As New Zealand Courts Tech Talent, Isolation Becomes a Draw

As New Zealand Courts Tech Talent, Isolation Becomes a Draw




 Interesting article in the NY Times stating that New Zealand would like to be the Tech Hub of the world and people are very interested. With the high prices in Silicon Valley, welcoming people and political turmoil and terrorism across the world, New Zealand is becoming a prime target for tech companies (and other companies/employees). NZ is welcoming those who are having trouble entering the US or other places looking for work.


 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/14/technology/new-zealand-tech-industry.html?_r=0

How Nielsen Is Shedding Old Perceptions, and Building New Businesses

How Nielsen Is Shedding Old Perceptions, and Building New Businesses

I thought it might be interesting to check into the business model of Nielsen, a brand whose general reputation I have been only passingly familiar with, but always wanted to learn more. I had previously associated Nielsen as the brand behind the boxes that were attached to clunky cable set-top boxes to track people's viewing habits in the 1990s, but I find it interesting to see how much further the company is expanding their reach. Television in the era of "Big Data" is becoming a much more fractured, decentralized viewing environment. Nielsen's evolution of "Watch" into the new "Buy" marketplace segment has shown strategic vision in navigating this changing dynamic...

"Nielsen's evolution is twofold, encompassing both sides of the company's operations: "Watch" and "Buy." Watch is the better known of the two, tracking media consumption in 45 markets and covering 80 percent of media spend worldwide. Flying somewhat under the radar is Nielsen Buy, which provides market analysis, retail measurement and sales insights to the packaged-goods industry in 106 global markets, representing 90 percent of the world's GDP.

Some might be surprised to learn that Buy is larger than Watch, and that's been true for quite some time. In the first half of 2016, Buy revenue was $1.65 billion, up nearly 4 percent, while Watch tallied $1.44 billion, a 6 percent gain. (Total revenue in 2015 was $6.17 billion.)

Barns views the continued growth and, to an extent, the convergence of Watch and Buy as essential to Nielsen positioning itself as an indispensable corporate partner, helping marketers boost sales and setting a new industry standard for determining ratings and ad prices.

What's more, he foresees increased automation driving that process. "As we continue to leverage technology in a bigger way … we move much more to a data-as-a-service and software- as-a-service model," he says, much as Adobe evolved from selling software in a box to providing a cloud-based suite of tools and services. Nielsen's implementation of this concept is called Nielsen Marketing Cloud. Launched this past spring, it is based in large part on technology and expertise the company gained from last year's acquisition of eXelate.

Nielsen Marketing Cloud gives the company's clients faster access to data and analysis, which helps them make more informed marketing and media decisions. The system facilitates cross-channel planning by letting clients connect in real time to mobile, online, over-the-top TV, video, social and other platforms. It lets them analyze how advertising and content mold consumers' purchase decisions. That means advertisers can see which platforms or specific types of media are doing best with their target audiences at any given moment and shift ad dollars accordingly. "It takes different product capabilities, connects them all into this interoperable system," says Barns. 'It's off to a great start in the U.S., and we also, just in the summer, launched it in Europe.'..."

Source: http://www.adweek.com/tv-video/how-nielsen-shedding-old-perceptions-and-building-new-businesses-173654/





Source: http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2017/information-inspiration-technology-and-a-global-pool-of-intel-has-given-a-rise-to-news.html

Most millennials don’t want to pay for Netflix

A recent Wall Street Journal article notes that "More than half of young people (54%) said they use a friend’s or family member’s Netflix account, according to a new survey of 6,567 college students released late Thursday by LendEdu, a consumer finance comparison site. "
The article notes that only 34% of users say they have their own Netflix account, while 8% do not have an account as all.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/most-millennials-dont-want-to-pay-for-netflix-2017-04-07 

While reading the article, I honestly was not very surprised by the statistics.  The majority of Netflix users who I know share an account, or have multiple profiles on one household account.

But what did surprise me was a featured quote from Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix: "Netflix chief executive Reed Hasting has said sharers (or, as some people say, cheaters) often go on to become paying customers. “We love people sharing Netflix,” he told the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last year."

Since Netflix currently does not release subscriber numbers, there is no public data that speaks to how many subscribers the service has.  Since Netflix has created one-of-a-kind offerings (i.e. original content only available on Netflix, and its wide library of licensed content) -- it has established itself as a desirable "must-have" these days.  Based on Hasting's sentiment, it would seem the company would crack down a little further or disable the ability to have multiple profiles on one account, if it was truly worried about subscriber fees and revenue conversion.  

This article made me wonder, what are the reasons that sharers go on to become paying customers, as Hasting claims?  Since this study was conducted among college students, one theory I had was that, as undergraduates graduate college and move away from friends, their lifestyles change (i.e. starting new jobs in new cities, beginning graduate programs, getting married and owning their own households, etc.).  Perhaps it is this "drifting away" from friends and young adult routines that drive people to get new subscriptions in their new lives.  Though I'm sure Netflix will not soon be sharing their own data or theories, I would be interested to see how Hasting backs up his comments.

