the Internet for what we've historically referred to as "TV", Google's method — and what it means for potential advertisers — becomes a lot more attractive than Nielsen's.

When it comes time to monetize those shows, all that big data will be just as useful. This is, of course, Google's specialty. The company that figured out how to make billions by serving contextually relevant ads to people searching the Web is probably well-positioned to do the same with the future version of what we once knew as television commercials. 

What Stands In The Way

Just because Google has the algorithmic capacity to acquire, smartly deliver and monetize rave-worthy content on a disruptive scale, that doesn't mean it will. If this indeed what Google plans to do, it's going to have to clear some hurdles. 

For one, there are privacy implications associated with the type of cross-service data sharing Google would need to do in order to build out these rich, super-profiles of viewers. Using that data to sell video ads won't go over well with everyone, even if it isn't that far off from what Google does with Web search ads. The change could be as simple as a privacy policy update and opt-in button, but nothing Google does on that front will ever fail to arouse concerns about privacy. 

Then there's the content issue, which is huge. YouTube already houses a massive amount of video, and Google likely has the intelligence to find its own House of Cards. But when it comes to hosting premium, TV-caliber content, Google is still playing catch up.

As Tim Carmody pointed out recently, Microsoft is much better positioned to win the living room than Apple is, primarily because Microsoft has managed to pull together the most compelling selection of content. (The same argument applies if you substitute Google for Apple.) That includes not just video games like Halo and Gears of War but online video sources and live TV available directly from cable providers.

With the XBox One, Microsoft also takes a pretty compelling stab at the interface problem. It doesn't eliminate the hand-held remote, but rather augments it with voice control and gesture-based interfaces that make us feel like we're truly living in the future.

To win at TV, Google is going to have to learn from products like the XBox One and incorporate a level of polish and attention to the user experience as its done with its more recent Android versions and handsets. If Google can create the Nexus 4 or set top boxes, loaded up with with a bulletproof UX and a wide selection of supreme-quality content, the Apples and Amazons of the world will have some catching up to do. And the traditional players will be screwed.

Something huge is happening in online TV this year. No, it's not a new streaming set top box or Web-exclusive video series. It's not even an app. It's a milestone: 2013 is the year that Internet-first TV became truly normal. 

People have been watching TV programs online at places like Hulu and Netflix for years. But until recently, most that viewing has involved programs that had previously aired on broadcast or cable TV. There have long been geek-centric webisodes of TV-esque programming online, but nothing that everyday people would watch. This year, things are changing. 

"An Inflection Point For Online Television"

For evidence of the mainstreaming of Web-first TV, look no further than the online revival of All My Children and One Life to Live. The classic TV soap operas are returning not to a broadcast network, but to Hulu and iTunes. It may sound like a distribution strategy fit for a tech video podcast or no-name Web TV series, but these are soap operas. TV doesn't get more mainstream than this.

(See also: The Internet's Assault On Traditional TV Is Working)

Citing an "inflection point for online television", the shows' backers are betting big on the notion that enough people watch TV online these days to make this a profitable endeavor. If recent history is any indication, it's a safe bet.

The first sign of Internet TV's legitimacy among mainstream audiences came earlier this year with House of Cards. We still don't know precisely how many people tuned into Netflix's TV-quality political drama, but it's clearly been popular among the service's 29 million subscribers, as well as many critics.

Most importantly, the show got people talking. Not just tech-savvy people living their lives online, but normal, everyday people. Suddenly, you could hear House of Cards being chattered about at parties as though it was the latest drama on HBO, whose U.S. subscriber count Netflix just surpassed. (Sort of, at least.)

At 4 million subscribers, Hulu is markedly smaller than Netflix, but it's growing fast. And unlike Netflix, Hulu lets non-subscribers stream shows for free from the desktop, so the potential reach of shows like the new All My Children isn't capped at 4 million, or even 29 million, for that matter. Then there's iTunes, through which viewers will be able to purchase individual episodes.

The Imperfect Science of Measuring Web TV

Even on these popular online services, these soap operas will almost certainly fall short of the kind of ratings numbers they used to see on daytime TV. It's impossible to know for sure, since each of these services has different viewership metrics and they're not particularly eager to share. Even Netflix, which proudly boasts the success of House of Cards, won't say just how many people actually watched the show. 

The measurement challenge might begin to change soon, as Nielsen moves toward measurement tools that Internet sources into account. Next month, a temporary pilot run of its Nielsen Digital Program Ratings will track online views from the networks' own websites. In time, the tracking method could become a standard utilized by an array of online video services, finally painting an accurate picture of what's getting watched. 

Nielsen has a long way to go with Internet TV measurement, but the fact that it's tinkering with a decades-old formula is a sign that online TV viewership is now too enormous for it to ignore if it wants to stay relevant.

Before the year is halfway over, we'll have another test of Internet TV's mainstream appeal when Arrested Development's fourth season lands on Netflix. Like the soap operas, Arrested Development is making the leap from TV to online, but in this case the show is backed by eight years of anticipation and the same data-driven smarts that all but ensured House of Cards would be a hit. 

Again, we won't know how many people will actually tune in to the new season of Arrested Development unless Netflix decides to share that data. In the meantime, we'll have only limited, largely anecdotal clues to go from. Perhaps the most important: Are people talking about this? I don't mean on Twitter, but at the bar. That's how we'll really know that a new era in television's history is underway. 

Whether we want one or not, Amazon is building a connected TV set top box for us, according to BusinessWeek. The so-called Amazon TV device will stream Internet video to our televisions, presumably with a bias towards the company's own Instant Video selections. It may not be something consumers are clamoring for, but then again, neither was Amazon's Kindle Fire. 

Indeed, Amazon's tablets offer a useful analogy for what we should expect from Amazon TV: an affordable device that mimics  existing offerings with direct connections into Amazons products and services. The idea is to provide just enough value to carve out a respectable slice of the market. In the process, Amazon sets up another entryway into its universe of content and goods. As The Verge smartly put it, it's all about the ecosystem. 

See Also: What The New Kindle Means To Amazon

The Kindle Fire didn't turn out to be the "iPad killer" some predicted, but it appears to be selling fairly well. The class of 7-inch tablets it helped popularize were popular enough to induce Apple to release the iPad Mini. For Amazon, the Kindle Fire isn't a huge money maker, but it plugs millions of people (and their credit cards) into Amazon's storefront. Expect the Amazon TV to do the same. 

Another Streaming TV Box? Really? 

This makes total sense for Amazon as a business, but why do we, the buyers, need another set top box?

Each of the devices on the market has its own benefits, but none of them are a slam dunk. Boxee's buzz has given way to an identity crisis, while Google has yet to apply the proper amount of polish to Google TV. The Roku has tons of content, but Apple TV's AirPlay feature offers even more, letting iPhone and iPad users stream anything from their devices onto the big screen. It's really the Apple TV that Amazon is taking aim at here. And the Apple TV, it's worth noting, has not generated iPad levels of popularity or excitement. 

Maybe that's the point. This could be a preemptive strike on Amazon's part. Whether Apple launches an HDTV set or not, the company is widely expected to make a splash in the Internet TV market sometime this year. By launching something with a TV app store, or at least an AirPlay equivalent, Amazon could beat Apple to the punch. That sounds a lot better than launching an inferior (albeit still good and, crucially, cheaper) competitor after the fact, as Amazon did with the Kindle Fire. 

