UltraViolet’s Web channels are now live and will be going global, with launches planned in the UK for the end of December, Canada in 2012 and additional locations in 2013.
“Sony, Universal and Warner began shipping UV-enabled Blu-ray and DVD titles to U.S. shelves in October,” reports paidContent. “In the last few days, the first three online exponents — SonyPictures.com, UniversalHiDef.com and Flixster.com — went live, allowing owners of the new discs to also stream the same movie on those sites for free.”
In the UK, Tesco’s Blinkbox VOD service will launch an individual version of the same concept, but “Blinkbox will also be plugging in to UltraViolet in 2012.”
“Against a backdrop of piracy and the rise of subscription access services like Netflix and Spotify, UltraViolet is a defensive ploy to build online value around the same model entertainment has known for decades — ownership,” suggests the article.
Verizon is planning to launch a TV and movie streaming and download service by May 28th, with a beta expected as early as April. The company is rumored to have partnered with RedBox to include physical disc rentals in the service.
The service, called Project Zoetrope internally, will stream in SD or HD to a variety of platforms — iOS, Android, Xbox and others — and video storage will be enabled for mobile devices and tablets.
“RedBox is immediately recognizable and synonymous with simplicity and value,” which will help Verizon with its lack of branding in the movie/TV world, TechCrunch writes. “RedBox, however, has little in the way of TV shows, so Verizon is probably doing much of the heavy lifting on that side, and of course on the delivery infrastructure front.”
“Pricing is expected to be monthly and credit-based, e.g. $5.95 per month for 6 credits, which could be used to rent X movies or Y shows,” adds the post. “There will be several tiers and some will include physical disc rentals, and of course there will be ways to purchase more shows if necessary.”
A new material, molybdenum disulphide or molybdenite, may challenge silicon as the leading chip-making material for the “next generation of smaller, more efficient mobile devices.”
Scientists at the Laboratory of Nanoscale Electronics and Structures developed the chip prototype. “This naturally occurring material can be worked within layers only three atoms thick, meaning it may be used to make chips three times smaller than the current standard,” reports Mobiledia.
“Advances in chip technology are about more than device size, however,” the article notes. “Mobile processors are called upon to do more functions…and the chip technology that drives them must advance as well.”
In this way, molybdenite would allow for high powered processors that take up less space, which would enable mobile processors to tackle larger amounts of data.
“Molybdenite also has mechanical properties that may allow it to be made into flexible sheets of chips, which may be used in mobile devices or computers that roll up, fold or stick to the skin,” indicates the article.
At this week’s UBS Global Media and Communications Conference, Comcast executives described “their multi-billion dollar pact with Verizon inked late last week a transformative event in some ways on the scale of acquiring of NBCUniversal,” reports Variety.
“Talk about content, you got NBC. And wireless, you got this. In perpetuity,” said CFO Michael Angelakis. “This is a deal forever. We don’t have to invest in building a wireless network. We aren’t going to acquire a wireless network. It’s quite a significant transaction.”
The deal to sell wireless spectrum to Verizon will finally enable the quadruple play where customers can receive video, Internet, landline and cell phone service.
“Watching a video on your wireless devices, then resuming it in your home. Great new devices with your Comcast (subscription), great new innovations…will come out of that side of the deal,” said Comcast Cable prexy Neil Smit.
Sony announced it has updated firmware for its Bravia LCD TV sets, enabling viewers to get tweets, post on Facebook and watch hi-def videos via YouTube HD.
Bravias have also added compatibility with a version of the Remote Keyboard application, previously available only on Vaio PCs and Xperia smartphones.
“Finally, you can now get live Twitter updates along the bottom of your screen and even use a Shazam like feature called Track ID to determine the names of songs, or their artists, that are played during your shows or commercials,” reports Engadget.
The press release emphasizes keyboard compatibility: “You can already use your smartphone or Vaio keyboard to control your TV and surf the Web — and now you can use other laptops too. From typing a Web address to searching for information about the latest movies, it makes entering text on-screen even easier than using your TV remote.”
