Posted on 01/10/2011 6:45:46 AM PST by abb
The blending of television and the Internet is inevitable. But will it happen in concert with the major cable and satellite distributors, or in spite of them?
That question loomed large at the Consumer Electronics Show last week as manufacturers promoted Internet-connected television sets and companies like Cisco and Sony talked about “redefining television.” All involved know that connecting the Internet to television and vice versa could solidify the distributors’ place in the food chain — or greatly erode it.
“We want to use all this technology to make a better consumer experience,” Glenn Britt, chief executive of Time Warner Cable, said in an interview after speaking on stage here. A better experience, it stands to reason, will help Time Warner Cable and other cable companies retain customers, protecting the lucrative subscription TV business from the prospect of cord-cutting. It will also help manufacturers sell more hardware for the living room.
During the trade show, however, there was a point in every demonstration where fantasy collided with reality — and it was usually when the cable and satellite distributors came up.
“The idea here is to work with cable,” said Google’s Rishi Chandra as he showed off Google TV to Julius Genachowski, the Federal Communications Commission chairman, on Friday afternoon. When working together, Google TV can seamlessly find live television channels, recorded shows, on-demand options and Web streams. So far, though, it works that way only with Dish Network.
“Right now,” Mr. Chandra said, “we’re limited.”
After seeing television setups at the show, Mr. Genachowski said, “They’re incentivizing the cable companies to innovate.”
And signs of innovation were evident: Time Warner Cable announced that it would start delivering programming via its network straight into some Sony and Samsung television sets, removing the need for a set-top cable television box.
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(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
"Network evening newscasts will go dark after the '08 elections and their news divisions disbanded."
Walter Abbott, (b. 1950), Media observer, blogger and commentator
ping
Does this mean that ABC and NBC would have to compete with things like PJTV, maybe a National Review TV or even a Free Republic TV??
Does it make CBS just another URL?
Of course its already been time for TV’s to come with their own hard drives and USB ports.
major cable and satellite distributors are looking at bankruptcy.
internet TV means NO REVENUE for them
And they deserve it.
$60/month for basic cable that gives you nothing
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703419104576068351674875680.html
Disney, Yahoo Look at Internet TV
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/business/media/10link.html?ref=media
Twitter Shines a Spotlight on Secret F.B.I. Subpoenas
http://adage.com/mediaworks/article?article_id=148077
Media in 2011: The (Real) Year of Living Dangerously
http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/news/digital/e3i60e757316c16345acdb762babeabf3ce
Apps Irk Cable Nets
http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/news/digital/e3i9d01b59e30b22e7b1b86ee2ec181b409
Connected Chaos: Is Free Web TV in Peril?
I'm not so sure about that. Ever since the printing press was invented and the "broadcast" (one to many) model of mass communications came to be, all the masses ever got was what THEY wanted us to see/hear/read.
Which is why THEY are so upset about the internet (many to many). It represents one of the largest shifts in power in human history.
I have a kitchen-top high def TV in my kitchen with an $85. antenna. It brings in seven channels incl. the local news and three substations which play oldie shows and videos. I watch DVD's on my laptop when there's nothing on TV. Works for me.
A la Carte TV is coming.
Will the networks survive?
My TVs have USB ports, and the Hard Drives are in the Tivo...............
The cable companies host most broadband. They will still control programming feeds via the internet connection
There is of course a problem there because the world is on the verge of broadband wireless internet everywhere delivered to your phone and router via ATT.
I am tinkering with tethering my I phone to my computer for the ATT internet connection. If I get it to work well, I can drop all the cable, including the internet. That is the future in my view.
The cable companies host most broadband. They will still control programming feeds via the internet connection
There is of course a problem there because the world is on the verge of broadband wireless internet everywhere delivered to your phone and router via ATT.
I am tinkering with tethering my Iphone 3G to my computer for the ATT internet connection. If I get it to work well, I can drop all the cable, including the internet. That is the future in my view.
Whatever cable/satellite company first offers a la carte programming will capture one helluva customer base.
