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Viodi View

Viodi View – 06/07/13

After a seven-year absence, it is exciting to return to The Cable Show next week in Washington D.C. With speakers ranging from Jennifer Lopez to the Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, this conference will provide a broad and in-depth view of both content and technology. The stories in this issue of the Viodi View provide a preview of what will be seen at next week’s show and how content and technology have become intertwined.


“TV Everywhere” Gaining Market Traction with Live Linear added to VoD by Alan Weissberger

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“TV Everywhere (TVE)” services have begun to pick up momentum among programmers and pay-TV providers, according to some industry executives who have seen a surge of interest among subscribers, especially on major stories such as the recent Boston bombing and its aftermath shown on CNN. Click here to read more.


A Cooperative Using Its Roots to Help Out with IPTV

Ken Pyle interviews Corey McCarthy of NCTC at the 2013 ACA Summit.
Click to view video

Ubiquitous delivery of video via IP is what allows cable and telco operators to offer the multiscreen video services. In the above interview, Corey McCarthy of NCTC discusses their efforts to create a converged IPTV platform that could be used by any of its 400+ telco operator members as well as the hundreds of cable operators that comprise the NCTC membership. The crowdsourced process he describes for evaluating the technologies takes advantage of the power of a distributed membership, while providing the scale necessary to achieve significant cost savings for those very same members. Click here to view.


From Capture to Screen & Everything in Between

Ken Pyle interviews MobiTV executives at NAB 2013
Click to view video

“Delivering Television, particularly live television, to non-traditional screens is extraordinarily complex, said MobiTV’s CSO, Rick Herman. Herman discusses the challenges of delivering television to multiple screens in the above interview. Cedric Fernandes, MobiTV CTO, joins in and describes what they are doing as an open IPTV platform; one where content could flow over a managed or unmanaged (e.g., OTT) networks. Click here to view.


MVPD-Driven BroadbandTV

Ken Pyle interviews Paul Woidke of NAGRA at CONNECTIONS at CTIA.
Click to view video

A year can make a big difference in the world of technology rollouts; at least between 2012 and 2013. Paul Woidke of NAGRA/OpenTV points out how many of the developments around broadband TV are now being driven by the MVPDs, as compared to earlier when Over-The-Top providers were pushing the envelope. Woidke points out that the cable operators are integrating broadband TV as part of their overall product offering that they can sell to advertisers. Woidke points out that the business models will have to evolve to support the creation of content that people want to watch. Click here to view.


The Advent of Ultra High Definition TV

An example of a 4K television on sale in May 2013; they are real.
4K TV at Retail

A new generation of television is here. Designed to leave current HD TVs in the dust, 4K televisions showed up in force at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this year and the associated production equipment was demonstrated at April’s National Association of Broadcasters’ Convention. As amazing as these televisions are, some question whether consumers will be able to afford them and how many will even be interested after only recently upgrading to HD. So what is 4K and is the product worthy of the hype? Click here to read more.


2013 TiECon- Part 3: Software Defined Infrastructure Presentations & Panels by Alan Weissberger

Software Defined Network is shown with OpenFlow control.
Image courtesy of IBM

In this third and final article on the information packed 2013 TiECon, we summarize key messages from the second half of the SDI (Software Defined Infrastructure) Track on May 17th, including the afternoon keynote and two panel sessions. The first article covered all the TiECon opening keynotes. The second article summarized the invited SDI presentations from the morning of May 17th. Click here to read more of this article, as well as the very informative interaction in the comments section below the article.


Some Tweets and Short Random Thoughts:

  • Looks like Broadband Service Providers have an ally with regards to patent troll concerns, as indicated by this quote from Bill Hughes, senior vice president for government affairs of the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA), when he said, “We welcome President Obama’s focus on this important issue. Increasingly, retailers are forced to defend themselves against infringement suits simply for using off-the-shelf products that incorporate patented technology. The prospect of costly litigation to resolve even the most dubious of claims enables patent trolls to generate settlements that neither reflect the intent of the law nor the actual value of their claims. Meaningful action must be taken to reign in this abusive practice.”
  • An excerpt from a recent Apple patent application, echos what we were trying to do at ZillionTV, “For example, watching ads could result in getting “tokens” that are redeemable for offsetting your mobile carrier costs, or even providing them completely for free.”  One former ZillionTV colleague indicated he would “be surprised if they get all these claims….I saw lots of these components working years ago.”
  • Meanwhile, TiVo reports that is, “has agreed to enter into certain patent licensing arrangements with Arris, Cisco, and Google. As part of the settlement, Google and Cisco will pay TiVo an upfront lump-sum payment of $490 million, bringing the total from awards and settlements related to the use of certain TiVo intellectual property to roughly $1.6 billion.”

The Korner – My Final Impression of the Last Cable Show I attended

A clever advertisement at the 2006 Cable Show.
An Ad That Made a Lasting Impression

It is amazing how sometimes the most trivial and most unimportant things can make an impression. Great advertising is that which makes the imprint that one remembers 40 years later. Clearly, those images from our childhood may be the most vivid; hence why there are limits regarding advertising to children (who out there still remembers cigarette commercial jingles).

The final image from the last cable show I attended left an impression on me. The advertisement was in an unusual place and I literally found it on my last stop of the last day as I was leaving the convention center. Although it was an image that will probably be forever etched in my mind, for some reason I felt compelled to film this unusual pitch and share it with the world. Since, then at least 1,000 other people have also seen what caught my attention.

It will be interesting to see what makes a lasting impression at this year’s Cable Show. Click here to read more and to view the video.

Author Ken Pyle, Managing Editor

By Ken Pyle, Managing Editor

Ken Pyle is Marketing Director for the Broadband Forum. The mission of this 25+-year-old non-profit “is to unlock the potential for new markets and profitable revenue growth by leveraging new technologies and standards in the home, intelligent small business, and multi-user infrastructure of the broadband network.”

He is also co-founder of Viodi, LLC and Managing Editor of the Viodi View, a publication focused on the rural broadband ecosystem, autonomous vehicles, and electric aviation. He has edited and produced numerous multimedia projects for NTCA, US Telecom and Viodi. Pyle is the producer of Viodi’s Local Content Workshop, the Video Production Crash Course at NAB, as well as ViodiTV. He has been intimately involved in Viodi’s consulting projects and has created processes for clients to use for their PPV and VOD operations, as well authored reports on the independent telco market.

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