OPINION: Grab and grow
By Paul Sweeting -- Video Business, 10/31/2008
OCT. 31 | IN THE 19TH CENTURY, speculators made killings buying up land in the American west and then waiting for the railroads to arrive and increase the land’s value by connecting it with markets.
Paul Sweeting is editor of Content Agenda
In some cases, of course, the speculators also controlled the railroads, so they knew exactly where the main lines were going to run. In other cases, they controlled the territorial government that granted the railroads’ rights-of-way, so they got to decide where the main lines would go.
But other times, they simply made educated guesses as to where to plant their stakes and hoped for the best.
Something like that is going on today in the realm of digital media distribution.
The territory being staked out, in this case, is the digital living room and the universe of connected portable devices.
The railroads are broadband Internet connections, whether wired or wireless.
Leading the land-grab right now are Netflix and CinemaNow.
Read the full column on ContentAgenda.com
