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From KillerApp.Com News
Consumer electronics and high-speed networks have become inextricably linked. Soon, all of our gadgets will be talking to each other over the home network and talking to other people’s gadgets over the Internet. Content providers are adopting the “three-screen strategy” and delivering content to the television, computer and mobile devices. But the devil, as they say, is in the details, so we went to last week’s press preview of the Consumer Electronics Show to learn the details of what the gadget manufacturers are thinking. The show itself, which will take place in January, is expected to tie up much of Las Vegas for the better part of a week. Last year, some 2,700 vendors displayed their wares to 140,000 attendees from 130 countries. So even last week’s limited “sneak peek” was large-scale enough to be illuminating.The Consumer Electronics Association has been surveying American consumers to find out what they're planning to buy during the 2006 holiday season, and the survey indicates that the season will be a whopper. Prices for individual items may be falling, but consumers plan to make up for that by “buying up” – shopping for top-of-the-line models instead of for the basics. Two findings of special interest to Killer App: First, the
most popular holiday gift item is slated to be the digital camera. You might think
that everyone who wanted a digital camera already had one, and you might be
right. But many of those camera owners have first-generation digital cameras that
they are eager to exchange for newer models. Since the newer models create much
higher-resolution pictures than the old ones, we can expect these consumers to
use even more bandwidth when they share their photos and videos with friends,
family and YouTube. Second, sales of TV sets are expected to exceed sales of PCs and mobile phones this season, and the key driver for television sales is HDTV. Even with new compression technology, HDTV gobbles up huge amounts of bandwidth. This year, cable companies and telcos will find out whether their bandwidth projections for TV transmission are on target – and how soon they’ll need to upgrade their networks. (And don’t forget that many of those HDTV owners will want to download high-definition movies and TV shows from the Internet, too.) So what are the manufacturers bringing out for the holiday
season and the CES show? Here's a sampling of items that we think will be of
interest to broadband users: Music The Internet’s musical offerings are far more varied than what
you can find on your radio dial – or in your personal music collection. All you
need is a good Internet-capable radio, and manufacturers are rising
to the occasion.
Com One
is introducing the Phoenix IP Radio, which also connects to the Internet via
broadband modem (wireless link only) and streams Internet radio or podcasts. The
Phoenix is
small and weighs only about a pound, so you can carry it with you and use it in
wireless hot spots. Its clock and alarm features make it suitable for a bedside
radio. Video
Sling Media, the maker of the Slingbox TV place-shifting device that lets you control and watch your home television from a PC, was showing the beta version of its SlingPlayer for Mac OS X. This is a software download for Slingbox customers who want to watch their televisions from an Apple computer. MediaFLO USA, a subsidiary of Qualcomm, is selling a service that distributes TV-quality video, audio, and data to the cell phone. Content can be combined with interactive services such as voting, ordering products, or linking to Web sites. Although the service is marketed through cellular providers (Verizon Wireless is the first distributor), it is actually carried over MediaFLO’s private network. Verisign is marketing a peer-to-peer content distribution system based on a platform
developed by Kontiki, a company it recently acquired. The software lets content
owners distribute video securely over the Internet, and monetize it through
advertising or pay-per-view, at much lower cost than traditional content
delivery networks. Though consumers have embraced peer-to-peer technology for
free content, it’s an open question how many people will pay for content when
a service is using their computing resources and bandwidth. But Verisign says
its software also has a role to play within the enterprise, offering a low-cost
method to distribute corporate training, messages from executives, and similar video
content to employee desktops. Finally, we had a chance to try out WorldGate's Ojo personal videophones, which we've written about before. Even in a crowded and noisy environment, the videophone experience really is more like a face-to-face conversation than a phone call. WorldGate recently introduced a new lower-cost “Shadow” model, similar to its full-featured phone but without a cordless handset. Ojo phones are being resold by broadband providers in New Zealand and elsewhere. © Copyright Killer App Ventures |