How Amazon Can Nail This - And Apple 

In that sense, this is a huge opportunity for Amazon. A super-cheap device with a bulletproof user experience (this is TV, after all) that taps into a rich app development ecosystem could blow away the Rokus, Boxees and Apple TVs of the world. For consumers, the goal is to get as much content as possible on the new device, including a Web browser. If Aereo survives, Amazon should have an app for that, right alongside Hulu, Netflix and all the little guys building innovative video apps with awesome user interfaces.

See Also: The Internet Assault On Traditional TV Is Working

Whatever shows it plays, the Amazon TV box has to be absolutely painless to operate. Television has been dead-simple to use for decades, a fact that the makers of many Internet TV products seem to forget. None of these boxes will truly take off TV watchers find them the slightest bit confusing or intimidating.

Don't Mess This Up, Amazon

Here's what we don't want: A half-decent piece of hardware that pushes you toward Amazon's content but doesn't let you stream Hulu Plus or YouTube videos. The things most people want to watch are fractured across these devices as it is. The reason Apple's AirPlay is so promising is that I can get almost everything I want to see on my iPad - and then beam it to my TV. 

You know what doesn't work with AirPlay though? The Amazon Prime iPad app. There's no good reason for that other than the fact that Apple and Amazon are rivals. We consumers shouldn't get caught in the middle of a corporate spitting match and get stuck with a crappier experience as a result (I'm talking to you, Apple Maps). 

It's clear why Amazon is working on a device like this. It makes total sense from the company's perspective. As long as Amazon also takes the consumer's perspective into account ours, this could be huge.  

Compared to the music and news industries, the television business has so far managed to avoid being upended by the disruptive forces of the Internet. That's about to change.

Despite the industry's furious efforts to starve or shut down its online rivals, the Internet is starting to carve out a respectable slice of TV's future. The good news is that while the coming transistion is likely to be rough on many established networks and providers, it's going to be great for consumers and developers. Here's how.

Netflix Bounces Back, Surpasses HBO 

Case in point: Netflix. The video subscription service has bounced back from its 2011 faux pas to not only regain members, but surpass HBO in U.S. subscribers for the first time ever. As Quartz's Zach Seward points out, Netflix now commands more daily attention than any cable channel in the United States. 

See Also: Do We Really Need Amazon TV? No, But Amazon Does

Netflix's dominance over HBO in particular makes for some pretty symbolic future-of-TV discussion fodder. It is, after all, HBO that refuses to offer its programming as a stand alone subscription service, despite growing demand for such a option. It is precisely its old media business relationships and norms that are holding HBO back from letting non-cable subscribers use its HBO Go app, a fact that seems worth recalling at this particular moment in history. It's no wonder that the company's CEO is publicly rethinking that strategy and admitting to reporters that cable-free access to HBO Go may be an inevitability.

It's also interesting to note, as Seward does, that HBO started out much like Netflix did, by first making out-of-theater movies available to subscribers, and then moving into original programming. 

The Internet Masters What Matters: Programming

For the last few years, it was the hardware, distribution and overall experience of watching TV that started to change at the hands of the Internet and mobile tech. Now, crucially, we're getting down to what matters most: the stuff that actually draws viewers. 

The trend toward original, Internet-only, TV-style programming is something we tech blogs have watched and opined about for the better part of a year. In the first half of 2013, the theoretical promise of original Internet TV has morphed into a confirmation that it is, in fact, something normal, non-techie people care about.

Netflix's Lilyhammer may not have changed the landscape, but it was an important precursor to House of Cards, which appears to be doing exactly that. Meanwhile, Hulu, Amazon and YouTube continue to make their own investments in original programming to compete with cable and network TV. 

The success of House of Cards has led to a great deal of discussion about the rise of data-driven TV programming and what it means for TV's future. Unlike the people who have traditionally made TV programming decisions, Netflix is sitting on a mountain of data about its users. That includes 30 million plays and 4 million ratings per day, in addition to details about when people watch, from which devices, which parts they rewind and more.

By looking at this trove of data, Netflix was able to place a pretty safe bet on the notion that a remake of this particular BBC show starring Kevin Spacey and directed by David Fincher would do well. 

Netflix isn't the only company tapping its users to help with video programming decisions. This weekend, Amazon asked viewers to rate the pilot episodes of 14 different Web series, which apparently resulted in quite a few views for the original programs. The company hasn't launched a stand-alone Netflix competitor, but Amazon Prime appears poised to evolve into such an offering. There's even an Amazon TV set top box rumor, hot off of the presses.

Aereo: Please Excuse This Interruption

Next month, people living in and around Boston will be able to join New York's early adopters in subscribing to Aereo, an innovative and controversial Internet TV service. Since its launch, Aereo has under assault by much of the TV industry, which claims its antenna-renting and re-broadcasting model of mobile and Web TV amounts to copyright infringement. That may or may not be true, but it's certainly threatening their business model, which is why they wasted no time in trying to sue Aereo out of existence. 

So far, Aereo has prevailed. That is, early court rulings have sided with the startup's claims of fair use and thus declined to shut it down before the lawsuit goes to trial, which will undoubtedly be an interesting affair to follow. 

If Aereo survives this litigious onslaught, it's poised to be one of the most disruptive forces the industry has seen in awhile. And while that would be bad news for network executives, it's actually pretty great for consumers, who will be able to tune into broadcast TV online without dealing with rabbit ears or a cable provider. It would also be a huge win for the Internet in the battle for TV's future.

The Original Web Programming Revolution Continues

The next big test for Internet-only TV will be the return of cult classic Arrested Development, a new season of which will land on Netflix next month, eight years after Fox dropped the original. If the show's enduring popularity and House of Cards' recent success are any indication, May will be a good month for Netflix. 

We won't actually know how well Arrested Development does, though. That's because like House of Cards and everything else on Netflix, it isn't tracked by the same TV ratings system that has measured TV viewership in the U.S. for six decades. The only numbers we get from Netflix are the ones it chooses to share. The company isn't typically generous with that data, which is somewhat ironic considering how much its users willingly hand over.

That all might be about to change, as Nielsen gets ready to update its TV audience measuring methodology to include Internet sources. It's not clear whether the long-overdue update will track views on Netflix when it gets rolled out this fall, but the normalization of TV measurement should help paint a clearer picture of what's getting watched, regardless of the distribution channel. 

If nothing else, the Nielsen update further illustrates the extent to which TV is changing in the age of streaming services and mobile devices. 

Watching Coachella from your phone just got easier. At long last, iOS users can tap into YouTube's live video streams, thanks to an update pushed out to the app yesterday. 

It may seem like a minor thing, but the addition of livestreaming support to YouTube for iOS is a pretty nice touch, especially if you're getting your "TV" content from your tablet or smartphone. This is a win for cord cutters. 

As somebody who relies exclusively on Internet streaming boxes and mobile devices to fill their 48" HDTV screen with moving pictures, I've long wished YouTube's native app would give me access to the live-streamed stuff. In recent years, YouTube has been making live video feeds available for whatever major political and entertainment events they can get the rights to stream. This includes music festivals like Coachella, sporting events and just about every major televised event in the course of each presidential election. You know, exactly the kind of thing for which we tune into live TV.

Internet TV User Experience: It's Getting There...

The problem with relying on the Internet for TV content is that the user experience is unpolished. As exciting as all this new TV tech might seem, there's still something to be said for sitting in front of a television set, pressing a button and leaning back. You can't really do that with Internet TV, but the experience is getting there. 

