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Earlier this month, I signed up for the commercial-free streaming option of CBS All Access. As part of this $10 a month plan, you get a 48 hour free trial period. If you cancel your subscription within 48 hours then you are not charged.
During the 48 hours that I had the commercial free CBS All Access streaming I watched all 9 episodes of part 1 of the first season. This required a mild Trek Discovery binge commitment over a weekend. After watching all 9 episodes I suspended my subscription.
Bottom line is that I got to watch all the episodes of Star Trek Discovery for no money. Was this the ethically correct thing to do?
To be clear, I broke no rules in free binge-watching Discovery. No pirate websites or borrowed logons were involved. CBS provided an option for a free trial, an option that I accepted. Having completed my free trial, finding nothing else on CBS All Access that I wanted to watch, I suspended my subscription.
The counter-argument is that signing up for CBS All Access and binge-watching Discovery, with the intent to cancel after 48 hours, violates the spirit of free trial. In adopting this tactic, I am a free rider on all those viewers who legitimately relied on the trial period to make an informed consumer choice. If everyone use the free trial to binge watch then CBS would be forced to get rid of the free trial.
A stronger argument that the way I watched Discovery was unethical would be one about the value of creative content. Surely the writers, actors, producers, production people, and everyone else involved in Star Trek Discovery deserves to be compensated for their creative output. If we want quality shows like Star Trek Discovery - and despite some critiques of the show that I might have there is no argument that this is good TV - then we should expect to pay for them. If we have learned anything about internet economics it is the quality has a cost, and the idea that content should be free leads only to bad content.
Despite these arguments for paying for Star Trek Discovery, I’ve come to the conclusion that in this case binge-watching the free trial and then canceling one’s subscription is the ethically correct thing to do.
How could not paying for somebody else’s creative content ever be justifiable? My answer is that as long as you are abiding by the rules set up by the owner of the content then you are within ethical bounds.
While I think that it is a terrible strategy for CBS to force their customers who are already paying for access to the network in the cable bundle (as I am) to pay more for another show, this is within the network’s rights. I’d also argue that CBS could have put Star Trek Discovery on Showtime (which it owns), a premium cable and streaming network that actually has a number of shows in addition to Discovery that are worth paying for.
Again, if CBS wants to leverage Discovery to drive subscriptions to its streaming service then it has a right to do so. Who knows, I could be wrong and this tactic could actually work. My gut tells me that this is not the right thing to do for the show, the network, or the audience - but I’ve been wrong many many times before.
The fact that CBS has the right to force people to pay for a new streaming only service to watch Star Trek Discovery does not mean, however, that we need to sign-up for that service.
If a free-trial exists then everyone should feel perfectly fine is taking advantage of the free-trial offer. It is up to CBS to provide a service that viewers want to keep paying for. If you can watch everything that you want from CBS during the 2 day free trial then the problem is with the quality of the content, not the willingness of the customer to pay.
Are there any lessons in all this for higher education? Actually, I’d say yes.
The big lesson is that it is a mistake to use technology to piss off your customers (or your students). A nicer way of saying this is that new technologies should expand access and choice, rather than diminish options.
In forcing Star Trek fans to sign up for a platform that they don’t want to watch one show, CBS is bringing into sharp relief just how bad are the rest of their shows. If CBS wants the next generation of viewers to skip the cable company middleman and pay the network directly to stream their shows, then they had better invest in better shows.
Colleges and universities make the same mistake as CBS when they look to technology for innovation. The only important educational innovation is the quality of the educators, and the learning environment in which they teach.
The question should never be, should a our college move into blended, low-residency or online learning? Rather, the question should be - how can we ensure that we are creating the highest quality education?
It may be that moving towards a new delivery method such as blended or online learning will be necessary for a school to reach their quality goals, but that decision follows a choice to invest in quality. New technologies and new platforms may support educational goals - but they are never the goal of education.
By restricting Discovery only to a paid streaming service, CBS confused technology (streaming) for an ends rather than a means. The goal should have been more paying customers to watch Discovery, not more streaming customers. The streaming option should have been thought of as a way of providing more options to watch (and pay for) the show, not less.
We should avoid making similar sorts technologically-addled mistakes in higher education.
Do you think that it is ethically correct to use the CBS All Access free-trial to binge watch Discovery?
Do you have any plans to watch Discovery in this way for free?
What would you say are the lessons of Star Trek Discovery for higher ed?
