Will newspapers all die? Maybe not. I am sure that, in some form, some Newspapers will live on. But for most of us – the Newspaper as a “Paper” for the masses is already dead. Will Paper Books die? Maybe not – I treasure my new Picture Book of my son’s wedding. There are few text filled books I will always treasure. But as a mass market object, books are already dead for many people as the sales of eBooks and Readers show.

The mass market distribution systems that supported newspapers and books will die soon as a result. For traditional papers and books only have to shrink by 15 – 25% to make the economic burden of running the presses and the system too much. Once these systems have gone they will be gone for ever. New systems are emerging.

I can already design and set my new book and have it printed and sent back to me – a market of one!

This is a new system quite separate from the old book distribution and publishing system. New “newspapers” such as Politico and Huffington are here. Some old ones such as the Guardian are moving to the new space. Twitter and Facebook fill in more news for me. My new “news paper” will be edited largely by me for me!

The same process is now going to affect TV. Most of the old infrastructure will die. New structure will emerge quickly. Some old structure will hybridize. The power will shift from them to me!

I have just enjoyed an Apple TV for a week with Netflix.  Now watching content via the web is easy. But the big attraction is not just that getting content online is easy. What I had not known about was how powerful the impact would be of how my habits of watching affects how Netflix adjusts its offering to me. In only a week, it has used its algorithm to begin to offer me content that I might never have noticed that I will almost certainly enjoy. What it is doing is “meaning making” of the almost infinite pool of content that is out there. This has put me in charge – I am now my own programmer. I am my own network CEO. I choose the time and I choose the content knowing that I will enjoy it. I also lose all the rubbish and all the ads.

I am constructing my own TV Network! This is the revolution that extends way beyond the web access issues. The web enables this personal customization for TV as wit will for books and news.

I am happy to pay a subscription for this. I don’t demand that this be free because it is great value for me. I will never go back to appointment TV – no matter who puts it on – a network, a cable company or public TV.

My bet is that within a year, the death of Appointment TV will be sure and a new system will be visible. Look at how TechCrunch see this right now!

• Google unveiled its Google TV platform less than 3 weeks ago. You can’t ignore Google. Hey, they just built a car that drives itself. But Thursday, in a battle that will likely become more frequent between old media and new, ABC, CBS and NBC blocked their programs fromGoogle TV. MTV, Fox and HBO are still available, but that could change. Still, one TechCrunch post declared “I’ve seen the future and it begins on my sofa with Google TV.”
• Steve Jobs bragged this week that Apple has already sold 250,000 new Apple TVs. The first Apple TV shipped in 2007. It had its fans but didn’t take off like the iPod or iPhone. The second generation of Apple TV’s launched just last month. MG Siegler really likes the device, but admitted it’s not yet the killer device in the living room. To get there, he said, would require tv network subscription packages.
• “Watch Instantly” is booming at Netflix. A shocking statistic came out this week. 20% of Internet traffic during peak times in the U.S. is coming from Netflix.
  For more on Netflix’s plans, see Sarah Lacy’s interview with CEO Reed Hastings.
• Hulu Plus will be coming to the Roku box in the fall.
  For some, the Roku box may be the first step towards eliminating cable.
• Boxee announced the new Boxee Box will ship next month, both if you pre-ordered fromAmazon or want to buy one in stores.
• Flurry reported Apple’s iOS Apps are responsible for the recent downward trend in TV ratings. The actual cause may be a bit broader.
• A TechCrunch post Friday suggested the future of TV is HTML5.

At the moment much power remains with the old powers. Netflix and Google are enduring tough negotiations with the producers of content. But why wouldn’t they take up this mantle of being the producer? Why can’t they do an HBO? Certainly today if I was a maker of documentary who cannot get space on conventional TV, I would approach Netflix and Google. Just as cable supplanted the networks, so those who provide access via the web will supplant cable and networks.

So what then for Public TV and the local Public TV stations?

If you are a producer it seems straightforward to me – you too have to approach those who shape access to the web – or add a service to the web yourself!

But that leaves the local TV stations on the beach! It does but like a local book shop, the audience is going somewhere else for the mass content.

So what to do?

Here is Doc Searls’ advice in a recent interview with me at KETC:

I think that an answer is to build the “Local Cloud” – Host the new Forum or Agora or Market. Be the host of the new/old marketplace for sharing through video.

There is not yet a really well functioning local cloud yet for video. This is a huge hole, waiting to be filled. Look at all those who are learning to use video. They are driving to HQ video. Look at the new screens that offer up a much better experience.

Take a look at your new 1080p HD TV screen. You know what the best-looking source is for that? Your new 1080p camcorder. That’s because all the TV stations, and all the cable and satellite services, compress their video, often to the point where grass fields look plaid and detail is just wiggly lines. Camcorders compress video too, but not as much.

My point here is that more and more individuals and small groups are going to be in better and better positions to produce their own video, and won’t be satisfied seeing it compressed to ugliness on YouTube. They’ll want to produce their own movies, their own documentaries, their own creative work, outside the  industrial system that YouTube comprises.

If they want to mash this video up, edit it, do CGI, do the kind of rendering that serious video requires, they won’t have the means at home. And it’s often too hard to do it out in some remote cloud provided by the likes of Amazon (which doesn’t even provide that yet — at least not exactly). They’ll need low-latency fat connections to back-end servers and rendering farms.

Thus we have a big opportunity for KETC and other public TV institutions, to ally with local telco and cable companies, which in most cases have the space, the conditioned power, and the direct connections to the Net’s backbone.

How much time before the Tipping Point? My feeling is 2-3 years tops. In 2-3 years time all your best audience will have made the shift to the web. This may be 30- 40% of the total. There will still be a conventional audience but it cannot pay the bills. Just as when a newspaper or a book publisher loses its best readers, it cannot pay its bills either.

The pace is change is accelerating as each new phase builds on the previous one and adds new platform power to the web. Coming right on the heels of all of this – a new web based system of education and then right after that a new web based health system. All based on the same idea – of putting you in the driver’s seat!

HBO will launch a new feature on Tuesday this week – Subscribers will be able to download its shows.

Targeted at younger subscribers and travelers who watch TV shows and movies on laptops, HBO on Broadband will offer 600 titles each month, with 400 of those available at any time, as well as a live stream of the main HBO channel.

HBO on Broadband will also suggest titles based on viewing habits. Programming will be available for at least a month, but will be erased from users’ libraries at its expiration date.

The application can be programmed for up to five users and downloaded to five devices that use Microsoft XP or newer operating systems. An Apple version is in the works.

Each month, an HBO original series such as “Entourage”, “The Sopranos” or “Sex In the City” will be available in its entirety.

Apple now rents and allows downloads. Netflix delivers online as does Amazon.

TV is moving decisively in 2008 to an online delivery.

If I want to see a show again on PBS, I have to order it on DVD by mail and it costs $19.95.

I imagine that a block for public television delivering online is the Station Issue.

I would love to have a PBS/Producer subscription that allowed me access online to content. I would have no problem in indicating in my subscription my “home” local station. So the revenue could flow both to the producer and my home station.

Time for an experiment folks – 2009 may be too late to learn.

There is more to profits than simply offering content online – I will talk more on how making the show a social object can add even more soon.

Update – please see comments below where Jen kindly brought it to my attention that PBS announced a few days ago that it will launch a new arrangement with YouTube