The free update is currently available for those with compatible Bravia TVs.
Google may directly challenge Skype with a new feature that enables free voice calls to the U.S. and Canada within Google+ Hangouts.
“To activate the feature, simply start a Hangout, click the Invite button at the top, select ‘Phone,’ and enter a phone number. If the recipient picks up, they’ll be instantly connected,” reports TechCrunch. “The free offer is supposed to last through 2012.”
This allows people who don’t have a Google account or even a computer to join a G+ video chat. It also enables free 1-on-1 calls, much like Skype.
The service has the potential to be used for conference calls, in making group decisions or serve as a a draw simply for casual use.
Google hopes the free calls will attract people to Hangouts, which has been “a bit sparse due to the social network’s low current user count.”
A new video metadata specification that would enable efficient interoperability of video between cameras, editing, playout and archiving may arrive as early as next year’s NAB Show, reports TVNewsCheck.
The Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA) has spent the past nine months developing AS-10, aimed at retaining and rendering readable the video metadata across devices that come from different vendors.
“Our goal is to have a single file that could move from camera to edit to playout to archive and back, really to be able to traverse the entire work flow,” says CNN’s Michael Koetter, who also serves as the AMWA director.
“I would love for CNN or CBS or whoever to be able to walk up to a [product] and see a little badge on it that says ‘AS-10 Inside’ and have some greater level of assurance than I do today,” adds Koetter.
The AS-10 effort has drawn support from CNN, NRK (the Norwegian state broadcaster), and vendors such as JVC, Sony, Harmonic, MetaGlue, MOG Solutions, Canon and Adobe.
Apple, Google, LG, Nintendo, Nokia, Samsung and Facebook are among 28 tech and media companies that are joining forces to “deliver a better Internet for our children,” reports TheNextWeb.
“The group was put together by the European Commission (EC) and the priority actions set out include making it easier to report harmful content, ensuring privacy settings are age-appropriate, and offering wider options for parental control,” according to TNW.
“This new coalition should provide both children and parents with transparent and consistent protection tools to make the most of the online world”, says Neelie Kroes, vice president of the EC. “The founding coalition members are already leaders in children’s safety online. Working together we will be setting the pace for the whole industry and have a great basis for fully empowering children online.”
The coalition has created a statement of purpose covering five key areas: create effective reporting with simple, robust tools; enable age-appropriate privacy settings; develop age-rating through widespread content classification; extend parental control; and effectively remove child abuse material through improved cooperation with law enforcement.
Netflix subscriptions could end up costing consumers $28 a month instead of $8 if cable companies decide to add charges for Web streaming.
“U.S. providers like Time Warner Cable have weighed usage-based plans for years as a way to squeeze more profit from Web access, and to counter slowing growth and rising program costs in the TV business,” reports Bloomberg. “While customer complaints hampered earlier attempts, pay TV companies are testing usage caps and price structures that point to the advent of permanent fees.”
As online video streaming increases in popularity, Web data usage soars. Some companies have penalties in place for customers that exceed their monthly gigabyte allowance, while others do not.
Adding charges will not only help cable companies’ Internet revenue, but also possibly boost pay TV service by disincentivizing online services like Netflix and Hulu.
A Netflix spokesman told Bloomberg, “[The practice] is not in the consumer’s best interest as consumers deserve unfettered access to a robust Internet at reasonable rates.”
The Connected TV Marketing Association (CTVMA) launched this week in New York, London, and Melbourne, Australia — in addition to 47 other chapters worldwide — to organize the fast-growing Connected TV industry, which is projected to account for 90 percent of the global TV market by 2014.
“I will be serving as an advisor and co-chair in North America of events and networking,” writes Natan Edelsburg of Sawhorse Media. “The implications for connected TVs with social is obvious. The more Internet enabled your TV becomes the more opportunities there will be to bridge apps and social platforms.”
