HBO Go Now on Nearly Every Android OS

HBO may be making it harder to transfer shows from TiVo hardware, but it’s expanding users’ other mobile options with the HBO GO app. Time Warner Cable let the cat out of the bag in a blog post stating that HBO GO would be available starting today on nearly every Android device, and the updated … Read more

Belkin Launching @TV Placeshifter Next Month

belkin-placeshifter

Looking for a Slingbox alternative? Belkin could have you covered when they launch @TV next month. Like Slingbox, Belkin’s upcoming $150 hardware relays audio and video from your DVR or other set-top to computer or mobile around the house or anywhere the world. Computer and iPad or Android tablet viewing software will be free, but the smartphone client will run you $13.

While it’s not clear if this hardware actually streams in HD, it’s entirely apparent who’s producing the box for Belkin… as I turned up this very same Vulkano product via FCC filings last fall. Further, a quick Google search of “Belkin” and “Vulkano” points us to Android Marketplace and iTunes App Store clients (that have been active for months). Monsoon, the maker of Hava and Vulkano, has been down this OEM path before with Pinnacle and Linksys — and here’s to hoping they have better luck with Belkin’s brand awareness and retail shelf space. Assuming consumers are still interested in roll-your-own placeshifting given all the mobile media alternatives.

Read more

TiVo Stream & IP STB Set For Fall Launch

tivo-ipstb

As The Cable Show kicks off today, TiVo is out with a few whole home-esque product updates.

First, the upcoming transcoding box and functionality that I had christened TiVoToGo 2.0, has received a possibly less compelling name in the “Stream.” This small square device (shown below) sits on one’s home network to access both live and recorded content via TiVo Premiere DVR hardware and beams it around the home to “second screen” devices such as the iPhone and iPad. Both streaming, for in-home viewing, and file downloads, for on-the-go access, are provided. Although, it’s probably safe to assume not all content will be cleared for offloading.

Next up, the TiVo IP set-top box, first announced in February, remains unnamed as their ungainly “IP STB.” This upcoming device, pictured above from the show floor, acts as an extender for TiVo Premiere hardware to other televisions – providing access to both live and recorded programming, in addition to web content, via the familiar TiVo interface. It’s quite similar to, and will coexist with, the TiVo Preview — but by dropping the integrated CableCARD tuner

Read more

Skitter, Aereo, and the Return of Basic Cable

Skitter and Aereo

They sound like bad comic book character names, but Skitter and Aereo are two of the latest companies to jump into the video service game. Instead of trying to offer premium content, however, the two start-ups are going old school. They’re both selling traditional broadcast content over the Internet and optionally combining it with a DVR. (Skitter’s DVR service hasn’t launched yet, but is in the works.) On the plus side, you get decent-quality transmission of the prime-time networks, access to TV across a bunch of connected devices, and all the benefits of being able to pause live television, fast forward through commercials, etc. On the minus side, you have to pay a chunk of change every month (around $12) for content that’s supposed to be free.

Whether you like the idea behind Skitter and Aereo or not, the fact that they exist (for now) is an interesting commentary on the state of television. Both companies are offering a very basic content package with a few extra goodies. It reminds of my household circa 2008 when we steadfastly held on to analog cable and combined it with a subscription-free ReplayTV DVR. Most of our TV watching was still focused on the major networks, but the ability to get ESPN and decent reception had us paying a monthly fee to Comcast. Fast forward to today and we pay a much larger monthly bill to Verizon for TV. Granted that bill includes HD channels, a FiOS DVR, VoD, and a much wider selection of linear content, but it’s still tough to stomach when the invoice clears are mailbox every four weeks.

And so Skitter and Aereo enter the scene.

Read more

Simple.TV – Television Without The Screen

Simple.TV is the retail DVR you wanted five years ago. And yet it’s still interesting enough to make my personal list of top product announcements coming out of CES 2012. Why? Because it’s a truly viable, inexpensive way to add digital video recording to your TV set-up without cable’s help. Maybe you remember the Replay … Read more

Broadcom to Put Sling on a Chip

Several pay-TV operators debuted iPad apps with streaming video in 2011, and most started offering live TV before the end of the year. Now Broadcom is hoping to take those TV Everywhere efforts a step further. This morning the chip maker announced an integration deal with EchoStar to embed Sling place-shifting tech in its dual-tuner … Read more

New Verizon App Won’t Be the Death of FiOS

Reuters dropped a veritable bombshell yesterday when it reported that Verizon has plans to launch a streaming service in 2012 to compete with Netflix. It wasn’t a bombshell because Verizon’s never talked about this before. After all, we got an inkling of the operator’s plans at CES last January. It was a bombshell because the … Read more

Time Warner Cable App Hits Android, No Live TV

Time Warner Cable was the first operator to bring live TV to the iPad earlier this year (apart from Dish with its Sling solution), and now TWC has added an Android app to its arsenal. Multichannel News reports that TWC hit the Android market yesterday with an app that enables remote DVR programming, channel tuning, and filtered program … Read more