Don Dodge

Member since: Jun 6th, 2006

Don Dodge's Latest Comments

Blog Activity

Blog	# of Comments
Engadget	1 Comment
Download Squad	2 Comments
The Unofficial Google Weblog	1 Comment
Blog Maverick	50 Comments

Recent Comments:

How to Jumpstart the Economy - Tax Free Small Businesses (Blog Maverick)

Jul 28th 2008 1:24PM Mark, I don't think taxes are a factor in deciding to start a business. Paperwork,"red tape" and local zoning ordinances are far bigger obstacles.

Local zoning laws are a big obstacle to any real world business that requires a physical location. Try buying a piece of land and building a retail store. It will blow your mind how many hoops you have to jump through, how long it will take, and how much it will cost.

The other approach is to just rent space from a landlord. But, guess what...all the costs of jumping through those hoops are reflected in higher rent costs.

My father-in-law built a chain of retail tire stores. He siad the number biggest obstacles to growth were local zoning laws and OSHA requirements.

Raising capital and hiring people were easy by comparison.

Ruh Roh - Porn could sink Youtube in Viacom case.... (Blog Maverick)

Jul 3rd 2008 3:13PM And here is the other side of the argument for YouTube's defense. I actually wrote this on my blog more than 2 years ago.

YouTube has "substantial non-infringing use", which was the critical legal issue in the Sony Beta-max case. If a product or service has "substantial non-infringing use" than it can not be held liable for contributory copyright infringement. However, individual users could be sued for copyright infringement. The RIAA is still doing this today.

YouTube has thousands and thousands of videos that are not copyrighted, which are produced by independents or amateurs. Napster really didn't have any non-infringing content so the case was pretty clear.

YouTube can stay within the DMCA law by "taking down" any videos that infringe a copyright when they are notified by the copyright holder and served with a "take down" notice. They do not need to proactively search their site for infringing video. It is up to the copyright holder to notify YouTube and provide some evidence that they are the legal copyright holder. YouTube must then remove the infringing content within a reasonable time using "commercially reasonable efforts".

This case is complicated. Prior cases are a guide, but several new areas of law will be tested.

YouTube/Google has very deep pockets so they can hire good lawyers. Napster had David Boies, one of the best trial lawyers in the country...and we lost.

Deep pockets also mean that the judge/jury can award billions in fines and damages.

Ruh Roh - Porn could sink Youtube in Viacom case.... (Blog Maverick)

Jul 3rd 2008 2:54PM Mark knows this stuff inside and out...and he is right. He is taking a few short cuts in his blog post assuming that everyone else understands the law and the rules. Obviously, many do not.

The point is this. If YouTube knows about porn being uploaded, and knows how to filter it out, then they have "knowledge" of the content on their service. This "knowledge" voids their DMCA safe harbor exemption.

To Dan's comment, it doesn't matter if it is impractical to screen out copyrighted material. We used the same argument in the Napster case. The judge replied "You created this monster, you are responsible for controling it".

Napster didn't store any songs on its servers. YouTube stores millions of files. Napster didn't sell any ads or take any revenues. YouTube does. These two facts weaken YouTube's case considerably.

Viacom very nearly got access to YouTube's source code. The judge denied it. But, you can see where they were going. They wanted to see how the software handled uploads, screening for porn, recording titles, creating hashs to identify files, identifying duplicate files, etc. All of these "features" mean YouTube has "knowledge" about the content on its servers.

This case is far more complicated than most people realize. Viacom has a mountain of copyright law on its side. The laws are not fair or balanced. Logic and reason don't enter into the equation. I can tell you this from first hand experience at Napster.

Hulu is kicking Youtube's Ass (Blog Maverick)

Jun 16th 2008 9:57PM YouTube also the $1 Billion Viacom lawsuit hanging over its head. If Viacom wins there will be a flood of similar lawsuits from other copyright holders.

YouTube content is very difficult to monetize, even more difficult than other User Generated Content, because it is not searchable.

Google knows how to sell CPC ads against search terms. Yahoo is pretty good at selling display ads against their own text based content because they know the subject and context. YouTube can't effectively sell CPC or CPM display ads.

