[mythtv-users] Supporting schedulesdirect.org

David Brodbeck gull at gull.us
Wed Aug 8 16:20:50 UTC 2007


On Aug 8, 2007, at 6:20 AM, Braindead wrote:
> The thing that bugs me the most is that the listing data should be  
> free to the non commercial end users.  It's in the best interest of  
> the TV stations to let you know what is on, when it's on..etc.  The  
> problem is that TMS wants to treat end users the same way they  
> treat commercial entities that make money from the listings.

Well, two things.

TMS is aggregating the data and standardizing it.  That has a cost  
and a value, neither of which is $0.

Secondly, it's hard to make money by selling something to companies  
and giving it to individuals.  Eventually the companies wise up and  
say, "Hey, instead of us buying this, we'll just tell our users to go  
get it for free."  I suspect this was what torpedoed Data Direct.

TMS is a middleman, and no one really likes middlemen.  But getting  
rid of them means convincing a lot of people on both ends of the  
transaction to do more work, and that's not an easy task.





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