Bollywood’s High Speed Internet Dreams
Checkout ScreenIndia’s article ‘Bollywood Bows to Broadband‘. I really can not understand what these people are talking about. Are they talking about Bollywood becoming more accessible to NRI’s with credit cards and extra bucks to spend on movies? Or they really want to get profit from the huge market of 50 Million internet users in India. The tagline of the article says, “In India, low bandwidths often make legally downloading movies a tedious, time-consuming process”, but just like the CEOs of web ventures mentioned in the story, the story itself totally ignores the people in India.
For many Indians, high speed internet is still far away. Out of 50,600,000 Internet users, only 2 million has access to high speed internet (source: Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of India). Indian state owned authorities define broadband as a 256 kbps internet connection. Some ISPs offering 64kbps bandwidth also label their dsl and adsl connections as broadband. Downloading full length Hindi movies on slower internet connections is lengthy process. Even watching the trailors on the web is difficult with dialup modems or slower dsl cable internet connections. Studios, Distributors and film-makers are mainly focused on providing the movies for NRI’s. There is a huge demand of Bollywood movies and music among Non Resident Indians all over the world. Most of them has access to faster, better and reliable DSL, aDSL or Broadband internet connections. Most of the time it is cheaper for them to download a movie rather than buying it on DVD or renting it. But in the hund for those NRI Dollars Bollywood has totally ignored local internet users the huge market of 50 Million subscribers.
The business experts in Bollywood who has ignored the potential of local market so far should now pay serious attention to gain money out of it. Most popular Hindi Movies and Bollywood music videos are easily available on Youtube. If you want to compete you need to provide the same content with better quality and affordable price. Recently Eros international and T-series sued Google for showing their copyrighted content on Youtube.
Most Indians using high speed internet from offices, work or schools spend their time downloading videos and music. Broadband availability would make it possible for content providers to reach out local market. It would be a great idea if content providers and ISPs join hands together to offer cheap dsl and broadband internet connections to Indian Market. Something like you pay for the Internet and get free movie or song downloads from popular Bollywood distributors. Bollywood and the entertainment industry in India really needs some great marketing and sales gurus to build a business that only brings them money but also bridges the digital divide in the country.
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2 Responses to “Bollywood’s High Speed Internet Dreams”
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April 9th, 2007 at 7:40 pm
I disagree Sabeen because by offering cheap DSL to consumers in India, it will only encourage more illegal internet downloads. Although your article stated how Indians would legally download movies/music, I suspect that there may be a majority that download these files illegally, since it is cheaper. If you pointed out that Indians would use the DSL connections for things other than downloading files then your argument may have some merit.
Nationwide DSL
April 10th, 2007 at 1:42 am
Fred, I agree with you that wider availability of High Speed Internet would encourage users to illegally download movies and music. Wider availability means more theft but also it means possible increase in sales for content providers. I was thinking on the lines that may be they should develop partnerships with DSL Broadband providers, online music and movie stores. Something like if you get service from xyz provider then you can download 1 movie/album for free. Of course I am not a marketing expert but I feel that right marketing strategies can bring more profit to bollywood.