South Asian content site TinselVision has shut shop, reports PaidContent. Tinselvision had signed numberous deals, including with Zee TV, STAR India, Zoom TV, NDTV, UTV and even Yash Raj Films. Tinselvision began with offering Bollywood videos on download for $1.99, with membership priced at $9.99. Movies were priced at $3 each, with $10 for 5 movies.
Eventually, the company took some content outside the paid subscription wall, and made some available for advertising supported free streaming. Remember that earlier this year, niche TV content site Jump TV had decided change focus from regional content to sports content.
The shutting down of TinselVision should also serve as a warning for other content streaming sites like Saavn, Big Flicks, Rajshri Media, Erosondem, Rediff iShare, among others. Most content owners may be giving them content for free, though some may be accepting a minimum guarantee, but bandwidth is a significant cost. Monetization via advertising hasn’t yet quite arrived, despite claims of significant paid downloads, and some projections for video advertising networks. The launch of video advertising networks like Jivox and VDOPIA should help, but given the current advertising market scenario, are advertisers biting?
Users are forever willing to view free content, but growth in viewership should be supported by the growth in revenues. Saying that the world will figure out a business model doesn’t really inspire confidence.
More on Tinselvision:
Executives: We just checked on LinkedIn, and it appears that the site shut down at the end of September – in November, former Tinselvision Chairman and CEO Chase Weir founded EarthShot Corporation; Christopher Remus, COO and VP Operations has also moved on to BrainBox Digital as VP of operations.
Websites: The homepage of TinselCinema.com is faceless, while access to TinselVision.com is forbidden.
YouTube: The Tinselvision Channel is still live on YouTube; no one has signed into the account for four months now, which was when the last video was uploaded.
Blip.tv: Some of their own content – a show called Inside Tinsel – is availabe at Blip.tv
Timeline:
Jun 20th 2007: Raises $3 million led by Innovative Entertainment Ltd, a Geneva based subsidiary of Innovative Energy Group
Jun 2007: Signs up ZEE TV
Sep 2007: Signs up STAR India
Oct 2007: Signs up Yash Raj Films
Nov 19th 2007: Raises “More than $3 million” from Innovative Entertainment Ltd with “pre-launch, post-money valuation at nearly $20 million”
Nov 25th 2007: Signs up Shemaroo, B4U
Apr 15 2008: Expands content licenses to include India
May 17 2008: Adds UTV Content
Sep/Nov 2008: Shuts Down
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11 Comments until now.
Its not just sites streaming video content who should be worried about revenue models. In an advanced internet market like the US, 50% of the clicks on display ads are contributed by 6% of the online population. No wonder the CTRs range between 0 to 1%.
So what does the future hold for Portals, Bloggers, Video sites and everyone else trying to make money on the web ?
Well, everyone who is overleveraged needs to be worried
Throwing money at contracts doesn’t bring users. Besides that, startups are good only for technical folks. Those who are not dont realize what they are getting into.
Over leveraged is an interesting in the current world scenario :) somedays back you had posted the article on hungama’s digital distribution supremacy. Do you think that is agood way to do business? Nautanki.tv is also a video site. Also what about music streming site like raga.com again in which hungama has stake?
Dinesh: difficult to say what is a good business model and what is not. Each has its issues. Hungama played a risky game with the MGs they paid, but they had the resources to hold out until the model turned in their favour.
I don’t know what Nautanki is doing but I am very very very skeptical about the kind of numbers their publishers are mentioning. some say 8 million, some say 11 million views per day…with a publisher network of 5000-6000. appears to be rather far fetched.
keep in mind that Hungama’s main source of revenue appears to be mobile, not the Internet.
i heard Tinselvision obtained a ten million dollar commitment for yet another round but investors in Dubai had capital issues and failed to fund their original investment pledge. word is they did not fulfill the terms that were promised to the company and sunk the whole capital funding plan they had agreed to. don’t know if this is more a lesson about online video, paid versus free content, or of the casualties from credit and equity collapses around the globe.
Hi.
maybe nautanki is a bad example but all the new initiative from hungama seems to be ad funded – raga, saavn or even their platform deployment in vodafone (amobi). Think they are reading all the analysts reports far too seriously :)
i believe all the video or music portals are viable for isp only.
this is all too common to be going on about. the tinselvsiion site had a decent go. if 10 more sites didn’t come online after them, maybe they would have lasted longer. they’re not reliance big. they’re not netflix. they’re not dish or amazon or youtube. if wishes were kisses. sounds like six million was not so much for staying power. especially with huge minimum guarantees for content and converting costs and so many sites competing for the same eyeballs with the same movies and tv. what are there like 5 million people in all of india with internet, and like 10,000 with high speed? and the NRIs, really? they’re watching on computers instead of dish or sky or pirated dvds? and, having to give the content away for free by selling ads when big advertisers are cutting back? and, super low ad rates, even sites giving ad space away for free in india to look legit. ok, maybe a few more connected in india, maybe, but can you share that with 10 other sites? you’d have to own the whole audience at those levels to achieve real profitability- if then. the only quality site doing even a little ok is hulu. over 100 mil in working money, major networks in a jv. huge ad funnel. if you’re not all that, you’re just not all that. sometimes the horseshoe is worth throwing. and sometimes close is enough. in this space, you have to ring it. nobody in bollywood is or will for many years.
Small start up companies that try to create a local platform to provide a service that is already successful in other parts of the world are either looking to fail or get bought out before money runs out.
Small companies need to focus on technology or content as that is unique, differentiated and ultimately if successful, will have value.
The rest needs to be left to midsize profitable or large companies. Funding is never enough and if people running funds were that smart or that good, they would be building and running this stuff not just mooching of other people’s hard work.
These guys more or less shut down in August, maybe July.
They were known to have a lot a new stuff in the works, some of it pretty cool from the sound of it.
If projects like this can’t work, don’t bet on the ones hanging on right now. Wait a few years and see what the content owners re-introduce. The audience, economics and technology still isn’t quite there.
Very sad. Tinselvision was one of the better sites with fun original programs and a slick interface. Loved their little game at sister site channelmine TV. Rest in peace. Or better, rise from the grave and give it another go.