Part of the equation is smart app design such as that found in iPad video apps like Frequency, ShowYou and Vodio.  YouTube's own four-month-old iPad app is the best the service has ever looked on Apple's market-leading tablet (it's naturally quite at home on Android as well).  Still, while a great mobile app UI is important, it's useless without the means to get it to the TV, which is where technologies like Apple's AirPlay come in. And of course, the most crucial part of all is the content itself. This update stands to make YouTube a much better source of that content. Meanwhile, if Aereo survives the TV industry's litigious onslaught, it will be, if you'll pardon the buzzword, a total game-changer for this type of TV-viewing experience. 

YouTube's Role In TV's Future

On the content front, YouTube has been ramping up its original, TV-style content for awhile now, even opening its own TV studio in Los Angeles. Like Hulu and Netflix, YouTube knows that people are going to be turning to the Internet for more and more  of their TV-viewing, and they want to stake out as big of a slice of that pie as possible. 

But while binging on Arrested Development on Netflix is great and all, certain shows and events are best enjoyed live. Trying to tune into those things via tablets and streaming boxes is a pretty clunky experience. As the interfaces mature and content selection widens, it's going to get better. YouTube is one of players that will be right at the heart of this evolution, which will lead to the future of what we now think of as "TV." Adding live streaming support inches us toward that future just enough that it's worth noting. 

This is not a blockbuster, life-altering feature for cord cutters - It's not like HBO just gave us all HBO Go access for free out of the kindness of their hearts - but it's an important step toward making mobile devices more suitable sources of television-style content. Combined with apps like Aereo and Hulu Plus, YouTube makes "TV" something that increasingly comes from the Internet, not from cable providers. 

The first time you launch Aereo, you start to see why TV network executives are losing their minds. It's not because the service feels like it's doing anything wrong. Quite the opposite. For the consumer, it's doing almost everything right.

When you log in, you're shown a TV Guide-style listing of shows that are currently airing. It's not just the four or five obvious options, either. In the New York market, there are 30 broadcast channels that Aereo grabs and rebroadcasts to your account via the tiny antenna you're effectively renting from the company when you sign up.

See Also: To Truly Stop Aereo, Broadcasters Need To Innovate Like Hell

It's mostly typical broadcast fare: local news, daytime soap operas, people having meltdowns on Maury, prime time sitcoms, PBS and so forth. All the standard broadcast networks are augmented with local channels, foreign language networks and an inordinate amount of religious programming. The selection may not be as robust as that of cable, but some of the most popular shows on TV are waiting there, ready to be watched or DVR'ed to the cloud for later.

TV On Any Device, Second Screen And All

Aereo doesn't have native mobile apps yet, but it makes up for that with a very capable, cross-platform Web app. It works in the browser on my iPad and iPhone, from which it can be AirPlayed directly to my television via Apple TV. I didn't get the chance to test it, but I'm presuming Aereo works on most other modern browsers and platforms.

Thanks to iOS multitasking, I can close the browser and do other things like check email, browse the Web and tweet. You know, the second screen stuff we all do anyway. It all still works, even if we use our second screens to feed content to the first screen. The only drawback is that the transition from video to video is not entirely smooth with AirPlay. That experience should get better once Aereo develops native mobile apps and, eventually, lands on smart TV platforms. 

I am admittedly not a huge TV person. Still, as I use Aereo's Web app from device to device, its value starts to feel more and more obvious. I can watch my favorite PBS shows, tune into the local news (for whatever reason) and watch popular prime time shows like 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation, all using the Internet, which is what I use for just about all other media consumption. 

Indeed, after a few days of testing Aereo, I'm left with the distinct impression that this is not only a useful service, but something that needs to exist. I understand why it frightens the TV execs, but I wholeheartedly disagree with them. This is a hugely innovative service that hands control back to the TV-viewing consumer in a way that wasn't possible before. I'm not a legal scholar, but the copyright infringement claims made by the big media conglomerates against Aereo seem like a stretch. So far, the courts have agreed. 

The TV Antenna Of The Future

Since Aereo launched, the television industry has been hoping to sue it out of existence. Early attempts to have the service shut down have been unsuccessful, thanks to legal logic that may well wind up saving Aereo in the end. Meanwhile, the networks are clamoring for a plan B, which, if you believe the claims of network execs, includes threats to pull out of broadcast TV all together. (Said threats are, of course, unbelievably stupid.)

Aereo does not disrupt the core broadcast business model. When I'm watching TV shows on my iPad using Aereo, I'm still seeing all the commercials, just like I would if I tuned in via an antenna on my television set. The problem is, my antenna sucks. On a good day, I can get four or five channels to display clearly on my TV, and even that involves some finagling. It feels decidedly old-fashioned to be tinkering with an antenna just to watch NBC. 

By contrast, Aereo feels right at home in the 21st century. When you watch it, it doesn't feel like you're stealing anything. Instead, it feels like the service has restored your ability to conveniently tune into broadcast TV — an ability that's atrophied for years thanks to changing viewer habits and, consequently, expectations for picture and sound quality.

Broadcasters and TV service providers didn't come up with a good solution, so Aereo rose to the challenge. Aereo isn't stealing anything. It just wants to sell you the TV antenna of the future.

Why Broadcasters Hate Aereo

This infuriates broadcasters because it could eventually threaten the lucrative fees they get from cable providers, whose all-or-nothing, bloated content bundles suddenly look a little less attractive once a service like Aereo is available for $13 per month. Combined with Netflix and Hulu, Aereo makes cable look less necessary than ever and all three combined are still cheaper than most cable bills. 

I have no interest in subscribing to cable. It's expensive and the vast majority of what I'd be paying for is, so far as I can tell, complete garbage. Instead, I catch up with favorite shows via the Internet, where I can also find a growing selection of perfectly worthwhile non-TV video. Aereo is perfect for people like me.

More importantly, it could be an easy sell to many in the upcoming generation of "cord never getters" who are now totally accustomed to getting their TV online. We like to think about what the future of TV might look like. If it survives, Aereo seems very well positioned to be a part of that picture.

For baseball fans, it's an exciting time of year. For those who prefer to stream games online, however, the anticipation can be tinged with a bit of frustration. That's because baseball games are still easiest to find on traditional cable or satellite TV.

Fortunately for cord cutters, there are some options when it comes to tuning in online, some of them more, shall we say, up to legal snuff than others. 

First and foremost, there's MLB.tv. That's the official subscription streaming service of Major League Baseball in the U.S. For $20 per month, fans can live stream games in high definition from their browser with DVR-style control. For $25 per month, they can get access from iOS devices, Apple TV, Roku, Playstation 3, XBox 360 and more than 300 other devices.

For fans fanatic enough to throw $130 a year at a multi-device subscription service, MLB.tv looks like the way the go. But there's a catch — and it's a big one.

Hey! I Paid $130 And Can't Watch The Home Team?

Because cable companies and broadcast networks have a way of ruining things, MLB.tv only includes out-of-market games. That means that if I'm in Philadelphia, I can't stream the Phillies game from any of the MLB apps, because Comcast SportsNet is paying big bucks for the exclusive rights to those games.

MLB, in turn, wants to preserve that relationship by ensuring high-as-can-be ratings. As is so often the case, this arrangement works beautifully for the sports league and service providers, but sucks for viewers. 

One way to thwart this home team blackout is by using a VPN service like WiTopia, VyperVPN or StrongVPN to trick MLB into thinking you're located elsewhere. It might technically be dishonest, but it is, so far as I can tell, perfectly legal. 

A less legally straightforward option would be to tune into pirated streams from shady third party sites. Sites like firstrowsports.eu and vipbox.tv are neither the best designed or safest looking sites in the world, but for desperate fans who want to tune into games without paying, they certainly offer the goods. Sites that offer pirated streams typically do so via links to Flash-based video streams or require users to download a desktop app — at one's own risk, of course. 

