Posts Tagged ‘Home Network’

Streaming to Tablets–Part Deux

In: Technology

By: Steve Stanfill on Aug 12, 2011 at 9:27 am

Several weeks ago I wrote a piece on the dispute between Time Warner and Viacom. (See that article here.)  At the center of the “TV Everywhere” paradigm is the legal question whether consumers should have access to content on any device that they’ve paid for as part of their cable subscription without additional fees being levied on the cable provider and consumer.  Most cable companies, as you would expect, feel that a cable subscription to a channel should extend to every viewable device within the home at no extra charge to the distributor or consumer.  Content providers see additional screens as an opportunity for more revenue.

In an announcement made this afternoon, CableVision (another large cable player who had introduced a “TV Everywhere” service) and Viacom announced that they had settled this dispute to their mutual satisfaction.  In a joint statement, the companies said: “Viacom and Cablevision have agreed to resolve their pending litigation, and the Viacom programming will continue to appear on Cablevision’s Optimum Apps for iPad and other IP devices. In reaching the settlement agreement, Cablevision and Viacom were able to resolve the iPad matter and an unrelated business matter to their mutual satisfaction. Neither side is conceding its original legal position or will have further comment.”

Hmmm….wonder what that means.  At least one on line source opined that Viacom had indeed bowed to the legal opinion of Cablevision, but I’ve been unable to find any other corroboration of that possibility.

As I indicated in a previous post, the cat is out of the proverbial (technical) bag IMHO.  I do not believe that the content providers’ desire for more revenue based on screen size or portability is a sustainable model.

Case in point:

Several weeks ago I replaced one of my televisions with a Samsung 7000 series LED HDTV. Samsung calls it a “Smart TV”, and indeed, carries with it a full series of apps as well as a QWERTY remote and the ability to surf the net via its built in wifi.  Guess what else is part of the technology?  Yup…streaming all channels from the TV set to a second screen, the Samsung Galaxy tablet!  Now at present, there are some limitations on this paradigm if you are not using the built in digital QAM or ATSC tuners, but I suspect that it is only a matter of time before enterprising manufacturers increase the functionality of the app and extend the option to iOS devices as well as other screens using the Android OS.

The point is that this idea has consumer inertia that will push continued development of multiple screen access to content.  Try as they might, content providers have historically had little control over the consumer electronics industry generally, and I don’t believe that they will bear sway here either.

These developments in the industry should help the content providers realize that forcing distributors of content to pay additional freight for implementing elegant solutions to “TV Everywhere” makes little sense, and is not a sustainable business model.

Until next time…

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Digital Rights Management (DRM) and the iPad

In: Technology

By: Steve Stanfill on Apr 18, 2011 at 2:28 pm

On Monday mornings, I typically scan the trades for news from the “outside world” that affects our business.  There’s lots of news these days; long overdue telephone intercarrier compensation reform with the FCC , universal service reform for both telephone and data, internet network neutrality, etc.  And all of these things are important, complex, and weighty issues.  But one item caught my eye this morning that might actually be of interest to the readership of our technical blog, though, strictly speaking, is not a technical issue.

It appears that one of our competitors, Time Warner Cable has gotten into some hot water by offering an iPad app to customers for viewing content they pay for in their homes. Apparently, Viacom, Discovery, and Fox sent cease and desist letters to TWC, demanding that their content be pulled from the iPad application they began offering last month.  Time Warner countered with legal maneuvers of its own, filing a request for summary judgement in a U.S. District Court in southern New York.

In a statement, Time Warner Cable’s executive VP and General Counsel said, “We have steadfastly maintained that we have the rights to allow our customers to view this programming in their homes, over our cable systems, without artificial limits on the screens they can use to do so, and we are asking the court to confirm our view.”  Further, TWC launched the very next day an additional 17 channels from content providers who apparently had no problem with the iPad app Time Warner released.

It appears to me that technology should trump the “old school” thinking on this issue.  If the assumed goal of a content provider is to have as many eyes as possible viewing content it produces, why would it want to limit any screen that a paying customer owns from viewing content ?  Go figure.

Regardless of your point of view on this issue, it promises to be hotly debated for the next several weeks.  This issue is also emblematic of many other issues where technology that is widely embraced by the public ends up trumping industry policy.

When the VCR was first introduced many years ago, the video content creation industry reacted by petitioning the US Congress to ban the devices outright.  When that failed, they tried to push through a “tax” on blank video tapes that would discourage their use.  Virtually the same playbook was read in the audio content industry when digital audio recorders (DAT) were introduced in the early ’90’s.  Complex legal maneuvers, copy protection schemes, petitions to government authority, and ultimately the technologies themselves came and went.  None of the histrionics of a slightly paranoid industry made it off the block.

