Liberal Talk Radio

There was once a time when Mrs. Contrarian and I were forced to download — illegally — a single episode of an serial television show that we unfortunately missed. Dedicated viewers of said show, we were bummed to think that there was no way to see that week’s episode and surprised that the network hadn’t thought to stream or post their shows to the interweb. That will soon change:

For the Walt Disney Company, plans to make television shows available free online are a way to bolster revenue by selling two sets of advertising — TV commercials and online ads — for a single show.

Yesterday, Disney announced details of the plan. Beginning in May, the company will begin a two-month trial that will make four popular shows from its ABC network — “Desperate Housewives,” “Lost,” “Commander in Chief” and “Alias” — available for free viewing online the day after they are broadcast. The plan was first reported in The Wall Street Journal.

Unilever is among the advertisers that bought ads for the initial test run. Noreen Simmons, Unilever’s director of strategic media planning, said she expected that consumers who were watching shows in streaming video online would be more alert than if they were watching the same content on television.

“It’s going to be a different viewing experience,” Ms. Simmons said. “Rather than people sitting back in their chairs watching TV, this is going to be a lean-forward experience.”

A string of other companies — including Cingular, Ford, Toyota, Procter & Gamble and Universal Pictures — have also purchased ads, a spokeswoman for Disney said. Jon Winsell, the director of online media strategy for ID Society, an interactive marketing agency in New York, said people who were willing to log on to a computer to watch a missed episode might be loyal enough to tolerate the unskippable commercial breaks.

“When you’re talking about ‘Desperate Housewives’ or ‘Lost,’ you’re talking about a rabid fan base, so they’re probably willing to put up with a little more,” Mr. Winsell said.

You know who doesn’t get that online distribution increases one’s fan base and provides extra revenue opportunities? The f**king record industry:

The decision to offer ABC’s hit shows for free online was motivated largely by a desire to avoid the kind of distribution troubles suffered by the music industry, The Walt Disney Co.’s president and CEO said Tuesday.

Robert Iger, speaking to an investor conference, said he was ”sobered” by the example of the music industry, which resisted the idea of selling music on the Internet even as so-called file-sharing services were exploding in popularity.

”The bottom line is they were not in tune with what their customers wanted and what the world was demanding of them and I think it hurt them significantly,” Iger said. ”I don’t want to wake up and see all the traffic moving onto new platforms” and Disney not being there.

Adapting to new business models — what a novel idea!

It makes you wonder what the music industry is so afraid of. Could it be that their product is ridiculously overvalued? Could it be that the old marketing and promotional system is an absurd waste of resources? Could it be that they are happy with the dumb — asinine! — inefficiency of cut-out bins? The sooner these jerk-offs go out of business, the better.