Alternatively, some users prefer to use a Slingbox to remotely tune into games using their home's pay television service or broadcast hookup. 

Lead photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Television broadcasters are freaking out. Certain that the courts would see things their way, companies like CBS, Comcast and News Corp. instead found that the Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Aereo, an Internet TV service they've been trying to shut down for a year. 

With Aereo's second legal victory under its belt, it might be time for broadcasters to focus on Plan B: to start, y'know, innovating like crazy. 

So Aereo Is A Go. For Now

At issue is whether or not Aereo violates the broadcasters' copyrights by retransmitting local, over-the-air channels so its subscribers can access them from smartphones, tablets and an array of smart TVs and streaming set top boxes. When Aereo launched in New York last March, the broadcasters immediately asked a judge to shut it down via preliminary injunction, arguing that indeed, it violates copyright law by generating a legally forbidden "public performance" without paying compensation. 

In its defense, Aereo has argued that the way it's retransmitting broadcasts — using tiny, remote antennae rented by its customers — does not constitute a public performance, since its use by individual viewers was inherently private. Aereo won a first round in court last July. Today, in a 2-1 decision, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the earlier ruling. 

The networks will undoubtedly continue pushing their case, opening the prospect of a full trial and eventually, a possible Supreme Court ruling. Broadcasters, of course, have every right to pursue a legal case against Aereo. This is yet another example of how technology has evolved faster than the law can keep up and how we, as a society, need to figure this stuff out.

In the meantime, broadcasters should prepare themselves for the possibility that Aereo will win in court, allowing its expansion to continue.  

Why Aereo Exists

Aereo is a pretty attractive service, especially for the cord cutter set. And for those who haven't yet considered canceling their cable subscription, products like this make it more tempting. It remains to be seen how much overall demand there is for Aereo, but the fact that it exists at all is pretty telling.

The legal niceties aside (those will be decided by courts, not blogs), Aereo is doing something innovative that empowers media consumers in a way that wasn't previously possible. That's because nobody — least of all broadcasters — made it possible. Now somebody is.  

When the Internet rose to prominence, newspapers didn't have the luxury of suing its brains out. They had to deal with the ways in which their landscape was shifting, which was ultimately better for consumers. Similarly, broadcasts may not turn out to have that luxury with Aereo. Trying to sue them out of existence is not an unexpected response, but it may not succeed. They need a backup plan. 

Should broadcasters have come up with this idea? It's nice to talk about how industries should disrupt themselves, but that's rarely how things actually work. It would have been totally counterintuitive for broadcasters to band together and develop the type of functionality that Aereo is offering. Smart, yes, but not necessarily a sound business decision within the framework in which these people generally think. 

What Should Broadcasters Do? 

It's a fruitless debate anyway. Broadcasters didn't come up with Aereo. Aereo did. Now the Comcast and News Corps. of the world need to think about what they'll do in the event that the disruptive little startup prevails in court. 

Aereo has already filed four patents that cover the precise technology its using, so it's probably not feasible to recreate its functionality. But what does Aereo do for viewers? It provides cheap, multi-channel, high-definition access to broadcast TV from an array of devices and allows for DVR recording. It lets you do all of this without paying for a cable subscription. 

To their credit, cable companies are already working on ways to bring live TV to tablet and smartphone owners. Comcast's TV Everywhere initiative clearly anticipated trends in the way people watch programs that could threaten their core business model, so they moved on it.

But while services like TV Everywhere and XFinity Streampix are nice, they're add-ons to a cable subscriptions, which some people simply don't want to deal with in the first place. It's unlikely that Comcast or Verizon is going to come up with a worthwhile Internet TV offering that doesn't hinge on their existing models — and the sky-high fees that support them. 

Broadcast networks might not be able to rent out tiny antennae, but they don't need to, either: They already have much of the infrastructure in place to provide live Internet TV signals and make them available from mobile devices and connected TVs. If they band together and offer enough programming, they could charge a small subscription fee. Think Hulu for live broadcast TV. In fact, yes, just tack this onto Hulu for a couple extra bucks. Bingo. 

There may be sound business reasons why broadcasters wouldn't consider doing this. Their relationships with cable providers may not allow it. But that rigid, no-we-mustn't mentality is exactly what created the void that allowed Aereo to crop up in the first place. It might be time to change that mindset.

Lead photo by schmilblick

A collection of statistics released this month is creating doubts about the trend of "cord cutting" - when home viewers replace cable TV service with streaming video-over-Internet and over-the-air content. Cable companies are declaring victory, but when you dig deeper, there are signs that cable is still in trouble — and that what we're hearing are the sounds of denial.

In its Fourth-Quarter 2012 Cross-Platform Report, ratings service Nielsen reported that in the U.S., there were more than five million households in 2012 that fit its definition of "Zero TV" homes. Zero TV is Nielsen's neutral, but still kind of inaccurate, description of cable-cutting households that get video entertainment via computer, smartphones and tablets.

Five million homes seems like a lot, especially when you consider that this is up from two million homes in 2007. Indeed, there were a lot of headlines proclaiming "Cable Cutting Up 150%! Comcast in Flames! Time Warner Out of Time!"

Well, actually, nothing like that. Because in reality, that's just 5% of the total TV market. Hardly enough for the cable companies to get worked up about. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts has repeatedly made public comments dismissing the impact of cable cutting, and for now it appears that he's right. Cable's dominance would seem to reflect that there is not much to worry about with these cable companies.

Of course, that's what the Empire said about the Rebel Alliance.

Or, you know, what the telephone carriers once said about people who were giving up land-line phones in favor of wireless. The carriers used to insist the trend wasn't real, until better cell coverage and services like E911 accelerated it to the point that no one could deny it any more. Telco companies now offer TV and Internet service. Cable and satellite TV company may face a similar shift.

Pay TV Numbers Aren't So Hot, Either

Another set of statistics were released this month that point to a troubling sign for the cable and satellite companies: SNL Kagan reported that multichannel service providers (cable, satellite, and telco) managed to add just 46,000 customers in 2012, a lot of it in the fourth quarter, when 51,000 mew customers managed to reverse the shrinking number of subscribers in the second and third quarters of last year.

Forty-six thousand new users, out of a total of around 100.4 million, isn't even a statistical blip — 0.04% growth is by most definitions flatter than a pancake. The average year-over-year growth of Zero TV homes was pretty low, too - 0.59% since 2007 — but that's still a a factor better than paid TV subscriptions last year. You have to wonder if the television providers' claims that subscriptions were slow just because of the economic downturn were entirely accurate.

The U.S. is still in a slow recovery, so we will have to see if the upward trend of pay TV subscriptions continues before making any determination about pay TV's flatline growth being connected to the economy.

For all of the hand-waving about cord-cutting "not existing" or being unimportant, a key fact is being blissfully ignored: those 600,000 new Zero TV users each year have to come from somewhere. They are either existing cable TV customers or incoming customers who have decided to go to the Internet/streaming model instead. Either way, that's 5 million customers the pay TV providers don't have.

Last year, the NPD Group estimated that the average monthly cable bill would hit $100/month sometime this year or next. Using that estimate for some back-of-napkin math, that means $6 billion in annual revenue is not going to pay TV.

Is it any wonder, then, that Comcast recently introduced a free sampling of its premium on-demand content in order to pull in more ongoing subscriptions to that content? Speculation about this promotion ranged from Comcast trying to better penetrate non-coastal markets that have a lower rate of on-demand video use to Comcast looking to juice up its margin.

