YouTube Fiasco In Pakistan
As if Pakistan needed one more issue, we have the botched YouTube blockage attempt which caused anger and frustration in Pakistan, plenty of confusion and some conflicting emotions, and possibly a YouTube outage. This BBC report alleges that YouTube went down for 2 hours because of the technical misunderstanding by PCCW, an Asian ISP. But the outage itself, if any, is less interesting to me. My take is that now that global media is paying attention to this lets use this opportunity to deal with this persistent Internet blcoking issue in Pakistan and turn things around. Enough has been written already so I will point out some of the items of interest here and invite you to share your thoughts.
I agree with my friend Tee Emm who wrote a post: The Tube Trouble and Why its a Good News
The persistent problem (of Internet censorship done the wrong way) is not being intermittently flashed to us any more – instead, this event throws it right into our faces.
That Internet censorship is bad and useless is an established fact but that it happens worldwide in both developing and developed worlds is even more established fact. In the absence of compelling Internet applications in Pakistan, Internet remains the sole killer application for the broadband mass uptake the government appears to be so concerned about.
Adil Najam has repeatedly written about the censorship and the flawed approach where government assumes the role of nation’s moral guardian role. Adil points to the possible political motivation for the ban at Pakistaniat.com:
The general opinion is that th ban is more “political” than “cultural”. A large number of videos with actual footages of electoral rigging were placed on YouTube and the view is that the “ban” or the “technical difficulties” that have come up are really a way to distract attention in Pakistan away from these videos, at least for the time being.
The ban may already be over but the repercussions will be there for a while. The technical angle to the Internet censorship and limitations of the Internet infrastructure in Pakistan is important as well. I am sure Google is looking into this as well. Since I don’t live in Pakistan and can’t experience it first hand I’ll refer back to Tee Emm’s post:
Now is the time stop using Cisco ACLs and use layer 4 solutions where the filtering must happen.
I believe this will force the PTA and the government (and the trigger happy PTCL’s PIE) to upgrade their infrastructures so that the delicate balance between civil liberties and our societal sensitivities is well kept.
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Faried, I’ll just add to what you have said, I like the way you have progressed inside your post. It may also be clear that there will be a time when the Urban half would identify their taste when it comes to brands and products ans will stcik to their choice and after all that Rural will be the prime target and the conventional media would play a major function in rolling-around the brands and services to the under developed areas!
I work at a local startup, and I’ve looked into marketing online and in the local media (TV stations, newspapers, news magazines, etc). I’ve spent about 90,000 Rupees for online marketing in the last two months, and I’m pretty happy with the results.
Youtube will let me host multiple ten-minute screencasts to help me market my tools and apps to (prospective) subscribers, for free. For comparison purposes, Rs 30,000 will get me a 30 second TV spot in my target market. One ad. That’s it. There’s simply no way that advertising in the local market can match online marketing campaigns for me.
I’m sure Youtube and Google/Yahoo/etc ads suck away possible in-country revenue, but it’s not as if there’s any viable alternatives in Pakistan.
I guess we both have created a perfect circle here. You’re refering to emerging and surging economies. Pakistan is emerging and urging economy.
Bil
“If love was red then she was color blind”
Nah, I’m just a little guy who likes to have choices. Name one country who’s TV market was destroyed by YouTube? And what’s stopping you from marketing on YouTube?
I’m not trying to pull you into a debate. I just don’t see why my choices should be restricted for your benefit.
Okay so you “tried” to turn the tables here for me but I’m afraid it actually failed.
-It’s not about eliminating the external competiton but avoiding the products which create distraction for your primaries.
-It’s about protecting the competition.
-You have gone out on a completely different direction of local marketer and local products debate which was not packaged into my reply. But now that you have tricked me into it, please try to note that YouTube can destroy a television market of an emerging country and let me back that with an example for you – an investment made on a Drama for a TV can go into ashes if the viewer has the ability to download from services like these. The advertising spent by a marketing organization goes along with it.
-Now that we have established the above, I would like to say, Nice try Big Guy!
Bil
@HeyyBaby
I understand your point. You basically want the government to help out the local marketeers by eliminating most (all?) external competition. Do I understand that correctly?
What you may not understand is that while that might yield some good results for marketeers in the short term. But in the long run, Pakistan would be left with a stagnant economy. Can you name one country where the government tried something like that, and it ended up being good for all parties involved?
Besides, its about consumer choice. If a local marketeer has a good product/service, I’ll buy it. But if the government tries to restrict my access to inferior products, should I be happy about it? And competition drives innovation. Products without competition are always inferior, since there is no incentive to make them better.
In the end, I think you are mistaken and being somewhat selfish. You do have the choice to advertise on YouTube for example (lots of foreign advertisers do that). And Google does allow you to target a specific audience like Pakistan.
I think we misunderstand eachother.
Though I agree that you have raised valid dimensions for me to look and think about the situation. Now let’s take a step back, deep breath and look at where the private sector consumer goods marketinbf and advertising investment is focusing at the moment. What is on the rise, where your major portion of marketing bucks are being spent in Pakistan and where do you expect to get the return on them. Give me some figures of Pakistan Marketing Companies speding $$$ on YouTube and then give me the figures for the Television side. Now where you have spent less marketing or none lets say and still one or two specified niche people get pulled towards that attaraction is a waste for me as a “Marketer” and I would not want something to run from where I’m not getting any volume. I don’t know whats your dimension of looking at this issues but I clarified before that I’m analysing from the Marketing perspective hence this stays true and I stick to my word.
I doub’t that you’ve ever done business or marketing otherwise you would understand the concept of “inhabit the base business first.” That my Sir, applies for a company, for a khokha, and for a country. Too much of things can trouble your ARPU for various sectors and which is what is happening at the moment in Pakistan.
HeyyBaby.
“Got a ticket for a world where we Belong, So would you be my baby?”
@HeyyBaby
You are joking, right? The suggestion that the government help TV channels by reducing choices for its citizens isn’t in the best interests of the citizens.
And YouTube is not a TV replacement. Not in Pakistan anyway. Many don’t have the bandwidth required for a nice YouTube experience. And most of the population probably doesn’t know what YouTube is. (A U shaped tube?)
I hope you don’t suggest the government block the web next, in order to help the newspapers. Or should they stop emails? That should help out the postal service, right?
-The internet censorship in an emerging country is nessesary. The censorship needs to be more of a “Marketing” move rather than any other, to block certain sites that have less return on Pakistani investment like for example YouTube – YouTube is destroying the TV viewership, the business directly involved in the growth factor of Pakistan. Even if you take 5% of the viewers away from TV, that gives a huge loss to the channel and advertisers.
-The previous government, without any sort of planning entered every from of media, entertainment and messed up each other’s competition.
-In emerging markets you need to first settle the base business of every service providing organization and then gain access to the other means to cultivate competition.
Just to enable one industry you can’t destroy another one.
HeyyBaby.
“Aik Chutki Sindur Ki Keemat Tum Kiya Jaano Ramesh?”