Study shows Europe slow to bite on internet TV viewing
By Darren Murph 
posted February 23rd 2009 12:04AM
posted February 23rd 2009 12:04AM
posted February 23rd 2009 12:04AM
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1. Shows come out in Europe much later than they do in the United States (at least, US shows). Many times, through the magic of the Internet, they have read, sometimes months in advance, what the premise of each episode will be. Sort of ruins the experience...
2. Because of point #1, many Europeans are also aware of, and often employ the use of, Bit Torrent. This is what happens when you artificially manipulate how, when, and where people can acquire content, in the age of the Internet.
3. Like most polls, I'd love to see who exactly they solicited this information from. Polls tend to often show exactly what the sponsors of polls are trying to show (go figure).
4. Since sites like Hulu aren't available outside of the US, why is this at all surprising?
Bottom line: Media industry is stupid, they unreasonably, unrealistically, and unnecessarily attempt to control the distribution and use of their content with an iron fist. That's all well and good until there is a viable means by which to access that content outside of their artificial environment, and then...oops! All bets are off.
This is what i have said all the time. Not att all surprising. Quality over quantity.
I completely agree with hexydes. It's the age of globalization and the internet has pretty much no borders so get with the program and start making content available outside of the U.S. or at least don't act surprised when you see that only a small number of Europeans choose to stream your content.
Exactly my thought in my home country the Netherlands there's only one HD cinema channel (Film 1) & because its owned by UPC it even isn't available on satellite :-( but only on cable. Quite ridiculous though because the other (SD) Film1 channels are available on satellite. To be honest I don't miss it, because they only air "old" movies with the newest 2 years old.
You can imagine I'm a happy Bittorrent user ;-)
Like the other guys have said, the problem is that we don't have the choice. Apart from Freeview (which is OTA) we really don't have the the equipment. Someone had the idea of starting up a new box doing this sort of thing but was stopped due to the fact it could stop competition, if no one starts it how can there be any competition!
The iplayer is good but unless you don't have have a PS3 are you really gonna watch whole shows on a tv screen in your office? don't think so. And not everyone has a HTPC.
I love my AppleTV and have a UK and US account. I love the idea of watching a whole season at my own pace. I also have SKY HD+ but you have to wait at a very slow pace for the stuff you really have to wait for it.
We will get there one day, I just don't know what year that day is in!
How can anyone claim Europeans are slower to bite on internet TV, when they don't have the same internet TV services that Americans have? What's next: "Antarctic slow to bite on 3G wireless"? The limiting factor is the availability and quality of service, not people's preferences.
I have to agree with the other posters.
We simply don't have access to the same range of content. Some UK channels are offering their content free like Hulu, others are charging for it and others don't offer anything at all.
US Shows are usually left out of the picture.
We don't have Netflix, Hulu etc.