(See also: Comcast's Awesome Watchathon Reminds You It's Still the Boss)

Given flat growth, why not both reasons?

Watch Out For The Killer App

What the pay TV services need to watch out for is the killer app for cable cutters. In the transition from land lines to cell-only for my home phone, it was the E911 service that made the decision for us: making sure emergency services knew exactly where we were calling from was very important.

I suspect that a similar killer app for cable-cutters will be a way to get access to live sports content. Yes, you can get content from MLB, NHL or the NBA - but special events or sports that are not covered by these media packages can be a hassle to watch.

I myself am lamenting the ongoing coverage of the NCAA Women's Basketball tournament on the ESPN channels this month, because I can't watch Notre Dame progress through the tournament. Unless one of the over-the-air networks broadcasts a game, I'm out of luck. Unless, I get cable again.

Sports are perhaps the biggest reason (on the content side) holding people back from switching away from pay TV. If a network like ESPN or the new Fox Sports Channel were to take its oh-so-important broadcast rights and offer its content to Internet subscribers directly, that would probably be a nightmare scenario for pay TV companies.

It's hard to imagine a situation where that would happen today, but if sports networks see a chance to make more revenue without giving TV providers a cut, would they take the shot?

Image courtesy of Shutterstock

The time to cut the cord on cable television has never been better. Between Netflix and Hulu Plus, consumers are treated to a variety of original programming financed and produced not by mega studios but by digital content companies that have little interest of seeding their content to cable channels. Netflix’s House of Cards has been a critical success and Hulu has some sleeper hits like Battleground.

With the investment in original content from its top competitors, Amazon will not be left behind.

Amazon today announced that it is picking up the pilot to Zombieland, a television series adaption from the movie staring Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone and Jesse Eisenberg. The move to pick up Zombieland is part of a larger original content play from Amazon as the company has promised to produce 13 series from a variety of pilots. Amazon is specifically focusing on comedy and children’s programming for its original content.

Zombieland and other pilots from Amazon will be featured on its Prime Instant Video streaming service. Amazon will pick the 13 series from its array of pilots based on user feedback.

The Zombieland series will be produced by the movie’s original creative team including writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. The roles occupied by the likes of Harrelson and Stone have been recast to Kirk Ward and Maiara Walsh, respectively.

Zombies are all the rage right now. The Walking Dead is killing it on cable. The adaptation of Max Brook’s novel World War Z is coming to the big screen in June with Brad Pitt.

Content Marketing At Its Best

People started scratching their heads a few years ago when companies like Netflix and Hulu started bidding on original series from prominent production companies. Why would Netflix spend millions of dollars to obtain House of Cards? Or make one final season of Arrested Development? This was not the business model we had come to expect from these companies. Netflix traditionally licensed content from the archives of major studios for its streaming service, not created its own. 

As the original programming has come to the screen, the play has made a lot more sense. House of Cards has a lot of people talking and the only way to see it is to have a Netflix streaming account. Users will have to get a Amazon Prime account to see the likes of Zombieland. 

Essentially, these original programs are giant marketing ploys. When it comes down to it, the point of marketing is to get people talking about your product. When people talk about your product, there is a chance they will actually spend money to use it. House of Cards certainly has people talking. If Zombieland the series is as good as Zombieland the movie, Amazon could see an uptick in Prime customers.

HBO has been doing this for years, from Oz to the Sopranos to Game Of Thrones. The difference now is that you do not need a cable subscription to get great exclusive programming.

Great For Cord Cutters

For consumers, the original content wars are the best thing to happen to television since the cable wars erupted in the 1980s. For the first time, television watchers are able to get true a la carte viewing options, choosing from here or there for what they want to watch as opposed to choosing various “bundles” of channels from the cable companies. 

Consumers that want to rid themselves of the monthly cable bill will have plenty of content to choose from and not just the shows that aired years before. In the end, everybody wins (except for, maybe, the cable companies). 

Lead image courtesy Shutterstock.

It's been 63 years since Nielsen started measuring what we're watching on TV. For most of that time, the concept of "TV" has  pretty much remained the same. But in the last half decade, the old model has been blown wide open by the Internet as more people go online to catch their favorite shows. To stay relevant, Nielsen is being forced to change its methodology. 

By the time the 2013 fall season begins, the 23,000 homes Nielsen uses to sample TV viewership will be equipped with a new system that takes Internet content into consideration, according to a scoop by the Hollywood Reporter. 

Piecing Together Fractured Viewing Habits

The report was short on details, but from the looks of it, Nielsen is going to start tracking select online video sources like Amazon, Netflix and Hulu as well as streaming devices like Xbox 360 and other gaming consoles. By the end of the year, TV viewership from iPads will be counted as well. That's good, considering the rising popularity of iPad apps like YouTube, Netflix and Hulu Plus and the ongoing push by cable operators and networks to make shows available on tablets. 

It's not clear which online content sources will be tracked at launch, since participating in Nielsen's ratings measurement system will require opt-in technical changes to the way those videos are encoded and streamed. 

"On the path to capturing all viewing in all homes, this foundational change addresses the lion’s share of viewing, in effect including any home with a TV that can receive video via an external source," Pat McDonough, Nielsen's SVP of Insights and Analysis told ReadWrite via email. "In collaboration with clients, we will continue to expand the reach of television audience measurement."

This isn't the first Internet-inspired change Nielsen has made to its methodology. In December, it announced a partnership with Twitter to launch a new social TV metric that will take into account the social chatter about popular shows. 

It's all part of Nielsen's larger plan to more accurately track media consumption habits that are increasingly fractured across time, devices and sources. Since the advent of TV, there's never been a change this dramatic in how people consume it. The seismic shift that's happening now calls for an equally significant retooling of how various aspects of the industry function. In a business fueled in large part by advertising, there are few moving parts more crucial than accurate audience metrics.  

Perfect Timing: Internet TV Is Growing Up 

The ratings updates come at a pivotal time for Internet TV. Online video has more than 182 million unique viewers watching 38.7 billion videos, according to ComScore's U.S. Digital Future in Focus 2013 report. The most popular video service remains YouTube, followed by Hulu, Vevo, Yahoo and AOL, in that order.

And we're not just talking about Justin Bieber songs and viral kitten videos anymore, either. In the last few years, YouTube, Netflix and Hulu have all been investing heavily in the production of their own TV-quality content. 

2012 saw a few Web original shows amass a notable amount of buzz online. This year, shows like Netflix's House of Cards are finally starting to grab the attention of everyday, non-cord-cutting viewers and generating almost as much discussion as popular shows airing on A&E or HBO. In May, Netflix will exclusively stream the fourth season of Arrested Development, a cult classic show whose low ratings got it booted from Fox a decade ago. Like House of Cards, the show is expected to draw plenty of attention, not to mention more new media pundits pontificating about the future of TV.

Online TV Ratings Could Help Fuel The Future

How many people will watch Arrested Development? We won't know, unless Netflix decides to tell us. And if it doesn't perform as well as hoped, why would it bother? The company declined to release viewership numbers for House of Cards, saying it had "no motivation" as a non-advertising based business to do so. 

That's true, but without an integrated, cross-platform method for tracking viewership, nobody inside or outside the industry has any way of knowing how popular a given show truly is. That's chiefly useful for advertisers, but such insight is valuable to plenty of others. 

There could hardly be an example more illustrative of the need for such a system than Arrested Development. The show got its start on broadcast television. As a Netflix exclusive, season four will be different only in how the episodes are released - all at once, rather than sequentially. Other than that, it will be very much the same show: Same dysfunctional family played by the same actors, presumably picking up the story line (or at least general premise) of the original. It's still a TV show, so why not measure it like one? 

