Zatz Not Funny!

No More Free Ride with Comcast Video on Demand

Free VOD is where it’s at. According to Comcast, 70% of the nearly half a billion video streams that subscribers watch on demand comes from the free section of its VOD library. And, leaving subscription fees aside, Comcast thinks that content should be bringing in cash. So get ready for more ads with Comcast VOD, and, quite likely, with every other cable operator.

At a Broadcasting & Cable and Multichannel News event yesterday, several cable and programmer folks got together to talk about “advanced” advertising. The term covers everything from interactive ads, to dynamic ad insertion, to cross-platform campaigns, but there was significant focus yesterday on VOD commercials. That’s because a cableco consortium known as Canoe recently ditched efforts to create a national platform for selling interactive ads, and instead decided to spend all of its resources on video on demand. (Canoe laid off 80% of its staff in the process too. Ouch.) With all of the flexibility on the web, the cable industry has been fighting to catch up in the advertising revenue game. Operators have all this premium, time-shiftable content, and yet with little ability rotate new ads in an out of on-demand programming, they’ve felt hamstrung. In 2012, they’re finally ready to do whatever it takes to change that.

Samsung Galaxy Beam, A Phone Without A Market

The Samsung Galaxy Beam is one of the more interesting looking smartphones announced at Mobile World Congress this week. As opposed to being just another Android handset, this Galaxy variant features a pico projector. And, as demonstrated above by PocketLint, the Beam… beams presumably anything displayed on the phone onto a wall, table, ceiling, or … Read more

What Will The Apple TV 3 Bring?

We’re generally not ones to speculate, yet given weeks without inventory it seems highly likely a new Apple TV is nearly upon us. Perhaps as soon as the March 7th iPad event. And adding fuel to the fire is a recent report that includes a new hardware model number. While we may end up with a slightly beefier Apple TV 2S or perhaps a dramatically enhanced Apple TV 3, and even if Steve Jobs did crack the code, I don’t think we’re quite ready for a full-on Apple HDTV. So place your wagers below – what sorts of goodies will the new Apple TV include?

Xbox 360 Receiving HBO GO April 1. Or Sooner.

Announced last fall, HBO GO is just about ready for its Xbox 360 closeup. I still find HBO GO to be one of the most compelling online streaming services, yet cord cutters will remain disappointed as access requires an old school HBO subscription via one’s satellite or cable provider. Further, Comcast and DirecTV customers may continue … Read more

TiVo Whole Home DVR Extenders Headed To Retail

Another compelling nugget of intel out of TiVo’s quarterly call is the upcoming release of an “IP-STB” for both their cable partners and retail customers. The device will act as an extender for a TiVo DVR hub, such as the Premiere Elite, to stream both live and recorded programming in addition to providing access to Internet … Read more

Microsoft Ultrabooks Inspired By Intel… Or Apple?

Last night, while watching live TV (*gasp*), I inadvertently caught the commercial above. And what was I thinking? As “the new Ultrabook [was] inspired by Intel”… not Apple’s Macbook Air. It’s a cute ad and Windows users also deserve both better style and substance in their computing hardware. Further, Microsoft’s hardware partners would prefer higher … Read more

TiVo To Go 2.0 Slated For Summer Release

tivo-transcoder

First previewed at CES, TiVo’s dedicated “transcoder” hardware is slated for a summer release according to remarks made during the company’s quarterly call. The small box above is designed to relay both live and recorded television from a TiVo Premiere DVR to so called “second screen” devices such as a smartphone or tablet. For example, back in January, Tech of the Hub took a look at the prototype streaming video from a TiVo to an iPad.

TiVo currently describes this upcoming product using technical terms (transcode, sideload), so I’ve taken it upon myself to label the new initiative a more consumer-friendly “TiVo To Go 2.0”. Whereas the original TiVo To Go feature, first available in 2005, copies recorded programming from a TiVo to a computer for viewing or processing and later transfer to a mobile device, TTG 2.0 transcoding duties have been offloaded to the box above. Real-time TiVo-to-portable streaming will be limited to in-home usage… meaning, this won’t replace a Slingbox. However, any TiVo video recordings that aren’t locked down (via the Copy Once CCI Byte flag) can be quickly transferred via a “high speed side load capability” to take those shows with you on the road.

Comcast On Demand TiVo Integration Weeks Away

Comcast-TiVo

Comcast’s long standing relationship with TiVo is nearly ready to bear fruit in the form of On Demand integration. Joint customers of the companies will receive Xfinity On Demand access via retail TiVo Premiere DVR hardware. During TiVo’s quarterly call, CEO Tom Rogers indicated field trials are underway and that public deployment to the San Francisco Bay Area “is weeks not months away.”

This collaboration looks quite different than their initial partnership, which resulted in TiVo software running on Motorola hardware to be marketed and deployed by Comcast. Unfortunately, the product wasn’t well received and was never deployed further than New England. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again? Rogers:

We started down one path and from a technical point of view completed it successfully, and they had difficulty rolling it out from an operational point of view. But we got back together and said, what would be a way that gets a product out that does not have those kind of operational difficulties

Indeed, the new solution is operationally distinct and something Rogers characterizes as a “hybrid” approach…