Megaupload down

[Lemur]

Yah, the issue is not how the studios create their products. Rather, the problem is their refusal to adapt to new delivery technologies. They can market 3D and smell-o-vision all they like. They can overpay Tom Cruise 'till the cows come home. But since their entire business was created at the turn of the last century by new technology, it's deeply ironic that they refuse, flatly refuse to modify their delivery methods to accept the new technical reality.

What's more maddening is that Netflix showed them how to do it, and all they can think to do is destroy Netflix. They should just buy Netflix, for crike's sake, not strangle it in the crib.

We've been here before. When MP3s first became a technical reality, the music industry was presented with dozens of new business models. They rejected every single one, crushed the start-ups, and generally growled to keep the other dogs away from their food bowl. It was only after years of this behavior that Napster happened. (I was a music industry journo at the time, so I had a box seat for the circus. I interviewed music execs and tech start-ups, and I watched the labels carefully, methodically dig their own graves. I asked them about it, on-record, several times. It's not as though they did not understand what was going on. They just couldn't bring themselves to make any alteration in their business model. They got what they deserved.)

Gah. I could write a 20,000 word essay on this subject, but I will spare the Org the ordeal. Let's just say that smart people do astonishingly stupid things when all of their incentives point toward stasis.