As a journalist, I would love to know how well the new season does compared to the original three. Hell, I'd be curious to see how many views those first few seasons have racked up on Netflix since they've been available to stream. 

It's not just reporters, researchers and media nerds who could benefit from those insights. This is the first time a television show has made the transition to an online-only service. Will it work? Plenty of other content producers and streaming providers would love to know, and sharing such data could help inform future decisions about premium video content, potentially helping to shape TV's future.

Nintendo is moving beyond Mario. To better compete with the likes of Microsoft's XBox and Sony Playstation, the Japanese gaming giant is looking to expand its role in the living room beyond video games. After some delay, it's launching an integrated entertainment hub this week called TVii, which will bring live TV, Internet-based video and digital video recorder (DVR) functionality to a single interface on the new Wii U console. 

Nintendo's TVii will smartly piggyback on the "second screen" craze by turning the Wii U's tablet-style controller into a device that lets viewers interact with social media and supplemental content while they're watching TV. 

It's about time. The original Wii had little more than Netflix and Hulu when it came to video content, even after the XBox had begun firmly implanting itself at the center of people's living rooms with a variety of entertainment content sources. Meanwhile, Nintendo has seen its profits slip as cheap, ubiquitous mobile gaming eats away at consumers' desire pay big bucks for dedicated gaming hardware and software. 

That revolution in mobile gaming was originally set off by the rise of the iPhone and iOS and accelerated with the launch of the iPad and competing devices from Google, Amazon and Microsoft.

This is a smart and necessary move for Nintendo, but is Apple about to eat its lunch again? 

Apple's HDTV Will Change The - Ahem - Game

Rumors, of course, continue to swirl about an Apple TV. The interface, they say, is the thing that Steve Jobs famously said he had finally "cracked" not long before he passed away. It's precisely that TV interface problem that Nintendo is attempting to chip away at here. From the looks of the demo videos, its effort is a noble one. But not only is Nintendo playing catch up with Microsoft, it will be right in the crosshairs if the fabled Apple HDTV actually does launch. 

It's been months since I turned on my Wii, a device I used to use almost nightly. Instead, my couch time is spent with an iPad in my lap, which is AirPlaying video apps to my Apple TV (a device I once thought I'd never want or use). 

The idea of being able to tune into Amazon Instant Video and live TV from my Wii sounds cool, but if it really wants to compete for my attention, Nintendo needs to offer innovative social video aggregator apps like Frequency, Showyou and Vodio. There's much more to online video these days than Netflix and Hulu. Apple is already sitting on a robust and extremely popular developer platform, upon which it will presumably build its TV-based operating system. Right out of the gate, the Apple HDTV will likely blow away Nintendo's content offerings and user interface. 

Admittedly, I'm not necessarily Nintendo's target customer. For one thing, I'm a pretty casual gamer. That's a big part of my shift away from the Wii - I'm not glued to Super Mario Galaxy 2 the way I used to be, and I don't rush out to buy all the latest titles. But I do remain loyal to many Nintendo-specific games. 

Perhaps if my online TV experience came from the same device as the games, I'd play more. In fact, if Nintendo sold old school Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) games for the iPad I'd be happily playing them on my couch and AirPlaying Mario to my TV all the time.  Nintendo refuses to do anything like that. It seems to be hoping that the reverse approach will work: bringing the entertainment console to the gaming platform rather than bringing the games to the mobile entertainment platform. 

To nail this, Nintendo has to do a very, very good job on the non-gaming entertainment side. Because it won't be long before the competition gets intense. 

Image courtesy of Shutterstock.

Don't think YouTube is any less serious about becoming your next favorite TV channel. Sure, it's slashing the number of Web shows it's funding, but that only means it's sharpening its focus. 2013 is going to be another big year for premium-TV-style video on the Web. 

YouTube execs said in January they would spend $100 million on premium video content, joining Hulu and Netflix in their effort to make online programming look a lot more like the stuff we turn to networks and cable channels to watch. Now, YouTube will funding only about 40% of that original raft of shows, according to AllThingsD. 

Winners And Losers

The company hasn't revealed which shows are getting the ax. That will be made clear as deals are renewed.  So how is Google, YouTube's parent, deciding? Advertisers want to see engagement, which means Google also wants to see engagement, including how long people watch.

Google's prime motivation in YouTube is attracting advertisers, just like it is with the company's mainstay search services. If it can change the TV landscape in the process, that's great. Just like a traditional network, Google is not going to wait around for shows to pay off. Unlike with the old gaurd, those that don't make the cut can keep going. Just not on Google's dime.  

The culling starts now, and the shows with the highest potential will reap further Google investment as the company grows beyond search ads. Focusing on successes helps make YouTube an alternative to traditional television, and gives a Google a more competitive position from which to negotiate with big content providers. 

The Louis C.K. Factor

For evidence of the power of the Web in video content distribution, look no further than edgy comedian Louis C.K (right). By now, most of us know how he used the Web to change how show tickets and videos are sold via the Internet, demonstrating a new model.

As it happens, C.K.'s next comedy special will air first on HBO and, a few months later, it will be sold directly to fans in a manner of his choosing. This, as Peter Kafka points out, is a major departure for HBO, which typically makes content available exclusively to its 30 million subscribers, no ifs, ands, or buts. It's interesting to see the premium cable channel loosen its grip. 

Another Big Year For Premium Web Video?

Next year should be another big one for premium Web video. There's little reason to doubt that Netflix and Hulu will join YouTube in making further investments in TV-quality content. And we already know 2013 will have an interesting case study -- and potentially a watershed moment for online TV -- when Arrested Development returns exclusively online. The cult-hit comedy was canceled by Fox in 2005, and will become the first TV show of its stature to be revived online. 

The old video model is still strong. Over 90% of American households subscribe to a traditional pay-TV service, according to ratings firm The Nielsen Co. The number of cord-cutters is growing, but not at a rate that will threaten cable soon. That may change as Web TV evolves, a process Google and others are trying to force right now. 

In case you missed it, the United States elected a president yesterday. I try to stay away from politics — it’s only fun in Chicago, anyway — but last night, I anxiously tuned in.

Election night television, it seems, hasn’t changed much in the past four years — the same guys in the same bad suits, pointing at maps, reading wire updates, and trying not to screw up. The biggest difference, I noticed, is how the main tool I really used was Twitter.

To the daily Twitter user, this, by now, seems obvious; a cliché barely worth repeating. But step back for a second and think back to an era — not long ago — when this didn’t exist. When the only analysis and opinion you had instant access to was from your friends in the room and the mouth-breathers the TV producers had picked for you.

Then look over at Twitter, where the room is bursting with fresh news, links, photos from everywhere, alerts that Karl Rove is melting down or that Diane Sawyer seems wasted, jokes coming so fast that you can barely keep up. (Many of them even funny.) You control the content, the sources, the volume, the pace, and your drink. Sometimes, it’s wrong, but it’s quickly corrected, and you should be more skeptical anyway. And if you want, you can participate. You’re not just watching.

Over the past ten days, with Hurricane Sandy and now the election, I’ve spent an unusual amount of time at home, sitting on my couch. The TV was often on, and sometimes useful: Some stuff is still better and faster observed in live video format. The emotion of an extended human speech will probably never travel well in 140-character text messages. Likewise, a television meltdown is still more memorable and lasting than a Twitter meltdown, perhaps because of its relative improbability.

