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I don't see how creating a Canadian ghetto helps anyone, really -- nor is it competing with the Americans, as you suggest. In fact, it's opting out of the competition.
And even if having BlogTv.ca restricted to Canadians is a positive (which it isn't), why does that mean that I and other Canadians are restricted from seeing BlogTv.com content as well? The whole model is flawed.
We have not created a Canadian ghetto. We have created a community of Canadian users, and all users can post their content around the world wide web. So, it's straddling both geo-blocking on live interactive, and www. distribution.
It's novel, innovative, and working.
As for BlogTv.ca "competing" with the U.S. by using the same geo-blocking techniques, you're comparing apples and oranges (not to mention twisting the meaning of the word "competing").
The U.S. blocks Canadians from watching CBS and NBC programming because Canadian broadcasters haven't bought the online rights for that content. Blocking user-generated content to which the owner has the rights makes no sense whatsoever, IMO.
We are actually competing against the Americans in Canada. It's U.S. services that are sucking tons of engagement from Canadians (and loss economic opportunity) into their services. In most cases, this is just bonusing their traffic; but it's still a sucking sound.
And it's very significant. YouTube does over 10M uniques per month in Canada; Facebook over 7M; and MySpace over 5M uniques.
The challenge Canada has in this space is open access from the Americans inside our territory; sharing the English language; and sharing the same time zone with the U.S. As a consequence, U.S. services can, in effect, dump their services inside Canada. As they are better capitalized than Canadian services, we need novel techniques to compete in our own territory.
What you are not seeing is that the Internet is not just the www.; it is also domestic users and domestic advertising markets.
What's we've done with blogtv.ca is geo-block, and geo-target with ads inside world networks, and encouraged Canadians to come into a Canadian network. This is not only highly novel, and innovative, it's working.
It's this little piece of innovation you are missing.
And finally, we are not blocking users from distributing their content. If they record a show, then can post it anywhere.
We are also managing our bandwidth and the community of users by geo-locating all this inside Canada. That's cost efficient, and, in the case of users, greating a valuable community. At blogtv.ca, Canadians, in a live context, are not lost in a sea of U.S. users. That's valuable, and it's appreciated.
On the strategy side, it's positive because we've figured out a way to compete against the Americans on our own turf (rather than just accept they they are "better"), and we are providing a Canadian only live advertising and marketing opportunity for Canadian advertisers.
No one has done this yet. And I think it's a very novel and innovative way for dealing with a unique geo-economic problem facing Canadian Internet services.
Wish I could add to blogtv.ca discussion, but I've only been once and didn't stay - interface is a nightmare, IMO. And much better content on YT.
As for BlogTv.ca “competing” with the U.S. by using the same geo-blocking techniques, you’re comparing apples and oranges (not to mention twisting the meaning of the word “competing”).
The U.S. blocks Canadians from watching CBS and NBC programming because Canadian broadcasters haven’t bought the online rights for that content. Blocking user-generated content to which the owner has the rights makes no sense whatsoever, IMO."
I was under the impression it was the other way around...that Canadian broadcasters HAD bought the rights, and so they are obliged by the providing US Networks to block Canadian traffic so that the Canadian Sites (the CTY Broadband Network and Globals streming) can claim the Canadian viewers and any ad dollars that come with it.
Now, that said, apples to oranges in my opinion. If you would like to set up a "Canadian" environmnet - great, I will wave the flag with the best of em. Canadian content can and will compete with content from anywhere. However, when I venture out onto the internet, I'm not sure if I want "just" a Canadian experience. Why can't I see how Canadians stack up against the rest of the world? Yes, your advertisers will appreciate a targeted audience, but will the audience stick around long enough?
Cheers,
Brad
My understanding is that they have not seen fit to pay the licensing fees required by U.S. content creators to allow them to do Canadian Web broadcasting of that content -- whether that's because the fees are too high or because they are afraid Web viewing will cut into their existing business, I don't know. I suspect a little bit of both.
Again though, we're talking millions of dollars in programming and ad revenues - not blogs. If you truly want to explode on the internet I do believe that you should lift the limitations. If you can make a profitable site with them, then hat's off to you, but you can't be the next YouTube or Google without being able to be seen by the whole world.
Cheers
Brad
Is this just blog.tv? Can you view ustream.tv and justin.tv as well as the other US-based livestream sites?
My understanding is that BlogTv.ca licensed the platform from Tapuz (which runs BlogTv.com), and one of the conditions of the licence was that it covered Canada only.
I assume part of the deal was that BlogTv.com would redirect any Canadian visitors it gets to the Canadian version.