On this week's episode of The MadTech Podcast, ExchangeWire CEO Rachel Smith and COO Lindsay Rowntree join head of content John Still to discuss "choice fatigue" for video viewers, publishers blocking OpenAI's GPTBot, and telcos pushing for streamers to cover data costs.

Too much choice causes a fifth of viewers to turn off

Have TV, video, and streaming become saturated? What can be done to remedy this “choice fatigue”?

One in five viewers are abandoning their TV sessions because they can’t find anything they want to watch. That’s according to Nielsen’s 2023 State of Play report, which states that people spend an average of 10.5 minutes looking for something to watch. 

The report, which cites findings from Nielsen’s Gracenote metadata unit, also found that the number of programs available to watch in some markets has risen dramatically over the past two years. In the US, UK, Canada, Mexico, and Germany, the number of new titles grew from 1.88 million in 2021 to over 2.7 million in 2023. The number of channels has also increased, and is set for further growth, which could exacerbate the “choice fatigue” that’s turning viewers off.

Publishers block GPTBot from crawling content

How can publishers protect themselves from copyright infringement? Is there a middle ground that can allow their content to be used to train AI models? 

A number of publishers have taken action to restrict OpenAI’s ability to access and use their content to train new AI models. The New York Times, CNN, and Reuters are among the media companies who have blocked the AI-firm’s web crawling tool, GPTBot, from their properties.

In order to be able to provide the long-form, near-conversational responses that have enthralled web users, large-language models like ChatGPT need to be trained using large amounts of data from an array of sources. As AI systems have garnered more attention, questions around potential copyright infringement have become louder. 

Telcos and streamers tussle over data costs

Does this proposal seem fair? What might the implications be if the “telco tax” is imposed?

The European Commission is forging ahead with new legislation that will oblige streaming platforms to pay towards the cost of broadband. The proposal, which was voted through in June, follows complaints made by large telcos that the proliferation of video streaming has contributed to a hike in data usage, resulting in higher broadband costs that consumers are unwilling to pay.

Since last year, British and European telcos have campaigned for tech firms to contribute to the €50bn (~£43bn) they claim to spend annually to build and maintain full-fibre broadband and 5G networks. Critics have expressed concern that the so-called “telco tax” will benefit incumbent broadband providers at the expense of competition.