But these days, if I had to choose one media tool to rely on — a cable box with 200 channels or a well-curated Twitter feed — Twitter now wins every time, no contest. And when I have both, I’m mostly paying attention to Twitter, with the TV providing background noise. The “second screen” is now my first screen. And compared to Facebook, which has been a relative disappointment over the past few big events — stale news and links, lame comments from distant relatives or acquaintances, too many sponsored Greek yogurt recipe links — Twitter is mostly doing it right.

While you’re here:

• Obviously, most people still aren’t using Twitter. This is really Twitter’s biggest job — getting more people to use it. The service is stable, the product is good, and the business is coming along. But most people still aren’t using it. So: How? A mix of distribution, marketing, product design, and magic, I guess. One likely problem: It’s still too hard for people to get started with Twitter. I’m generally happy with my view of Twitter and the 2,200+ people I follow, but I’ve spent the past 5 years refining that list. This seems to be why Twitter is pushing things like curated Twitter pages for big events like the election and the Olympics. They’re so much better than an empty timeline, or 10 random celebrities, but there’s so much more to do here.
• This is where Twitter’s “cards” thing might actually be interesting. When NPR tweets out an election news update, for example, it might be cool to be able to attach some sort of live or interactive version of the state-by-state “big board” it was keeping on its website. This might get annoying — Twitter’s all-time best feature is its simplicity — but we’ll see. Likewise, companies will have to weigh the costs and benefits of displaying this sort of information within Twitter, rather than using Twitter to drive people to their own websites. (What’s my attention worth to NPR on their website vs. on Twitter? Is it a big difference or a small one? How to really measure?) But it’s at least worth thinking about.
• That whole Twitter developer drama shitstorm feels like it happened ages ago. I don’t know about you, but I haven’t been using Twitter less since then. Nor have I felt any urge to use App.net, or some other alternative. If anything, Facebook and Instagram seem less exciting to me these days, but that’s another post. And this isn’t to say Twitter is perfect — many of the company’s decisions are frustrating or annoying — but relative to most companies and services I deal with, it’s pretty solid.
• The iPad mini was great on election night. It’s almost the perfect Twitter device: Light enough to hold for hours, but more tweets on the screen than an iPhone. And it was easy to switch to handheld TV mode, via the Time Warner Cable app, when I wanted to watch two channels at a time. This sort of living-room-couch usage is where a bigger iPad “classic” is also great, especially if you’re mostly resting it on your lap or a table. (I’d still like to consider an even bigger iPad for this sort of situation, see Forget The iPad Mini - Is There Room For An iPad Maxi?) But the mini definitely didn’t feel too small for couch surfing; I’d still recommend it as the go-to iPad. (More here.)

Sometimes I fear for the future of entrepreneurship in America. A stock market crash is a breath away from draining the cash hoards of popular venture capitalists, the Securities Exchange Commission could easily change its rules to cripple the startup ecosystem and we are one serious privacy breach away from Congress enacting Draconian laws that could cripple a world they know nothing about. But judging by the online chatter, the biggest danger to startups in the United States is reality television.

I, of course, am kidding. Reality television will not be the death of startups in the U.S.

But in early November, cable channel Bravo will debut a new reality program titled “Silicon Valley” that will chronicle the lives and struggles of startup entrepreneurs in San Francisco. Bravo's trailer for the show hit the Web earlier this week and response from the entrepreneurial community and blogs has been predictable. 

The reaction went along three main lines:

1. This is basically just a disaster waiting to happen.
2. These people are crazy.
3. They don’t represent the true Silicon Valley.

...in the world according to @bravotv there are no Asians or Indians in Silicon Valley. Not even a few token ones. Where did they all go?

— Christine Lu (@christinelu) October 9, 2012

Why A Reality TV Show About Silicon Valley Will Obviously Be So Much Worse Than Blogs About It

— NextTechBlog (@NextTechBlog) October 8, 2012

The first two points are hard to argue with. As for the third, well, yes they do and no they do not. 

Reality TV Isn't

The first thing to remember when thinking about “Silicon Valley” is that it is over-produced reality television.

I am acquainted with some of the people featured in the show and have been to the mansion in San Francisco where they live and much of the program is shot. I also know people who have appeared on other Bravo reality shows, like Top Chef.

You know those spontaneous moments or dramatic shots that seem so off the cuff that they must real? Well, many of those scenes are shot half a dozen times before the producers are satisfied that they're spontaneous enough.

One such moment in "Silicon Valley" comes when one of the characters is riding a motorcycle with her boyfriend crossing the bridges in San Francisco. They went over the bridge once and then the producers had them do it a couple more times to get the shots right. So, take “reality” for what it is worth in the lexicon of Bravo programming. 

It's A Caricature

“Silicon Valley” will be a purposely designed caricature of startup life. We will see lots of over-sized personalities, drama for the sake of drama, borderline alcoholism and an endless stream of bad buzzwords and catchphrases. The show will be the quintessential guide to the Silicon Valley Echo Chamber, where things that nobody cares about outside of San Francisco become huge crises of conscience within that insulated environment. 

Yet, like any caricature or stereotype, there will be elements of truth to be found within “Silicon Valley.” Yes, startup founders really are full of their own self-importance. They can be arrogant, pretentious and pushy. They work long hours and are often razor-focused on their own mission, to the exclusion of the larger world around them.

They are also real people with emotions, moments of strength, moments of weakness and distinct visions for the future of the world. They often live in a semi-state of poverty, waiting for that first funding round to be able to eat, pay themselves and hire a team (this particular aspect of startup life is not something we will likely see in the show considering its posh setting). 

Entrepreneurial Truths

I have met startup founders and employees in San Francisco, Boston, New York City and Washington, D.C., among other locations. Each city's community has its own distinct sense of self but, by and large, they all share many of  of the characteristics listed above. The difference in Silicon Valley is that, because of the sheer volume of startups and the surplus of cash in the region, these characteristics are often magnified. 

That magnification is what the show “Silicon Valley” will likely try to capture, in all the splendor and bullshit that comes with reality television. The entrepreneurs of San Francisco and elsewhere might be wary of how Bravo will portray their world, but they cannot deny that, regardless of the tawdry presentation, "Silicon Valley" will also reveal some elements of truth.

Kitchen and skyline images by Dan Rowinski. Other images and video from Bravo.

The entire season 7 premiere of Dexter is on YouTube - and no, it's not a pirated copy. Showtime posted the entire episode, as well as the season 2 premiere of Homeland. A capitulation to pirates? No, an effort to entice viewers to pay for premium television service.

Bundled cable channels occasionally host episodes of their shows online, either through the video player on their site or through Hulu, but premium channels like HBO and Showtime have shied away from offering their content online. Until now. Showtime is not running ads with its YouTube content, indicating that the free online distribution is, indeed, a marketing ploy.

Cable networks started experimenting with offering their content online last year. Fox led the charge in an unprecedented digital-first showing of Zooey Deschanel’s vehicle New Girl before the show aired on cable. The “sneak peak barrage” worked wonders for buzz, leading the network to try again this year with Mindy Kaling’s The Mindy Project. Fox’s success with digital premiers prompted NBC to try the same approach with Smash in January of this year, and again with its new fall shows Revolution and The New Normal. Showtime's offering is available only to YouTube users in the U.S.

This digital strategy seems to be successful at expanding the audience for new shows, but will it work for shows going into their 7th season?  So far, the answer appears to be a tentative yes. More than 40,000 people have tuned in since the Dexter episode was posted on the Showtime YouTube channel last night, meaning 40,000 people without Showtime didn’t pirate the episode.

