more on worth reading more on : Telco's Arrogant Stand on Content

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Bob Frankston <Bob2-19-0501 () bobf frankston com>
Date: January 7, 2006 11:58:56 PM EST
To: dave () farber net, ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: RE: [IP] worth reading more on : Telco's Arrogant Stand on  
Content

Two quick follow up notes.

One -- why is to hard to get the information about how these services  
actually work? How are public policy decisions being made in the  
absence of such information?

Two -- Vongo. I finally get it working by just deleting the DRM  
directory and let it pick up the pieces. There are some bugs such  
full screen viewing not working on secondary screen but it does work  
much more smoothly than Real version.

When I ask for ITV with buffering I’m told that it won’t work well  
because people expect to be able to quickly change channels. I simply  
ask, “what is a channel”. But I now have a much better answer – I was  
watching the live feed while previewing another movie for downloading  
at the same time. I was even able to enable both audio tracks. This  
may be a bug not a feature but is another reminder of how easy it is  
to slip into “television” thinking when there is a better solution. A  
TV is over-defined. Why not allow viewing of other content at the  
same time or seeing thumbnails or whatever.

Vongo is still closer to being TV which is why I think the ability to  
view the two streams may be a bug not a feature but it provides a  
strong response to the “channel surfing” complaint – we can do far  
far better when we can develop our own applications at the edge and  
experiment.

How did we ever tolerate television as we knew it? It’s really  
pathetic once you start thinking about the possibilities. The problem  
is not simply that the carriers are trying to prevent competition –  
they are dead hand of the past trying to prevent the real competition  
– ideas that are far better than they are.

It’s another reminder that they price we pay for the corporate  
welfare system that the FCC is chartered to implement and enforce.





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