When the ants start crawling over the elephant

[Carrie]

I've gotten about halfway through it and it's definitely interesting. Want to comment on this before I forget it:

I predict that Blockbuster will start selling more books and renting fewer tapes and DVDs, following the lead of Hastings, a regional video rental chain that sells books and magazines. I predict that HBO will suffer falling revenues as a result of satellite Internet connections and cable modems. Finally, I predict – no genius required here – that the big three TV networks will continue to suffer falling viewer ratings that mindless sitcom degeneracy with laugh tracks will not restore.

I think all of these predictions are dead wrong.

Blockbuster unveiled a new pricing scheme this week with the release of Finding Nemo - $1.99 for one night. Just like the old video stores used to do. I took it - others will as well. Blockbuster has been selling magazines for well over a year now, all of the top entertainment and gaming mags are right up by the counter. They occupy maybe a 3-foot square footprint out of a huge store.
New DVDs are also out now that disable themselves after 48 or 72 hours and you can throw them away. This means no trips back to the video store to return the disc. I see all of the big video stores turning to these in about two years, and I'll love it.
If anything, Blockbuster, Hollywood Video etc will join the revolution and start offering fully licensed movie downloads from their sites as well as offering the DVDs in their stores.

HBO suffering falling revenue due to satellite and cable? You must be joking. Since the inception of cable, HBO has expanded to have about 5 different channels or so and they're only getting bigger as they (wisely) break ground into niche programming. Satellite hasn't hurt them at all; on the contrary it's been a significant boon to them.

I do agree that the big 3 will continue to suffer falling ratings, but they won't be displaced as the main source of television entertainment for at least another 10 years. And in that amount of time, you'd better believe they'll come up with things that keep people coming back - just look at Survivor, CSI, etc etc.

The author makes a dangerously wrong assumption here - that the *majority* of people are middle-income and above with relatively high IQs who love and embrace technology. Oh how I wish that were true... but it's not.