Everyone has that mindless TV show they watch to unwind in the evening. Mine was Pawn Stars, the reality TV series hit about a family-run pawn shop. Then, last Friday, Netflix removed Pawn Stars from my life without warning. I ditched my TV back in college and I haven’t been tempted to own one since... until now. 

What happened? Netflix’s right to broadcast A&E’s 800 hours of content expired. While Pawn Stars still airs every Monday night on cable, I no longer have access to it because I'm one of those cord cutters who relies on Roku to watch my favorite shows via Netflix and Hulu. The show might come back if negotiations work out between the two media companies. Then again, it might not. 

The sudden removal of Pawn Stars, along with A&E's entire catalog, is nothing new. In fact, things like this happen all the time. Earlier this year, for example, Netflix lost 8% of its content when its deal with Starz expired. The Starz shows, while horribly pixelated, comprised some of Netflix’s best offerings including one of my favorite romantic movies, The Illusionist.

Netflix doesn't seem to have a problem with this. "A number of titles expired today, that is true, but we have titles coming on and off all the time," said Netflix spokesman Joris Evers on Friday to the Hollywood Reporter.

Evers casual acknowledgement of how unstable the relationships his business depends on really wouldn’t be so insulting if I, as a paying customer, knew beforehand about titles being removed, or coming. I only had a couple episodes of Pawn Stars left to watch before I would have been caught up to the current season. If I had known the titles were being removed, I would have sat down and watched them all before the expiration date.

When I flopped down on my couch last Friday night all ready to hear Rick laughing at some ridiculous offer made by a customer before I went to bed, I was met with a significantly sparse Netflix page. At first I thought Netflix had been hacked. I had to seach Google News to find out what happened. To date, Netflix has yet to release an official statement on the deletion of 800 hours of content.  

Netflix attracts customers like me by offering a catalog of worthwhile shows. If those shows can disappear at any moment, it fundamentally changes the nature of the relationship. Perhaps Netflix thinks its safe to add and drop content at the drop of a signature and keep customers in the dark about the resulting disruptions. After all, the company has few competitors. Frankly though, I'm ready to take my business elsewhere. 

For video entrepreneurs, brand marketers, and ad buyers, evaluating the success of Google's original channels has been a conundrum. There was no online equivalent to Nielsen's authoritative television surveys. Nielsen itself launched its own YouTube rankings at the end of June for the month of May, but it seems to have abandoned the project after one month. comScore counts video streaming users and views each month, but it doesn't break out Google's premium content.

Now two outlets have stepped in to fill the void. In May, Entertainment publication Deadline Hollywood began tracking YouTube premium channels based on data from the analytics website VidStatsX, long trusted among YouTube professionals. And earlier this week, Ad Age launched its own tracking tool. It is unclear where Ad Age gets its data; possibly directly from YouTube.

Deadline Hollywood presents its findings every week in a simple chart noting weekly and total views, the previous week's ranking, and the date when the channel launched. In addition to the chart, Deadline Hollywood provides an analytical breakdown on channels that have made significant advances (or losses) in viewership plus context and related news.

In contrast, Ad Age’s tool is “clickable and entertaining,” with big graphics in the form of screenshots from videos. Ad Age displays rankings, weekly views, as well as a percentage comparing the week's view counts to those of the previous week. Hovering the mouse over “view more data” reveals a channel's all-time views and the number of subscribers.

Deadline Hollywood and Ad Age are respected sources of media industry perspective, but neither tools are sufficient by themselves. Industry professionals interested in keeping up on Google’s entertainment investments can also check out William Hyde’s “Winners and Losers” show on YouTube. Hyde is a self-styled YouTube reporter and analytics junkie, and as a well-connected member of the YouTube community, he provides context and little-known industry secrets and tidbits. While Hyde admits he has been slacking on his “Winners and Losers” segments, he mentioned in an interview that he is interested in doing an equivalent with a focus on YouTube’s Original Content channels.

SourceFed, a.k.a. the "bacon of the news" on YouTube, emerged as the first successful channel among Google’s premium content offering yesterday, when the show hit 500,000 subscribers with 158 million views to date.

Google invested roughly $400 million in nearly 100 shows last January as part of YouTube’s Original Channel Initiative, a bid to rival TV networks as a digital content creator. The productions feature stars like Amy Poehler, Chris Hardwick, Madonna, Deepak Chopra, Kevin Smith, Tony Hawk, and the occasional YouTube celeb. Advertisers are paying between $5 and $10 million for spots in the shows.

Despite the star power, so far, the top-performing shows have been created by people who initially built their audience on YouTube. This shouldn’t come as a surprise: These young Web celebs understand the online video space, and some of them have grown up there. It is only fitting, then, that the first premium content channel to hit a major milestone of success would be one created by a YouTube mega-personality.

SourceFed is just that: Brainchild of six-year YouTube veteran Philip Defranco, the channel has seen phenomenal growth since day one, collecting 5.5 million views within a week of launch.

James Haffner, SourceFed's producer, believes the channel's success lies in a couple of factors: First, the channel provides “easily consumable” content that's also accessible on mobile devices (accounting for 50% of views). “We get to have fun every day, but at the same time, we inform people,” Haffner said. And because each video is short, people can pick and choose among segments. Second, the way the four SourceFed show hosts interact with fans is key, because it fosters a sense of online community. “Our viewers treat us like we’re their best friends,” Haffner explained.

A video celebrating SourceFed’s accomplishment emphasized this relationship with viewers, which features fan-submitted videos of viewers describing why they love SourceFed. Reasons mentioned range from SourceFed’s “non-partisan” and “non-boring” news to “you guys are like a family, and we appreciate that.”

Editors note: an earlier version of this post had an incorrect number in the title.

That online video ad traffic, as reported by comScore, translated to 4.6 billion minutes watched by 180 million Internet users in the United States. The average duration of an online ad was four seconds.

The top five ad networks streamed at least one billion ads each. Google took the lead with 1.41 billion ads streamed. Google's domination isn't surprising; YouTube serves more than 99% of video on Google-related properties and is the third most popular website in the world, with 72 hours of video content uploaded every minute.

BrightRoll, a San Francisco-based video network serving thousands of sites including Google, came in a close second with 1.39 billion ads served.  BrightRoll bills itself as "the world's largest and fastest growing advertising network." It announced in an official blog post that the company now holds the number-one position for reaching video ad viewers in terms of duration. (BrightRoll watchers viewed 805 million minutes of ads.) 

Hulu came in third in video ad rankings, but it delivers the "highest frequency of video ads to its viewers with an average of 52" ads per person.

Greg Jarbone at Search Engine Watch theorized that Hulu's drop in ad sales to third place could be partially related to "the lack of hit shows on TV," a.k.a. the summer TV season lull. Jardone's theory has merit. The most popular (and new) video shows on Hulu over the past month have been Gordon Ramsey's reality television projects, "Hell's Kitchen" and "Master Chef." 

The record-breaking number of ads streamed comes on the heels of a New York Times article pointing out TV watching among young adults is at a low, or as the headline put it, "The Case of the Disappearing Viewers." (Mystery solved: Young folks watch TV on the Web.)  Incidentally, the TV shows that experienced their lowest audience numbers, according to the New York Tmes, were the most popular shows on Hulu in the spring. These included the NBC Thursday night lineup ("Community," "Parks and Recreation," "The Office," and "30 Rock"), Fox's "Glee," and ABC's "Modern Family." The coveted young-adult audience has moved online, and Internet video ad networks are capitalizing on that shift. 

Image courtesy of comScore.