Technology360

Microsoft aiming to deliver TV over IP

Microsoft aiming to deliver TV over IP
. Microsoft has taken a step towards delivering its vision of IP-delivered TV with a deal that could bring advanced TV controls into the homes of cable subscribers in the USA. ¶ Cable company Comcast has agreed to adopt Microsoft TV Foundation Edition 1.7 software for rollout to as many as 5m of its subscribers, with an option to raise that number at a later date. ¶ Foundation Edition 1.7 lets cable companies and some other TV providers offer an interactive programming guide, navigation tools and advanced features for capturing programs on DVRs (digital video recorders). [snip] [PC Advisor]

Evolving the Links Presentations

The keynote address at the "Evolving the Links" meeting 9/24-26/2003 of Clifford Lynch, Director, Coalition for Networked Information, and other keynotes from Lawrence K. Grossman, co-chairman, Digital Promise, Wayne Hodgins, Director of Worldwide Learning Strategies, Autodesk, and Douglas Van Houweling, President & CEO, Internet2 are available at the Evolving the Links web site. --Dennis

Digital Rights Management

File this one away under DRM. Karen Coyle has written a report for the Library of Congress called Rights Expression Languages (pdf). RELs "are emerging in the information community that support different aspects of the digital access environment -- licensing, payments, web material, use control, access, etc." --Dennis

DBS, Cable and Interactive TV

Can Cable Bring DBS Back Down to Earth? If you think that DirecTV's low churn figure was scary, well, don't look now, 'cause Rupert's comin'... [snip] ¶ News Corp.'s Sky satellite companies reap hundreds of millions annually from interactive applications, but it's unclear whether the same business models will be successful in the United States. VOD and other interactive applications, once expected to be big revenue generators, are now being used more as value-added services to retain customers. [CableFAX's CableWORLD]

N.B.A.'s New Universe Rotates Around Cable

N.B.A.'s New Universe Rotates Around Cable. The next time ABC Sports broadcasts an N.B.A. game, it will be Game 1 of the finals, on June 6. Though hardly winded, ABC will rest during the conference finals (it did two games last year), as it will for the next four years during what is probably the best part of the playoffs. ESPN and TNT have taken over. ¶ ABC hardly makes the ripple that NBC Sports did for a dozen years through the 2002 finals. ¶ At no time in recent N.B.A. television history has a broadcast network — which reaches more people than cable and, thus, more casual viewers who might tune in as series heat up — been so minor a player. ¶ But this was ordained by N.B.A. Commissioner David Stern when he made his six-year, $2.4 billion deal with ESPN and ABC, and renewed his long-term deal with TNT, for $2.2 billion. And ever since, Stern has been saying that the allure of NBC's doubleheader/tripleheader approach had faded, along with the appeal of 5:30 and 8 p.m. prime-time games in Eastern time. ESPN's young viewers, he said, are my young viewers. Come hoop with me. ¶ So this is the new N.B.A. paradigm: Go where you think your fans are and where the money is — cable. Expose your league to ESPN, the Walt Disney Company's real Magic Kingdom, through its networks, its Web site, radio network, Spanish-language TV network, its magazine, wireless, video-game and high-definition TV businesses. [snip] [New York Times]

Classical Finally Cracks the Internet

Classical Finally Cracks the Internet. On a sunny afternoon last month, a group of cellists from the New World Symphony, a training orchestra for young professionals based here, opted for the relative dimness of the Lincoln Theater in South Beach. They were taking a master class on Beethoven's Fifth Symphony with two notable teachers: Carter Brey, of the New York Philharmonic, and Stephen Geber, formerly of the Cleveland Orchestra and still of the Cleveland Institute of Music. ¶ But Mr. Brey and Mr. Geber were not there — not, at least, in the flesh. Instead, they were projected onto a wall of the lovingly restored Art Deco movie house, listening, commenting and demonstrating fingerings, all in real time. ¶ It was, in short, a musical video conference, held over the Internet. Not just your regular home Internet but Internet2, the next generation, with enough broadband capacity to transmit huge quantities of data, including CD-quality sound and DVD-quality images, at as much as 250 megabytes per second (more than 4,000 times the rate of a standard dial-up modem; more than 800 times that of a cable modem). Like the Internet at its inception, it is the province of universities and technology centers. All you need to join the system is academic accreditation and nearly $12,000 a year to pay for an affilate membership. [snip] [New York Times]

History Channel enlists vid game technology

History Channel enlists vid game technology. In the spirit of the proverb "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em," the History Channel is tapping the video game industry to lure younger audiences. So epic re-creations in "Decisive Battles," ..., use technology that U.K.-based Creative Assembly used in producing its PC game "Rome: Total War." It's not the first time the game engine has been used for a TV show. For last year's "Time Commanders," the BBC also looked to "Rome: Total War." And the company is in negotiations with other TV production companies, Creative Assembly development director Mike Simpson said. "Rome: Total War" is an incredibly detailed strategy game that allows players to experience the brutality of warfare via advanced artificial intelligence and breathtaking 3-D graphics. The game puts players in control of more than 20 historical warring factions and more than 100 different types of soldiers, with each player commanding an army of thousands. [snip] [HollywoodReporter.com]

New TV Network To Take On TiVo and Other DVRs

New TV Network To Take On TiVo and Other DVRs. Millions of Americans now have digital video recorders (otherwise known as DVRs or PVRs) thanks to TiVo, ReplayTV and cable and satellite providers who offer PRVs in their satellite receiver boxes. Users who have PVRs are now calling the physical act of recording shows with their hard drive recorder “TiVo-ing” even if the service and hardware unit they are using is not actually a TiVo. [snip] ¶ Ripe Entertainment is introducing a free “on-demand” cable network, called RipeTV, which will have advertising embedded into its shows. It has seven different types of advertising that will not be able to be fast-forwarded through when recorded on a PVR. RipeTV’s CEO, Ryan Magnussen, calls it “TiVo-proof.” [AudioRevolution.com]

DVD rentals blast off as old and new forms of delivery unite

DVD rentals blast off as old and new forms of delivery unite. DVD rentals are booming, boosted by the growing popularity of new Internet-based subscription services that bring the video shop into the home. ¶ The newest online way to pick films, however, still relies on the oldest form of delivery -- the good old mail service. ¶ This combination of the Internet, low-cost monthly subscriptions and mail order allowing people to keep DVDs as long as they want, is a winning formula across the United States, Europe and Australia. [Yahoo! News]

Network Reruns Going the Way of Rabbit Ears

Network Reruns Going the Way of Rabbit Ears" href="http://ktla.trb.com/news/la-et-reruns20may20,0,6311857.story?coll=ktla-news-1">Network Reruns Going the Way of Rabbit Ears. Broadcasters act to stem loss of young viewers, who tune out stale fare for cable and the Web. ¶ It's taken more than 50 years of TV evolution, but the prime-time rerun is rapidly becoming an endangered species. ¶ With the six broadcast networks unveiling their 2004-05 schedules to advertisers this week, it's become clearer than ever that TV bosses are taking sledgehammers to the templates that have ruled nightly household viewing since the waning years of the Truman administration. ¶ As they try to stave off fierce cable competition and chase the young adults prized by advertisers, networks are loading up on high-concept reality shows and rejiggering lineups at the last minute. As a result, they're using reruns more sparingly than ever or, in many cases, banishing them entirely. [LA Times via KTLA]