This blog started as an experiment. As with all experiments I chose the easy route: in this case, hosting by Google's blogger. After four months and 190 posts, this blog appears here to stay. So I am moving it to bigger digs.
In the future, please visit the new Core Economics Blog at economics.com.au (a nice easy name to remember). All of the past posts and comments are there too. You can also update your feeds on that site.
Thanks and I'll see you across the net ...
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Exploiting the unused resource
Yet another new way of renting movies has appeared in the US -- MovieBeam. (Here is the NYT write-up). But there is something much more profound that lies at the heart of that development. Something that gave me a radical idea about how to dramatically improve competition in our television markets. But first I need to explain just what MovieBeam does.
From the user's perspective, you spend US$200 for a set-top box and then pay per view for movies you watch after that ($4 for new releases, $2 for old stuff, $1 extra for high definition). You can watch them for 24 hours as much as you want; including pausing and rewinding. So it is exactly the same as renting a video without the trip to the video store or the late fees (if you are that way inclined).
The bit that interested me was how it all worked. It turns out that the movies are downloaded to the set-top boxes hard-drive (and it has plenty of capacity for 100 movies). But they get there via broadcast. MovieBeam pay PBS (US public television) to piggy back on an unused part of their spectrum. At these rates you couldn't watch this stuff in real time but if it is being downloaded, who cares? So the distribution method exploits a resource with a zero opportunity cost. A true win-win.
What this shows, however, is how truely outrageous our current broadcast television system is. It is all based on licenses for 'real time' viewing. That hogs spectrum but also forces viewers to watch in real time or try and record shows themselves. That is simply an inefficient use of spectrum. It restricts total spectrum use as a function of actual viewership and so makes spectrum a scarce resource; the source of broadcaster's market power over viewers and advertisers. In this respect, it works the same way as other broadcasting regulations (see my earlier post on multi-channelling and my post on the regulation of content).
Now to the radical idea: what would happen if the government gave everyone a MovieBeam type set-top box? Suppose the box was such that viewers could specify what they want to watch and that stuff is what they pick up in the broadcast. I suggest this will dramatically open up competition on broadcast television but allowing more access by 'channels' and 'programs' outside of traditional network broadcasters.
What about objections to this idea?
From the user's perspective, you spend US$200 for a set-top box and then pay per view for movies you watch after that ($4 for new releases, $2 for old stuff, $1 extra for high definition). You can watch them for 24 hours as much as you want; including pausing and rewinding. So it is exactly the same as renting a video without the trip to the video store or the late fees (if you are that way inclined).
The bit that interested me was how it all worked. It turns out that the movies are downloaded to the set-top boxes hard-drive (and it has plenty of capacity for 100 movies). But they get there via broadcast. MovieBeam pay PBS (US public television) to piggy back on an unused part of their spectrum. At these rates you couldn't watch this stuff in real time but if it is being downloaded, who cares? So the distribution method exploits a resource with a zero opportunity cost. A true win-win.
What this shows, however, is how truely outrageous our current broadcast television system is. It is all based on licenses for 'real time' viewing. That hogs spectrum but also forces viewers to watch in real time or try and record shows themselves. That is simply an inefficient use of spectrum. It restricts total spectrum use as a function of actual viewership and so makes spectrum a scarce resource; the source of broadcaster's market power over viewers and advertisers. In this respect, it works the same way as other broadcasting regulations (see my earlier post on multi-channelling and my post on the regulation of content).
Now to the radical idea: what would happen if the government gave everyone a MovieBeam type set-top box? Suppose the box was such that viewers could specify what they want to watch and that stuff is what they pick up in the broadcast. I suggest this will dramatically open up competition on broadcast television but allowing more access by 'channels' and 'programs' outside of traditional network broadcasters.
What about objections to this idea?
- "Where will the spectrum come from?" The possibilities are endless. There is unused spectrum all over the place. More critically, there is unused spectrum held by the traditional broadcasters. We could make it a term of their licensing agreement that that spectrum by opened up for piggy back use.
- "What about advertising?" There is no reason why the set-top recorder couldn't record programs with advertising. Indeed, it could probably be configured to stop advertisements being skipped.
- "Does the government really need to fund this?" Not necessarily, but that was the radical bit to get your attention. But when it comes down to it, it would be just like funding roads or rail, this is just the transportation infrastructure for broadcast television. Paying for all of it is probably a tad extreme.
- "Won't the traditional broadcasters go bankrupt with all this competition?" Ha ha ha, I can't believe you are even asking that. What do you think? They will still be there. This only creates a new option.
Saturday, June 03, 2006
Planned congestion
[Link from Greeneconomics] Ed Glaeser advocates a form of congestion pricing for New York City traffic. This is similar to plans advocated by Stephen King and myself except that we don't see any reason why it can't be on all roads. (See my earlier post here and my Age op ed). Glaeser's piece makes a nice point about how the London system was actually progressive (favouring lower income commuters). He writes:
Some critics of congestion charges argue that they are unfair to low income people, but in London, lower-income bus travelers were the charge's biggest beneficiaries. Bus riders didn't have to pay the charge and their travel times plummeted. As the time cost of bus travel fell, the number of bus passengers during morning hours increased by 38% (some of this is due to improved bus service provision). Like London, New York has many more people who commute by public transportation than by car, and New York's many bus travelers would particularly benefit from a congestion charge reducing their commute times.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Twisted blog
This comes from my brother, Jeremy. It is worthwhile following his guide in reading this blog post.
Click here to read the blog.
Another remarkable web document with a twist, but this one isn't as amusing as the 'cab driver' expert.
It's a blog about the recovery of a car accident victim in a coma. The blog is, as usual, in reverse chronological order, so the shock ending is at the top. You could just go straight to the key post (May 29th 2006) or you could scroll straight to the bottom and read upwards. (It's a bit long, but key posts are Friday 4/28 to Monday 5/1; Monday 5/8; Wednesday 5/17; Monday 5/22and Thursday 5/25 to the top.)
Click here to read the blog.
Funky data presentations
Google have generated a funky tool for viewing graphs of correlations of world development indicators. It has several dimensions including correlation, scale and also animinations across time. You can even pick your scale -- linear or logs. Someone will find this useful for classroom presentations.
Game Theorist: The Hard Line on Sleep
For those interested, I have a new post today at gametheorist on babies and getting them to sleep through the night. It is mostly reflections on personal experience.
Google Notebook
Google have come out with some wonderful little programs of late. Let me plug just one: Google Notebook. This one requires a little download to your browser (Firefox on Mac or PC or IE) and then you have a notebook hosted by Google that you can put links, thoughts and 'soon to be blogged' items. Just with the click of the right button. It also has a little notebook icon on your browser that you can open and add new notes. It is a great way of transferring thoughts from home to work to the laptop and back.
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