It’s going to take the ubiquitous installation of fiber-to-the-doorstep for a completely successful marriage of the Internet and television to become reality. While it’s pretty simple to build an Internet-TIVO type of interface box that has an HDMI cable running out of it to connect to your favorite giant flat screen monitor, the unlimited bandwidth provided by fiber-to-the-doorstep is critical for realizing the full potential of the marriage. In the mean time, lots of folks are working on “The Box”, and eventually I would expect a few elegant solutions to shake out. However, until the speed of fiber-to-the-doorstep arrives, shows will be recorded off the Internet when folks are sleeping and later played back in real time.
But the real kicker to all of this will be the destruction of the monopolies of the broadcast and cablecast distribution networks. With fiber-to-the-doorstep, ANYONE can become a network! Instead of just being TV consumers, anyone can become a distributor. Fiber-to-the-doorstep will do to the monopoly casters what Internet publishing did to the monopolies of the newspapers and magazines. Instead of a few limited distribution channels requiring enormous amounts of capital for entry, all of a sudden the number of distribution channels will be virtually unlimited and the costs to entry approaching zero.
For example, I can just so imagine a brilliantly produced Free Republic channel that takes advantage of the talents and knowledge of our many members, with each of us contributing video productions using inexpensive equipment like Flip video cameras, with a master programmer stringing together instant, factual real-time refutations of the latest lies told by the MSM, and streamed in real-time to everyone’s homes. (Naturally enough, we’d have programming from experts on guns, computers, pets, medicine, automobiles, technology, science and all the many subjects we are so interested in here.)
There’s also no particular reason to believe that the existing players have some special advantage to utilizing fiber-to-the-doorstep. Their main advantage probably relates to their legal infrastructure and their established relationships within the advertising industry. However, both of these advantages could be short lived unless the current casters quickly utilize this infrastructure to lock up partnership deals with whomever emerges as the new creative geniuses that catch on with the viewing public.
In effect, fiber-to-the-doorstep married to an elegant interface box that connects the Internet to a household’s main monitor will unleash unimaginable creative forces. Throughout history, from monks copying texts in monasteries, to the invention of movable type and high speed printing presses, to the Internet, and finally to fiber-to-the-doorstep, more and more information has been disseminated to more and more people, inevitably leading to the destruction of the elites who previously hoarded that information in order to maintain their power and control over the deliberately ignorant proletariat of the day.
Interestingly enough, the elite have heretofore generally been unable to foresee their own destruction from the advancement of information distribution technology. They have usually reacted only after the cat was out of the bag, taking anemic steps such as trying to control who owns a printing press or trying to promote so-called net neutrality control over the Internet.
However, it may be different with fiber-to-the-doorstep. While the American Socialist Democrat party will try to make sure that all citizens have equal-but-mediocre Internet access (just as they promote all equal-but-mediocre works), if they manage to smarten up, they will do everything in their power to thwart the next and virtually final step in egalitarian information distribution technology, namely fiber-to-the-doorstep, in order to preserve the existing mainstream media information distribution monopoly that they currently control.
One of my biggest disappointments was the indifference to doing anything other than maintaining the status quo by the administrations of the second George Bush. I had so hoped when Bush came into office he would do something big and positive like a fiber-to-the-doorstep initiative that provided low-cost loans to ANYONE who wanted to build fiber-to-the-doorstep networks, with the only limitation being that carriage terms would be the same for all content providers. The last barrier to total egalitarian information distribution would thereby have been breached, and in retrospect, perhaps the destruction of the U.S. economy by the government-induced housing bubble would have been somewhat lessened.
When the conservatives next take control of the government, let’s hope they recognize the advantage it will be to them for the main stream media to be destroyed and replaced with a more egalitarian media, as well as recognizing the means by which to do that. Furthermore, construction and operation of fiber-to-the-doorstep networks and all the associated content generation and distribution infrastructure would provide a very positive boost to the U.S. economy.
I have free USB tethering with my phone and unlimited data. Both are becoming rare. Be aware that ATT has caps on their internet service. Probably no problem if all you do is Freep but it would be a killer if you wanted to stream video.
I cut cable/Sat about 10 years ago. Between Hulu and Netflix streaming, I miss nothing I want to see.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703822204576074193849159186.html
Ailing, ABC News Mulls Bloomberg Tie-Up
~mark~
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