SRG asks online users to pay
Video on demand Pay for what you have already paid for: A new Internet video library rents out films for a fee that have already been co-financed by SRG with license fee money. Audience interest is limited.
Video on demand Pay for what you have already paid for: A new Internet video library rents out films for a fee that have already been co-financed by SRG with license fee money. Audience interest is limited.
For ten days now, Swiss television SF has also been an online video library. Like its sister channels TSR and TSI in French-speaking Switzerland and Ticino, SF offers a dozen feature films, documentaries and short films for download on its website. As in a real video store, a rental fee is charged and the film does not have to be returned, but it can only be viewed for 48 hours. This usage period is programmed into the digital film file that is downloaded from the Internet. "No additional income "The films are works whose production was co-financed by the SRG as part of the so-called Pacte de l'audiovisuel. It is therefore all the more astonishing that viewers are being asked to pay to watch them. After all, they are the ones who made it possible to finance the films in the first place with part of their reception fees. Every year, almost CHF 20 million from the SRG budget is currently spent on film production via pacte. This amount has more than doubled in the last ten years.
However, SRG does not accept the view that users of the new online video library will have to pay twice for the same service. "According to the provisions of the law, we are permitted to charge money for such an additional service. This income does not even come close to covering our costs. We therefore do not generate any additional income with video-on-demand films," says SRG spokesperson Daniel Steiner.
The rental fee for a feature film, such as the army movie "Achtung, fertig, Charlie!", is six francs. Around half of this goes towards the technical implementation of the new service. The other half is shared by the rights holders of the film and the Pacte de l'audiovisuel, where the money is used for the production of new works. Nevertheless, an amount of six francs for what is on offer seems to be at the upper limit. All the more so when you consider that the aforementioned film "Achtung, fertig, Charlie!" is available on DVD in stores for sixteen francs. For the extra charge compared to SF's online offer, the DVD offers unlimited use as well as additional and background information on the film.
A trial for the time beingSRG has declared the new online video library to be a "trial". In January 2008, those responsible want to go over the books and decide whether and in what form the service should be continued. "The SRG's desired goal," says Daniel Steiner, "is to make all films that are financed and produced as part of the Pacte de l'audiovisuel available to the public via video on demand."
Whether this goal will ever be achieved depends not least on viewer acceptance of the service. One week after the launch, those responsible are still unable to provide any precise figures. Beat Schneider, director of the SRG subsidiary Swisstxt and responsible for the technical implementation of the online video library, only knows of 110 films downloaded within the first 36 hours of the launch.
The number of users who have looked at the SF, TSR and TSI websites - without renting a movie - is far higher: More than 8300 people have clicked on a site a total of 155,000 times since August 6, probably including numerous people with an Apple computer. All they can do is click around on the website. Films can only be downloaded and viewed if you have a computer with a Windows operating system and playback program. Whether this restriction remains in place will also be the subject of an evaluation after the trial phase in six months' time, according to SRG.
It can also be freeWhile SRG defends the pricing policy of its new online video library, its public service colleagues from Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) in Hamburg show that it can also be free.
Since the end of May, the multi-award-winning feature film "Gegen die Wand" by German-Turkish director Fatih Akin, which was co-financed by NDR, has been available to watch on the broadcaster's website. Free of charge and with no restrictions on the technical infrastructure. All you need is a computer with Internet access.
The only restriction: to protect young people, the movie can only be watched online after 8pm. The majority of the audience is enthusiastic, as can be read in numerous discussion forums on the Internet. But there are also critical voices. They suspect that the offer is merely a ploy by public television to retroactively legitimize the broadcasting reception fee for Internet computers introduced last year.
Nick Lüthi
For ten days now, Swiss television SF has also been an online video library. Like its sister channels TSR and TSI in French-speaking Switzerland and Ticino, SF offers a dozen feature films, documentaries and short films for download on its website. As in a real video store, a rental fee is charged and the film does not have to be returned, but it can only be viewed for 48 hours. This usage period is programmed into the digital film file that is downloaded from the Internet. "No additional income "The films are works whose production was co-financed by the SRG as part of the so-called Pacte de l'audiovisuel. It is therefore all the more astonishing that viewers are being asked to pay to watch them. After all, they are the ones who made it possible to finance the films in the first place with part of their reception fees. Every year, almost CHF 20 million from the SRG budget is currently spent on film production via pacte. This amount has more than doubled in the last ten years.
However, SRG does not accept the view that users of the new online video library will have to pay twice for the same service. "According to the provisions of the law, we are permitted to charge money for such an additional service. This income does not even come close to covering our costs. We therefore do not generate any additional income with video-on-demand films," says SRG spokesperson Daniel Steiner.
The rental fee for a feature film, such as the army movie "Achtung, fertig, Charlie!", is six francs. Around half of this goes towards the technical implementation of the new service. The other half is shared by the rights holders of the film and the Pacte de l'audiovisuel, where the money is used for the production of new works. Nevertheless, an amount of six francs for what is on offer seems to be at the upper limit. All the more so when you consider that the aforementioned film "Achtung, fertig, Charlie!" is available on DVD in stores for sixteen francs. For the extra charge compared to SF's online offer, the DVD offers unlimited use as well as additional and background information on the film.
A trial for the time beingSRG has declared the new online video library to be a "trial". In January 2008, those responsible want to go over the books and decide whether and in what form the service should be continued. "The SRG's desired goal," says Daniel Steiner, "is to make all films that are financed and produced as part of the Pacte de l'audiovisuel available to the public via video on demand."
Whether this goal will ever be achieved depends not least on viewer acceptance of the service. One week after the launch, those responsible are still unable to provide any precise figures. Beat Schneider, director of the SRG subsidiary Swisstxt and responsible for the technical implementation of the online video library, only knows of 110 films downloaded within the first 36 hours of the launch.
The number of users who have looked at the SF, TSR and TSI websites - without renting a movie - is far higher: More than 8300 people have clicked on a site a total of 155,000 times since August 6, probably including numerous people with an Apple computer. All they can do is click around on the website. Films can only be downloaded and viewed if you have a computer with a Windows operating system and playback program. Whether this restriction remains in place will also be the subject of an evaluation after the trial phase in six months' time, according to SRG.
It can also be freeWhile SRG defends the pricing policy of its new online video library, its public service colleagues from Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) in Hamburg show that it can also be free.
Since the end of May, the multi-award-winning feature film "Gegen die Wand" by German-Turkish director Fatih Akin, which was co-financed by NDR, has been available to watch on the broadcaster's website. Free of charge and with no restrictions on the technical infrastructure. All you need is a computer with Internet access.
The only restriction: to protect young people, the movie can only be watched online after 8pm. The majority of the audience is enthusiastic, as can be read in numerous discussion forums on the Internet. But there are also critical voices. They suspect that the offer is merely a ploy by public television to retroactively legitimize the broadcasting reception fee for Internet computers introduced last year.
Nick Lüthi