I am interested to see if our class has any theories, as well.  What do you think would cause a Netflix sharer to become a paying subscriber?

Could Facebook Save the Struggling Media Industry?

This little new piece talks about how Facebook and Google are gradually leading to the demise of journalism, owing to the increased spending on digital ads causing an ad-revenue shortage for traditional media outlets like newspapers and television etc.

A former FCC adviser suggests that the founders of Google, Facebook and Apple should contribute from their revenues and create a $4 billion fund to preserve journalism.

The suggestions put forth in this article sound too good to be true, but I will be happy if it does happen!

http://marketrealist.com/2017/04/could-facebook-save-the-struggling-media-industry/

Audience Measurement Struggles To Keep Up With Changing Viewing Behavior

This article caught my eye as it talks about how the advertising industry is struggling with tracking viewing behavior. With the advent of multiple channels and devices, demographic metrics like age and sex no longer help in selling products. In order to match the right ads to the right people, specific data sets need to matched for targeting and optimization. People know what they want but it's hard to match the ads to their viewing behavior. Moreover, nowadays all networks have multiple platforms like digital, mobile and social media platforms, which means that advertisers need a broader perspective than just playing a 30-sec ad during a prime-time show.

Being a data analytics major I am fascinated to see how important data is for every business. Once the advertising industry has resources to leverage the available data and draw useful information from it, issues like these can be easily resolved.

https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/298614/audience-measurement-struggles-to-keep-up-with-cha.html

Mexican Newspaper Shuts Down, Saying It Is Too Dangerous to Continue

Norte, a Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, newspaper announced it will be shutting down after nearly 30 years after three journalists from other news organizations were killed last month.  The newspaper stated that journalism had become a high-risk profession due to killings and increasing violence and threats against reporters.

Recent killings include:  Miroslava Breach, a correspondend for the national newspaper La Jornada – shot eight times outside of a garage.  Ricardo Monlui Cabrera, a columnist – shot to death as he left a restaurant with his wife and son.  Cecilio Pineda Birto, a freelancer and founder of La Voz de Tierra Caliente – killed at a carwash in Ciudad Altamirano

While violence against journalists played a critical role in the decision to shut down the newspaper, there were other factors in play.  The newspaper executive, Mr. Murguia, listed financial troubles, a strained relationships with local officials, and the wave of violence against journalists as reasons for the shutdown. 

The article states that Mexico is going through a “deep freedom of expression crisis” and that the killings and threats are having a chilling effect on the democratic process, reducing the flow of information to citizens and lawmakers and stifling Mexicans’ ability to engage in public debate.

I find this news very troubling and sad.  While fake news and tensions between the media and the government are major concerns in the United States, at least journalists aren’t being killed for what they write.  Mexico is not alone in its violence against journalists, as the country “only” ranks 11^th out of the 20 deadliest countries for journalists.  It’s shocking that the newspaper, El Diario, wrote a letter on their front page asking Mexican drug cartels what they would be allowed to publish without facing deadly consequences.  Many publications do everything they can to stay afloat by informing and  providing valuable content to their readers – it’s a shame that providing this service can be so life-threatening in certain parts of the world. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/03/world/americas/el-norte-closes-mexican-newspaper.html?ref=media

Amazon Prime Suits Up as NFL's New 'Thursday Night Football' Streaming Partner

Announced in this early April, the NFL is huddling up with a new live-streaming partner in Amazon, which has agreed to fork over $50 million to simulcast the 10 fall "Thursday Night Football" games broadcast by CBS and NBC.

Amazon now is offering its prime members access to Thursday night football streaming service without extra cost which boasts a membership of some 65 million U.S. consumers.

Following Twitter's footstep, which last fall became the NFL's inaugural full-season live-streaming partner, Amazon won over the likes of Facebook and Google's YouTube for the rights to carry the Thursday night games but will have to pay five times what Twitter did a year ago for what is effectively the same package.

Besides boosting prime membership's signup rate, Amazon will have the option to sell a smattering of ad inventory in each game. It's expected that a part of those available slots will be used to promote homegrown shows such as "Sneaky Pete," "Goliath" and "All or Nothing," a doc series produced by NFL Films.

While NFL insiders last season said they were pleased by the quality of the Twitter stream, the Amazon deal will provide the league with a chance to take a look under the hood at yet another digital-media company in advance of its next big TV rights auction. The impact to traditional TV media company is inevitable and that those businesses will have to make room for one of the digital powerhouses when the NFL rights package expires in 2022.


Source: http://adage.com/article/media/amazon-prime-nfl-thursday-football-replacing-twitter/308565/