Here’s the thing.  Most people understand that the creation of quality content costs money, and are willing to pay for quality entertainment, whether music or video production. Those very very few that are bent on bootlegging or infringing copyrights will likely find a way to do so, in spite of DRM protections.

Until next time….

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Maintenance, Did you know….?

In: Customer Experience & Support

By: Bill Wright on Oct 13, 2010 at 4:15 pm

The majority of scheduled maintenance work is performed between 1am and 5am local time. This timeframe is used because it impacts the least amount of customers that have WOW! service. Preventive maintenanace work is also performed at night Monday through Thursday. This time is used due to the low usage of Internet and Voice. Video has low usage during these hours but our VideoOnDemand product tends to have a higher usage. Because of this, we schedule maintenance for VideoOnDemand at 5am local time. Whenever maintenance is performed that will affect a large group of customers or a community for more the 15 minutes, we will deliver bulletins to the affected WOW! customers  via computers within 48 hours of the scheduled work. We will also post this information on the Network Status page of the Customer Portal.

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Video Servers–DLNA

In: Technology

By: Steve Stanfill on Jun 23, 2010 at 8:00 am

Over the past couple of weeks, we have discussed a couple of basic approaches to home networking for video–the basic DVR and AppleTV.  Both of these approaches work well, but both have different focus and cater to different needs.  They are also proprietary, and as such are very simple to configure and operate within the designs of the device, but are single vendor solutions for sure.

Some years ago, a number of manufacturers and industry players determined to define an ad hoc set of standards to allow devices to share digital media.  After several iterations, this standard has evolved into what is known as the Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA), which defines a standard for moving movies, photos, music and other digital media from device to device within the home.  DLNA servers store media in one location, and can stream the media to DLNA compliant clients, such as the Xbox, PlayStation 2, and even network-enabled HDTV sets. The idea (if not necessarily the reality) behind DLNA is to simplify video server/client configuration, and create a standards based protocol to move media between devices from different manufacturers.

The cool thing about DLNA is that software, as well as hardware, can function very well within the standard.  So garden variety PC’s can act as both servers and clients with the addition of inexpensive software/freeware.  Virtually all operating systems are supported to one extent or another.

That said, using PC’s as servers is not the best way to do this in my opinion.  It’s expensive to tie up a computer system to function solely as a media server.  the best approach is to use either:

1)  a Network Attached Storage device (NAS)–This is typically a ethernet accessible hard disk that is assigned an IP address on the network, and is therefore accessible to all clients on the network as well.  Since it’s a server topology, all computers on the network can access it to save and retrieve media, and DLNA capable players and TV’s can access the media from the NAS as well. Sometimes the NAS will have a built in router which will allow internet access at one central point through your internet provider. NAS devices are more expensive than comparably sized external hard drives, but have the distinct advantage of being able to be left on 24/7 and not tying up expensive processing resources.

2)  a wireless DLNA enabled router with attachable hard drive.  Netgear, Cisco, and others build wireless routers that are DLNA savvy, allowing the user to attach one or more external hard disks for storage of media.  Essentially, they act very similarly to the NAS, but have the advantage of wireless access and the ability to upgrade or add to hard disk storage as the user’s media libraries increase.  Some of these devices (as well as the NAS) are well executed, some are less so.  Do make sure you have return privileges for any hardware you purchase.

A couple of NAS/routers to consider:

Netgear’s ReadyNAS for Home

Netgear’s DLNA Savvy Wireless Router

On these pages, we’ll keep you informed as to developments in the DLNA space.  There is momentum building for this standard, and my expectation is that these devices will take hold in multi-computer/video hungry households.

Happy Networking!

Next time–TIVO as a video server/client.

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Keeping your service running

In: Customer Experience & Support

By: Bill Wright on Apr 22, 2010 at 10:40 am

The majority of scheduled maintenance (routinely scheduled maintenance that ensures the service is working correctly on a regular basis) work is performed between 1am and 5am local time. This timeframe is used because it impacts the least amount of customers that have WOW! service. Preventive maintenanace (routine repair and replacement of parts) work is also performed at night Monday through Thursday. This time is used due to the low usage of Internet and Voice. Video has low usage during these hours but our VideoOnDemand product tends to have a higher usage. Because of this, we schedule maintenance for VideoOnDemand at 5am local time. Whenever maintenance is performed that will affect a large group of customers or a community for more the 15 minutes, we will deliver bulletins to the affected WOW! customers  via computers within 48 hours of the scheduled work. We will also post this information on the Network Status page of the WOW! Customer Home Page.  Just log in at:  http://portal.wowway.net/

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