"'Online Television' news" 

THE BATTLE for eyeballs is not really a battle at all was the message
of Eric Schmidt's MacTaggart lecture at the Mediaguardian Edinburgh
International Television Festival this weekend.

The launch of the online television platform Google TV, he claimed,
would "increase television viewership significantly", growing the
revenues pie for all. Most importantly, he said of television's next
wave of interactivity, "this time it's social".

Schmidt is the first person to give the MacTaggart lecture in its
36-year history who does not hail from the world of television or film
production, and a degree of scepticism lingered in the theatre as the
Google executive chairman struck a diplomatic but firm tone on issues
such as copyright, advertising revenues and funding the production of
content for YouTube (or, rather, not funding it).

The spectre of Google TV threatens to drain power away from the major
British broadcasters, who are still working on the development of
YouView, an internet television project of their own.

Google TV's success on this side of the Atlantic is not yet assured,
in any case. In the US, where it was introduced nearly a year ago, it
has failed to bring on board the major American networks ABC, CBS and
NBC, which have blocked their websites from the service.

Schmidt's explanation in a post-lecture QA on Saturday was that there
was "a presumption" that the service would affect revenues that flow
between cable companies and distributors – economics of the US
television industry that wouldn't apply in the UK. But the deal with
UK broadcasters has yet to be done, he conceded.

"We are talking to them," Schmidt said. "The real key is that will
become part of your TV over the next five years," he added, citing the
example of a children's television show that has interactive games
"layered" on top. But he didn't wish to dwell too much on Google's
tardiness in recognising the importance of social media, preferring to
talk up its new Google Plus "identity service" instead.

Online television platforms will make television "more personal, more
participative, more pertinent" and actually help preserve "appointment
viewing" (much in the way that Twitter does) in an era marked by
greater use of on-demand services and time-shifted viewing, Schmidt
claimed.

The "linear programming model" of channels whose "live" output is
fixed by one-size-fits-all, in-house schedulers would probably remain
as "an organising principle", however, especially given more than 90
per cent of broadcast TV viewing in 2010 remained live. "It's pretty
clear that it's not going to go away in our lifetimes."

While Schmidt talked up the opportunity for independent production
houses to trial content on YouTube, there was no chance that Google
would risk denting its profit margins by commissioning content – if it
did, it would probably just be "bad sci-fi".

At the same time, Schmidt argued in favour of less regulation of the
television advertising market – the same market from which it is on
the verge of taking a major slice.

On the question of dominance, he simply dismissed the idea that Google
could replicate its 85 per cent share of search advertising in
television advertising as "highly improbable".

The MacTaggart lecture, described by television executive Peter
Fincham as "the closest most TV people get to going to church", takes
place annually in the country where television was invented.

Schmidt's thesis was that – as successful as British TV format exports
such as Strictly Come Dancing/Dancing with the Stars have been – a
combination of an education system deficient in computer science, a
marketplace too highly regulated for his liking and a cultural fear of
scale businesses has undermined the UK TV industry's ability to
dominate the rest of Europe and the world.

This, he said, reflected Britain's track record for being
technologically innovative, but then losing the early lead and letting
overseas companies capitalise in terms of hard cash.

In his address, Schmidt made sure to pay tribute to the strengths of
each of the broadcasters whose representatives were present. "I have
just one request," he said as he praised the BBC for its iPlayer app
for iPad. "Please hurry up and make an Android version."

He also peppered his lecture with references to the actual television
programmes made by the people in the room. He remained committed to
Google even though Larry Page now has "the keys to the Google Tardis"
and joked that though it was impressive that more people had watched
vajazzle-touting reality show The Only Way is Essex online than when
originally broadcast, "I must confess that I have not seen this
high-quality show myself".

He also took Alan Sugar to task for comments made on The Apprentice
that engineers do not make good entrepreneurs. "Okay . . . " said
Schmidt, who has a degree in electrical engineering. "Shall we check a
few facts here?"

The Google executive chairman acknowledged that some swathes of the
television industry blamed the search behemoth "for the havoc wreaked
on your business by the internet".

But he wasn't going to have much truck with open hostilities. "You
ignore the internet at your peril," he warned. "The internet is
fundamental to the future of television for one simple reason: because
it's what people want."

UNAPOLOGETIC BIAS: QUOTES FROM ERIC SCHMIDT

At the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival,
Google chairman Eric Schmidt spoke On his ideology: "I speak as an
American entrepreneurial capitalist who's also a technologist, so my
bias is pretty clear."

On satisfying current tax laws in Europe: "It's true that we could pay
more tax, but we would have to do so voluntarily."

On David Cameron's idea that social media sites be "turned off" during
riots: "I think it's a mistake and I hope that's a clear answer. It's
a mistake to look in the mirror and break the mirror."

On previous MacTaggart lecturers: "When he spoke here two years ago,
James Murdoch described himself as the crazy relative everyone is
embarrassed by. I wonder what he'd call himself now."

# posted by andrew newton at 10:42 AM