Comcast's CBS on demand becomes free service

from the hollywood reporter

CBS, Comcast end VOD fees

CBS Corp. and Comcast Corp. are snipping the price tag off their
video-on-demand offering of primetime series. The companies announced
a new pact Thursday that will not only make episodes of CBS fare like
"Survivor" free on video-on-demand, but for even more shows, for a
longer period time, and in all Comcast markets. When the nation's
largest cable operator struck a deal in November to make CBS the first
broadcaster to put series programming on VOD the morning after their
primetime airing, they charged 99 cents per episode. The experiment
covered just four CBS series and extended only to CBS
owned-and-operated markets served by Comcast. Nine months into the VOD
offerings, CBS and Comcast have switched from collecting a fee to
offering it for free. The conversion is a reflection of the
experimental nature of programming on alternative platforms, as well
as increased interest from advertisers in VOD. (Andrew Wallenstein)

Allen W. McDonnell...

I love my VOD, they only leave about 5 commercials in an entire one hour
episode making it 45 minutes or less instead of 60. I can back up a scene
if I missed something, pause it to leave the room, share it with family that
were not present when it was broadcast. I think this really is the wave of
the future like monthly paid internet vs. hourly paid internet it gives you
control of when and how you view the show. The only objection I have is you
have a limited time to restart the show in the same spot if you have to stop
for some reason, after three hours it resets and you have to start over from
the beginning.

John Gilmer...

BINGO.

VOD is a near perfect media for advertisers:

1) They KNOW that someone will be watching.

2) They have a good idea about the "demographics" of the viewer.

The inserted ads could be targeted to the particular household with
consideration for the type of program.

timeOday...

This could also reduce the incentive for people to TiVo (or otherwise
time-delay) on their own, increasing the liklihood that shows will be
watched with ads in place. VOD doesn't remove all incentive to TiVo,
since (I assume) it doesn't let you skip ads, but VOD has one huge
advantage - it eliminates the need to plan ahead.

I've never even bothered to figure out how to use VOD, but if I can
really get it at no additional charge, I think I'll give it a try.

Of course "they" could still blow it. The ads would have to be "high
quality" commercials that don't insult the views taste or intelligence. I
suspect, however, that "they" will take on all comers and most of the ads
will be local car dealers and real estate agents with little or no
production value.

Lord Vader III...

I wonder if this applies to HD too. Currently we have NCIS free
On-Demand (probably because there weren't any first run episodes) but
if we wanted them in HD On-Demand, we were then charged $1.99 or .99 (I
don't remember which).