Comments on: Big Brother / Minick / Channel4 — what am I paying for? http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2006/08/big_brother_min.html Daily news and opinion for 250,000 industry executives and mobile fanatics Tue, 14 Feb 2012 22:14:00 +0100 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: steve procter http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2006/08/big_brother_min.html/comment-page-1#comment-346 steve procter Sat, 12 Aug 2006 22:10:32 +0000 http://www.smstextnews.co.uk/2006/08/big_brother_minick_channel4_--_what_am_i_paying_for.html#comment-346 first of all, Minick will, just like every single other service provider, put a cluase in their contract with Big Brother that the buck stops with Big Brother. This is standard stuff now in this game... 1. customer complains 2. icstis rule and fine the tier one aggregator 3. tier one aggregator contract passes the fine on to service provider 4. service provider contract passes the fine on to the application provider It might be said (but I couldn't possibly comment) that with this model, in general the application provider makes several million and ends up having it's wrists slapped and paying a fine of probably a few tens of thousands of pounds. As a business model this looks pretty good. So we can whine all we like but frankly the people involved in this type of thing can end up laughing all the way to the bank and revel in the extra publicity that The Sun can bring them with their "shock horror" stories. So am I waffling? What is my point? Well I think the point is - who give a damn!!!! If the public want to be couch potatoes and sit staring bog-eyed at a screen voting on a Victorian freak show, and then grumble a month later when the freaks re-surface then...well...they should switch over the TV and watch the news and see some of the real stuff that is going on in the world!!! Can fans of BB please tell me the last time they seriously heard a conversation between any of the house-mates that was about something in the real world - and I don't mean who's shagging who in the c-list celeb world!! steve first of all, Minick will, just like every single other service provider, put a cluase in their contract with Big Brother that the buck stops with Big Brother. This is standard stuff now in this game…

1. customer complains
2. icstis rule and fine the tier one aggregator
3. tier one aggregator contract passes the fine on to service provider
4. service provider contract passes the fine on to the application provider

It might be said (but I couldn’t possibly comment) that with this model, in general the application provider makes several million and ends up having it’s wrists slapped and paying a fine of probably a few tens of thousands of pounds. As a business model this looks pretty good.

So we can whine all we like but frankly the people involved in this type of thing can end up laughing all the way to the bank and revel in the extra publicity that The Sun can bring them with their “shock horror” stories.

So am I waffling? What is my point?

Well I think the point is – who give a damn!!!!

If the public want to be couch potatoes and sit staring bog-eyed at a screen voting on a Victorian freak show, and then grumble a month later when the freaks re-surface then…well…they should switch over the TV and watch the news and see some of the real stuff that is going on in the world!!!

Can fans of BB please tell me the last time they seriously heard a conversation between any of the house-mates that was about something in the real world – and I don’t mean who’s shagging who in the c-list celeb world!!

steve

]]> By: Helen Keegan http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2006/08/big_brother_min.html/comment-page-1#comment-345 Helen Keegan Fri, 11 Aug 2006 17:39:36 +0000 http://www.smstextnews.co.uk/2006/08/big_brother_minick_channel4_--_what_am_i_paying_for.html#comment-345 I think this is a really interesting case. Does this mean that the show itself should have had terms and conditions (i.e. that the producers reserve the right to change the rules at any time) rather than just the telecoms services providers (in this case Minick and I-touch)? Does this mean that entertainment is a 'service' and that 'service levels' need to be agreed and maintained? I think more worrying is all the "quiz" shows that are on during the night like The Mint that are screwing the general public out of 100s of 1000s of pounds as they are in effect running a lottery (a friend told me it was something like 60k an hour they were earning in phone calls). OK, so there's a small element of skill involved, but actually, what's against you is the chance that you'll even get on air to enter your answer. So it's really gambling. ICSTIS is currently looking into this as well. I'll definitely be watching both of these cases closely and am very interested also, in others' views on the matter both from a consumer and a business perspective. Seems to me our whole economic model (based on advertising) is screwed and the emerging models based on all/most content as paid-for is also screwed. So where does that leave us? I think this is a really interesting case. Does this mean that the show itself should have had terms and conditions (i.e. that the producers reserve the right to change the rules at any time) rather than just the telecoms services providers (in this case Minick and I-touch)? Does this mean that entertainment is a ‘service’ and that ‘service levels’ need to be agreed and maintained?

I think more worrying is all the “quiz” shows that are on during the night like The Mint that are screwing the general public out of 100s of 1000s of pounds as they are in effect running a lottery (a friend told me it was something like 60k an hour they were earning in phone calls). OK, so there’s a small element of skill involved, but actually, what’s against you is the chance that you’ll even get on air to enter your answer. So it’s really gambling. ICSTIS is currently looking into this as well.

I’ll definitely be watching both of these cases closely and am very interested also, in others’ views on the matter both from a consumer and a business perspective.

Seems to me our whole economic model (based on advertising) is screwed and the emerging models based on all/most content as paid-for is also screwed. So where does that leave us?

]]> By: Robert http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2006/08/big_brother_min.html/comment-page-1#comment-344 Robert Fri, 11 Aug 2006 15:24:12 +0000 http://www.smstextnews.co.uk/2006/08/big_brother_minick_channel4_--_what_am_i_paying_for.html#comment-344 I'd say it would be very unfair for the buck to stop with Minick. In my opinion they simply provide a service to channel4/Endemol/whoever is responsible for BB. It's the responsibility of the BB producers/management to engineer situations within the house and to edit and televise the footage in such away that people are encouraged to text vote to either keep people in or out. The producers goal is to fire people up so they feel compelled to vote, normally out of complete hatred for a housemate which is probably unjust as there's some seriously careful editing done to portray the housemate in such a light. BB are obviously carefully analysing the text voting and they'll have people crunching ways based on the voting pattern at the time to maximise their voting revenue by showing certain housemates in different ways. They seem to have made a real cockup with this latest BB and you can see that some of their decisions have been made out of panic that the viewing figures and voting revenue is clearly down on the norm. Anyway i'm waffling.. the point i'm trying to make is that BB decide on strategy and Minick simply provide a service and based on that BB management should be the ones to take the flak. If i'm a cab driver providing a service and a thief and a rapist happen to be patrons of my service at some point... it doesn't make me a thief and a rapist.. i'm just providing the service mate and I wont be held responsible for their poor strategy and decision making! I’d say it would be very unfair for the buck to stop with Minick. In my opinion they simply provide a service to channel4/Endemol/whoever is responsible for BB. It’s the responsibility of the BB producers/management to engineer situations within the house and to edit and televise the footage in such away that people are encouraged to text vote to either keep people in or out. The producers goal is to fire people up so they feel compelled to vote, normally out of complete hatred for a housemate which is probably unjust as there’s some seriously careful editing done to portray the housemate in such a light. BB are obviously carefully analysing the text voting and they’ll have people crunching ways based on the voting pattern at the time to maximise their voting revenue by showing certain housemates in different ways.

They seem to have made a real cockup with this latest BB and you can see that some of their decisions have been made out of panic that the viewing figures and voting revenue is clearly down on the norm.

Anyway i’m waffling.. the point i’m trying to make is that BB decide on strategy and Minick simply provide a service and based on that BB management should be the ones to take the flak.

If i’m a cab driver providing a service and a thief and a rapist happen to be patrons of my service at some point… it doesn’t make me a thief and a rapist.. i’m just providing the service mate and I wont be held responsible for their poor strategy and decision making!

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