jrcart

I am not trying to argue the finances, it is none of our faults that Drive can not make money on their reviews, it boils down to simple economics, either figure out a way to make the films for less or figure out a way to generate more revenue. They are obviously going the route of generating more revenue but in my opinion they is the wrong revenue generating stream. My point was only that in this day and age of the internet and You Tube and such Drive will be hard pressed to survive let alone turn a profit by doing things the old fashioned way. People just don't pay for this kind of entertainment/service these days. Earlier in this thread someone eluded to the **** industry and he was 100% correct, who pays for **** these days? At first the **** industry went after hackers, copyright violators and file sharing sites but when they realized their efforts were not even putting a small dent in the problem what did some leaders in the **** industry do? They opened their own file sharing sites or purchased existing ones and shared their copyrighted work on other file sharing sites and now generate revenue with linked based advertisers. The **** industry is alive and well and they now give away most of their stuff....if you can't beat em, join em! The **** industry adapted, the Drive network took a step back a decade or two. Sure, Drive will get a small percentage of their viewrs to pony up the subscription fee but as you mentioned earlier they got millions of views on their P1 review, I suspect their "premium pay" video reviews will garner only a small fraction of that amount of hits/views and in the end they will lose market share and overall traffic to their site will dwindle which will ultimately affect their bottom line even worse becasue the advertisers they do have pay a rate based on hits....less hits = lower advertising value.

You may be an attorney but I am a business man, while I do not know much about law I suspect it is often black and white and slow to evolve/change, the business environment changes at a rapid pace, especially these days, if you do not have foresight to see the changes you will not survive.

zibby43

You could be absolutely right. The subscription route might not pan out for Drive. My point was merely that I do not fault Chris Harris and the Drive team for wanting to be paid appropriately for their work. If the subscription route "pays off" for them, I will be thrilled that they are finally earning the compensation they deserve.

Few other online publications have the production quality of Drive's videos. Car & Driver and Motortrend put out some decent stuff but they're pulling in cash from their magazines.

Regarding the law, I wish it was black and white. Most of the time, it could not be more gray.

Yes, there are Federal statutes and regulations (and of course, the U.S. Constitution), but each State has its own Constitution and common law (case law), which fills in the gaps left by the statutes and regulations. And whether the law is slow to change depends on the area of law in question. For example, in the energy/utilities industry, there are administrative law rulings issued every single day that change how companies/entities operate within that industry.

The EPA statutes and regulations are also constantly being tweaked.

On top of the statutes and regulations you have various Federal and State civil/criminal procedures.

What makes the law gray is that oftentimes, a particular case's facts/circumstances don't neatly correspond to either the existing statutory or common law.

If an issue in the case isn't addressed adequately by existing law, the judge ultimately has the power to create new law via his decision, which effectively updates the common law of that particular jurisdiction.

I could spend hours demonstrating the complexity of the law but neither of us have that kind of time haha. A case could come out differently in two different jurisdictions simply because different judges presided over it. And then you have to take into account how many times a lower court judge rules one way and the Appellate overturns the decision. If the case then goes to a Supreme Court of some kind, the decision could change for a third time.

Something like a speeding ticket is fairly black and white. The issue is simple: Was the citizen speeding or not? Did the officer "catch" someone speeding using an appropriately calibrated radar device? Were all procedures followed when issuing the ticket? If yes, then there is a "black and white" statute/regulation/ordinance that addresses what the fine/penalty is.

-Marlin-

I just discovered Chris Harris about a month ago. I crawled out from under my rock and now, after wetting my whistle on his reviews, I realize my future dealings with Chris will have to come to a hault. I'm not paying $4 for his YouTube videos.

A great man once said "why pay for **** on the net, when it's free everywhere?"

I've never paid for an episode of Top Gear or Fifth Gear, but shouldn't they start to charge $4 a month in solidarity for someone not willing to work for free.

Thanks for your "legal/business insight" but I'll stick with common sense.

zibby43

Top Gear and Fifth Gear make money off of cable, so those wouldn't be good comparisons. They're not even close to being solely web-based content providers.

And there's no need to cop an attitude with me. Just trying to have a discussion.

-Marlin-

I say what I think

350Zed

I take it back...

I took on the trial subscription, and Chris' /DRIVE+ review of the new M3 reminded me that these guys are worth funding!

Spend less than the cost of a Starbucks to keep these guys fighting the good fight? Hell yes!!!

BLKROKT

^ I'm going to have to take a look now too. I'd like to see his full review on LaFerrari also.

zibby43

Well said. I found it comical that some people driving $60k+ plus cars were getting so worked up over a few bucks a month. Hell I burn that much just hitting the Start/Stop button every morning. Perhaps it was the principle but I'm never going to knock someone for trying to make what they deserve (especially when the quality of their work is so good).

VaclavSV

Can I wait 6 month pay $4 and get all the episodes that have aired until then?

zibby43

Yes. The service has been misconstrued as a "pay-per-view" one but the reality is, once you subscribe, you get access to all the content.

I went in for the free trial and have been thrilled with the content thus far.

VaclavSV

Thats pretty stupid on their part. They should've just charged $ per episode or $0.99 if they make roughly 4 per month.

mrmkeller

Not to dump on the proletariat, but paying $4/mo to watch him wax poetic about these fantastic machines is money well spent.

DiscoBandit

Way to bump a super old thread, CH left Drive months ago...