Plus, it is enormously expensive to host and stream all this video content. This is the worst of all possible worlds for YouTube. Even might Google, the king of web advertising can't figure this one out.

All Your Video Is Belongs to Us (Blog Maverick)

May 28th 2008 12:22PM Mark, Great insights backed by practical realities. Most billionaires forget all the real world practicalities after several years of the good life. You have never lost that, and probably never will.

It is amazing how few people really understand the economics of video on the web, or even the page views required to generate $1M in advertising revenue. They just never stop to think about it and pencil out the math.

Google/YouTube is a long way from finding a profitable business around video. Viacom has a Billion dollar suit pending against them.If Viacom wins that suit there will be a flood of similar suits that will cost Billions and Billions.

You are right, on demand, and cable TV is the route to really big profits.

Don Dodge

Talking Mavs (Blog Maverick)

May 5th 2008 7:44PM Mark,

It is truly a pleasure to read your inside thinking on trades and the NBA. No other owner in professional sports does this. It is truly a gift to knowledgable fans to get the inside scoop from an owner.

Your logic is perfect. The numbers you presented impressed upon me again how close the competition is in the NBA. Scoring on 55% of posessions and then dropping to 50% is really not much of a drop, but that is all it takes in the NBA, especially the Western Conference.

I always thought the Mavs big problem was defense. But, your numbers suggest that defense really isn't that much of a problem.

Success in the NBA is much more complicated than most fans understand.

Thanks again for a look inside the NBA.

Don Dodge

I can't believe I'm becoming an Apple Fanboy (Blog Maverick)

Jan 22nd 2008 10:32PM For consumer devices like music players and phones..maybe. But when it comes to getting work done on laptops? You will be back Mark.

The loss of productivity and absence of some key applications will drive you crazy. Brad Feld tried to move to Mac. Couldn't do it...hard as he tried. Lots of VCs have tried it only to come back to the Windows PC.

BTW, have you reconsidered running for president? The current candidates are lame. You could do much better.

Don Dodge

Success & Motivation (Blog Maverick)

Dec 24th 2007 5:55PM Mark, Thanks for re-posting. I LOVED it!! Most people have no idea what it takes to start a business, the challenges you will face, and how hard you have to work. Then when you finally make it a success...they say you were lucky. Ya...right.

The best part for me was "In business you only have to be right once". This is pretty close to my favorite mantra "One yes erases all the no's".

I also use the baseball analogy a lot. I know of no other pursuit where failing 70% of the time is considered an 'All-Star" level success.

When I was at Napster I told everyone "This will either be a grand slam home run or a strike out...but we won't need to wait 4 years to find out which it is. It will happen fast."

Next time I hear someone say "Mark Cuban was just lucky", I am going to send them this post. Outstanding!

Don Dodge

Warren Buffett , Taxes and the Presidency (Blog Maverick)

Dec 13th 2007 10:21PM Mark Cuban for President!

Mark this is so refreshing and thoughtful. I wish the politicans would listen.

Politics, once a noble calling, has degenerated into slime ball, double speak, demagoguery usually reserved for defense lawyers. Many years ago, while I was in college, I did an internship for U.S. Senator Edmund Muskie, and later was a paid staffer for U.S. Senator Bill Hathaway. Politics was different then. Now it is disgusting.

I wrote a blog entitled Mark Cuban for President! where I explain why you are right and the politicians are wrong. See http://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2007/12/mark-cuban-for.html

Don Dodge

P2P Part 3 (Blog Maverick)

Nov 23rd 2007 1:12PM Mark, You got it right this time. In fact, the first time you wrote about P2P and bandwidth I was pretty sure what you really meant was metering bandwidth, not blocking P2P. It just makes sense.

I agree with you that the ISP's should think about charging for bandwidth the way wireless networks charge for cell phone minutes. You should be able to buy different levels of bandwidth based on your usage. That is the real issue, not what you are doing with the bandwidth, or if you use P2P or not.

I thought this was your main point all along, so I didn't react to the P2P example. I thought you just used P2P because it was an obvious example of the bandwidth inequities.

The problem may be that the cable/DSL providers don't have the metering and billing capabilities in place yet.

It is inevitable that this issue will be addressed, and metering seems to be the most reasonable answer.

Don Dodge