Move Networks, a company that once was called one of telecom’s rising stars in these virtual pages but has since fallen on hard times, has been acquired by wholesale video platform company EchoStar. At EchoStar, Move’s media technology assets and expertise in over-top-video streaming could be integrated with the SlingBox in some way (EchoStar acquired Sling Media back in 2007). (more…)
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Is Netflix a video cord-cutter gateway?
J.P. Morgan is the latest to weigh in on the video cord-cutting trend (not old John Pierpoint himself, of course, but the finance giant that bears his name). A new J.P. Morgan consumer survey appears to lend weight to the observation the membership in Netflix’s online video streaming service can be a gateway to cord-cutting. The survey, according to NewTeeVee, says that 47% of subscribers who use Netflix streaming at least once or twice a month would consider cutting the pay TV cord. (more…)
Will TV sector confusion be a CES downer?
What the consumer electronics, TV and telecom industries least want to see during the week of the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is a reminder of how confusing the current TV products market is, but that is just what they are getting from Fortune magazine. Fortune reports this week on how most recent TV service, software and device innovations intended to promise greater choice and capabilities for consumers are, at least for now, wanting.
Fortune has more:
“But for the moment, all that promise translates into a proliferation of new boxes and services that are impossible to compare. Do I want an Internet-connected TV from Samsung or Sony, or should I just buy a separate box that hooks up to the Net, like that brick-size Logitech gadget that enables Google TV? What about the supercheap Roku box? Should I bother paying for Hulu’s new premium service or just get a Netflix subscription?”
The Fortune story actually is a fairly epic look at everything that’s been going on in the TV sector lately, and how much the market is changing. We highly recommend it. However, it’s also important to remember how early it is in the evolution of the sector. It may be true that the first version of Google TV isn’t terribly impressive or that Hulu’s business model remains questionable or that Apple and Roku boxes could be better, but similar things have been said about every new evolution in consumer products (think about the shortcomings of the first mobile phones and personal computers in the 1980s).
The good thing about many current TV products is that they can be easily and frequently improved via software updates, so they will only get better. As for the confusion caused by having too many choices, it may be a curse for now, but when you compare it to being forced to accept whatever set-top box cable TV company wants you to have, isn’t it also a blessing?
AT&T catches cable TV price hike fever
Despite facing mounting competition from telcos, some cable TV companies have insisted on continuing to raise prices. But, competitor AT&T is making it easy for them to do so by following suit with its own price increases for the second year in a row. The company is set to raise U-verse TV and broadband rates by as much as 9.3 percent starting in February. (more…)
Old-school retailer Sears discovers over-the-top video
Sears, the long-struggling retailer that also own K-Mart, has delivered the biggest surprise of the year in the over-the-top video sector, waiting until the last few days of 2010 to announce plans for an online video streaming service called Alphaline Entertainment. The effort follows in the footsteps of somewhat similar but much earlier moves by Best Buy and Wal-Mart, and will be based on the RoxioNow service from Sonic Solutions, a company just acquired by Rovi Corp. (more…)
EarthLink continues to morph into business telco
EarthLink last week moved to acquire business-focused CLEC One Communications in a cash-and-debt deal worth about $370 million. The acquisition will give EarthLink more than 100,000 new small and medium-sized business customers up and down the East Coast. (more…)
Google, Logitech refute ‘puzzling’ reports of Google TV suspension
Google and Google TV partner Logitech are discrediting a bevy of recent reports that suggested Google has asked Logitech to suspend shipments of its Revue Google TV product. Engadget quotes Google as saying it has not asked for a suspension, and Logitech on its own blog calls the reports “puzzling,” because the Revue could receive later Google TV upgrades via software download.
Google has remained mostly quiet throughout weeks of criticism of Google TV and ongoing rumors that the Internet giant was trying to rein in new product launches while it focused on upgrading the platform.
Holding pattern: Logitech reportedly freezes Google TV shipments
Consumer electronics company Logitech, one of Google’s earliest and most prominent partners on Google TV, and the first company to launch new hardware in support of the Internet giant’s TV software, reportedly has told it own product partner, Gigabyte Technology, to temporarily suspend shipments of its Logitech Revue Google TV set-top box. A report at DigiTimes suggests this will allow Google further time to upgrade its software (more…)
Twentysomething households confirm landline’s inexorable decline
Time Magazine this morning asked a question that will sound to telecom industry types like a leftover from 2007: “Have Cell Phones Killed the Landline Telephone?” What sparked the report were fresh numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that 51 percent of households belonging to 25-29-year-olds are now cell phone-only dwellings, marking the first time any age group has surpassed 50 percent. The CDC also said about 27 percent of households in the U.S. depend solely on cell phones. (more…)
With reported pull-back, Google TV goes from potential CES hero to almost zero
Next month’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas could have been a major coming-out party for Google TV, and a big step forward in the hybrid TV movement. With early device partners Sony and Logitech having rolled out the first two Google TV products, CES appeared to be the perfect time and place for a multitude of other CE companies to come on board. However, it is starting to appear that won’t be the case, and The New York Times reports that Google is the one leading the pull-back by asking new device partners to delay launches until it can improve its much-criticized software platform. (more…)