By Yankee Group Friday, May 21, 2010

One of the big interrogations I have about Google’s FTTH experimentation is whether someone (not necessarily Google) would be able to deliver live TV over IP to their potential customers. The issue is not so much technical (with 1Gb/s there shouldn’t be any QoS issues, even if I doubt Google’s capacity to actually deliver a consistent Gb/s) as it is regulatory. Content distribution rights in the US are constrained fifteen different ways and delivering TV the “traditional” way for a project on that scale is probably not economically viable. Even Hulu is not an option because they are barred from delivering content to the TV.

So a couple of questions have been on my mind for some weeks now:

Would a significant proportion of customers accept alternative TV (VoD, net streamed content, etc.) as a substitute to live TV ?

Could Google reach a workable penetration rate delivering only internet access ?
Google’s announcement yesterday about their Google TV product (which, it seems is going to be nothing like this gem) may prove to be a sign that they rely on the first option.

Spotted here