 espaethDigital PlumberPremium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN
kudos:2 | Who wastes $22 million on this stuff? Seriously, anyone who believes you can replace existing TV distribution for the masses with unicast flows needs a refresher course in both current available networking technology and basic math. |
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| Or the system is non-linear and can take days to transmit an hour of programming. Or weeks. I don't see real-time TV over the internet as ever being viable because of the constraints of which you're thinking. However, stretch out the time for delivery and there's more possibilities.
I wouldn't mind having a Tivo-like box that catches my selected programs off the internet. It's more efficient to broadcast to me what I want as opposed to broadcasting what I want and what I'll never watch.
As Mr. TK has said, there's still the issue of broadband ISPs needing to add significant capacity to support everyone using even a non-linear system. But as someone who is tired of supporting cable channels that I'll never watch, this sounds like it might be a compromise method of finally getting ala-carte programming. |
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EPS
join:2008-02-13
Hingham, MA | The problem with a non-linear system like that you describe is time-sensitive programming, like news and sports games. |
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 RARPSL
join:1999-12-08
Suffern, NY | reply to espaeth
said by espaeth:Seriously, anyone who believes you can replace existing TV distribution for the masses with unicast flows needs a refresher course in both current available networking technology and basic math. What is needed is to replace the current one show per channel (and even channel sharing SDV) with IPv6 MultiCasting using the same channel slots. Sending the shows via IPv6 to the set top boxes makes much better use of the channel slots than the current broadcast method. |
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 funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | reply to espaeth
said by espaeth:Seriously, anyone who believes you can replace existing TV distribution for the masses with unicast flows needs a refresher course in both current available networking technology and basic math. While not unicast exactly, Cable companies are moving to switched video.
This whole article proves to me that the day of Cable's reckoning is coming -- they can either embrace it or resist it, but one of those choices is futile.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
Comcast: We never did anything wrong, and we'll never do it again...
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espaethDigital PlumberPremium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN
kudos:2 Reviews:
 ·Clear Wireless
| said by funchords:While not unicast exactly, Cable companies are moving to switched video. SDV is analogous to multicast streams. The current VoD system *IS* unicast streams, but the engineering of the distribution system provides many times more bandwidth to that front than to HSI.
said by funchords:This whole article proves to me that the day of Cable's reckoning is coming -- they can either embrace it or resist it, but one of those choices is futile. If the day of reckoning is coming, it's not from the technology discussed in this article. Nor will it come from Vuze, or NetFlix, or XBL, or the PS3 store, or Amazon Unbox. An extreme minority of video content is currently being delivered on-demand (maybe less than 10%), and these Internet-based unicast delivery solutions are only going to capitalize on a small percentage of that. Even if you ignore the fact that broadband doesn't have the same reach as existing video distribution options, and that the majority of people with TVs don't have computers or other intelligent video widgets hooked up to them, and that broadband networks would need to be scaled about 10,000% to support this solution, you're still left with glaring holes of logic in pricing.
Are you seriously suggesting that an external company will be able to pay the various media companies for content, pay for servers, pay for Internet bandwidth, to be distributed to ISPs who also pay for head-end Internet bandwidth as well as their own local network infrastructure, and that solution will be cheaper than the cable companies buying from the media companies directly and distributing over their networks?
I don't know whether to laugh or cry that people can't see the blatantly obvious flaws in these "Internet video will take over the world" proposals. |
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funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | Once upon a time, people never thought that -- in the future -- Americans would prefer to pay a company to watch TV even though it was free over the rabbit ears. |
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espaethDigital PlumberPremium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
Minneapolis, MN
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Clear Wireless
1 edit | said by funchords:Once upon a time, people never thought that -- in the future -- Americans would prefer to pay a company to watch TV even though it was free over the rabbit ears. .. and even after that service was introduced, people continued to watch TV for free over rabbit ears. The advent of cable and satellite TV didn't make local broadcast TV irrelevant; in fact, they need to incorporate local broadcast TV into their service so people will even buy it. Moreover, there are still a lot of people to this day that only get their TV content over rabbit ears, which is why the DTV transition and the coupons are a big deal.
At least with cable and satellite TV people got extra channels for their money. What these researchers are talking about is using a more expensive solution to deliver people the same content they are getting today. The proposal is so ridiculously stupid that I'm amazed it got funding in the first place. |
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funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | $22 million in R&D is huge, I've gotta agree there. |
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