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Machiavellian on 20 November 2014
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Intrinsic said:

You are asking for things that aren't possible.

What PSVue is is literally a direct competitor to the cable companies. Where for now the cable box is literally you PS4. Nothing more nothing less. And that is how the service needs to be looked at. Now once you can do that, then you can start factoring in the benefits to such a service.

Remeber, this is sony saying, pay us, instead of paying your cable company.

Benefits (these are just ideas combining such a service with a dedicated gaming console)

  1. "Smart Cable". Your channels can be better integrated into the system and as per your viewing  habits. And you will have a more immersive and content specific UI as the screenshot shows. Gone will be the channel guide, and in comes the content guide. 
  2. Possibility of cummunity services. The could very well do something like they are doing with PSshare right now wheer they could allow a friend watch shows you ghave recorded from your system to theirs via. Or think about things like trending shows. If a show is trending, it would be easy to make it visible to users  and you can see what your friends think about it directly. 
  3. TV DVR can be a cloud feature as opposed to you having to record stuff directly to your harddrive. Wjat this meas is that you could literally record an infinite number of shows simultaneous and just stream them whenever you want to or have the time to watch them.
  4. You could share favorites lists with other PS users and intsntly have reminders set for all the shows they are watching on your own system instead of filtering trough shows individually.
  5. Pay as you go model, no contract fees. You want to only have it for the NFL playoff season, then you pay for a month or two and call it a day. And if having PS+ somehow ties into it, even when not paying for the Tv service you could still be recording shows that you could watch whenever you do pay for it.
  6. Global presence. They can basically have services tailor made for every region they are in. Something that cable companies basically can't do today. So they could have a service with 75 channels in NA. One with 50 chanels in NA. One with 45 channels in japan and another with 30 in spain. With very little crossover and very region specific programming. This is actually the biggest single benefit to the service. 
Possible issues
  1. The price. It can't be ignored, the cost of this service isn't just what you pay monthly, but also whatever you pay for your monthly internet connection. Some may say that you are paying for internet anyways, but you can't have this service without an internet connection. So that should be factord into the price.
  2. Just like cable, it will be impossible to get individual channels as per your exact requirements. Cause content providers don't do that. A cntent provider may know all you want from them is Channel A. And maybe Channel B and have no interest n channels C, D and E. So what they always do is that they bundle channels C, D and E along with channel A and B and sell that to sony. Somthing to the tune of pay us $4.25 for channel A and B or $5 for everything.
  3. Roll out wil be very slow since they are not just tapping into existing services and creating theer own. Then again they have been working on this for years so who knows how far they have gone.

 

I know that vue is a direct competitor to cable, that’s the point.  The article make statements as if the cable providers do not have On Demand service that you can get without a cable box which is incorrect.  The article also make claims like Sony will be able to negotiate contracts from content providers in a way that will change the industry which is also incorrect.  The thing is, cable companies are not sitting idle content with what they got.  A lot of them have put their content Online with OnDemand Apps that do pretty much what Sony service is trying to do.  

Even the points you make in your statement is already done by cable companies with their current Apps that are supported by Net TVs, Xbox 360 and the X1.

Point #2:  You know MS tried to do this last gen and it never took off.  I believe any type of community sharing will have a huge rights battle and it probably will be only available if the content provider allows.

Point #3:  Who needs DVR when most of this content is On Demand anyway.  Currently right now I can watch all the shows for HBO, Starz, CW, Fox, ABC, NBC, CBS and a whole bunch more anytime I want, when I want and most do not require any sub to do it.

Point #4:  Only being able to share your list with PS subscribers is way to limited. With OnDemand from most of these content providers which continue to grow on a daily basis, my friends just tell me what shows they enjoy and I just watch them.  No sub needed or Sony device.

Point#5:  You do not need a contract now for cable.  You can add or remove channel packages or just drop cable altogether.  Also since most of the big cable companies have Apps that provide all of their content On Demand, there is no advantage here for Sony service.  I still make the point that recording shows are becoming more outdated as the content is there On Demand 

Point#6:  We will see about this point.  Having service and content tailored for each region sounds like a huge undertaking and I am not sure Sony is in a position to make this happen but I will leave that one as a plus if they could do it.

 

Right now, I do not see anything Sony is doing that the major cable companies are not doing also.  If anything, maybe Sony can price their content aggressively which could make the cable companies do the same but at Sony current position, I am doubting this will happen.