Co-founder Zach Weiner told Lost Remote in an interview: “Our core reason for existence is help navigate the ways that the marketing, technology and device community can all come together to achieve potential. We hope to help educate, inform and provide oversight for the industry at large.”
“We believe that social TV is one of the core elements that truly enlivens Connected TV and makes it relevant,” adds Weiner. “Television with an endemic connection to the Internet allows for watching behaviors to be socialized in amazingly new and novel ways. New TV apps that are being created and app branding vehicles will all be highly social. EPGs and even programming itself will all have social graphs at their core.”
Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter believes Netflix cannot repair itself from the damage inflicted earlier this year after the streaming company raised prices on subscribers.
CNET reports that, “according to Pachter, by year’s end, Netflix will show a loss of 11 million ‘hybrid’ customers that previously rented DVDs and streamed video content. He said he believes that 7 million of those customers will have traded down to the streaming-only option, while another 4 million will have ‘quit the Netflix service altogether.’”
Shareholders also seem uncertain if Netflix can bounce back. “Over the past six months, the company’s stock is down 75 percent,” indicates the article.
Netflix has not given up, and believes things can be turned around. However, the company offered this honest evaluation: “If we are unable to repair the damage to our brand and reverse negative subscriber growth, our business, results of operations, including cash flows, and financial condition will continue to be adversely affected.”
In the wake of a devastating couple of months, the company is looking to rebound “brick by brick” with a strong rebranding, suggests a related Home Media Magazine article.
In addition to ongoing damage control, Netflix is working to increase its content selection, update its interface and improve user algorithms. These changes, the company hopes, will restore credibility after its recent 60 percent price increase led 800,000 people to unsubscribe.
Walt Mossberg favorably reviews Apple’s iTunes Match service. For $25/year, you can create a music locker in the Cloud that allows you to play your music collection on up to 10 devices.
In contrast to similar locker services from Google and Amazon, you do not have to upload your entire collection — iTunes Match scans your iTunes library and matches it with its 20 million song library.
The service only works for digital music currently, and not for movies, TV shows or audiobooks.
Your locker can include up to 25,000 songs. It’s worth noting that, “Match is an optional addition to an existing free service called iTunes in the Cloud, which covers only songs you bought from Apple’s iTunes store.”
“In all, I like iTunes Match, and can recommend it to digital music lovers who want all their tunes on all their devices,” writes Mossberg. “It’s another nice feature of iCloud, priced reasonably.”
Founded by a team of execs and engineers from Intel’s Wi-Fi Centrino group in 2007, Wilocity is developing next-gen 60GHz multi-gigabit wireless chipsets for mobile and peripheral markets.
According to the company’s website: “Wilocity’s Wireless PCI Express technology will enable truly multi-gigabit wireless for a wide range of applications from I/O to networking to video.”
“Wilocity, which is leading the charge for next-generation technology called 802.11ad designed to reach 7 gigabits per second over short distances, plans to show off a variety of devices using its technology at the mammoth CES trade show,” reports CNET.
“In Wilocity’s dream, the company will excite people about the possibilities of wireless networking that’s faster than what typical computers today can do with a wired connection,” explains the post. “For example, a smartphone carried into the office could connect to a keyboard, mouse, and large display. A tablet carried into the den could become a controller for a game shown on the big-screen TV.”
Cisco recently launched a wireless IPTV service with AT&T U-verse that features new wireless receivers and wireless access points (WAPs).
“Consumers can now rely on wireless technology to deliver high-quality video services throughout the home without the need for cables or wires,” explains the press release. “TV content is sent from the Cisco wireless access point via in-home Wi-Fi to the Ciscowireless receiver next to the TV.”
Based on the 802.11n standard, the wireless solution can deliver SD and HD programming to multiple receivers with integrated Wi-Fi, provide interactive services and function as an HD DVR.
In addition to enabling consumers to view television anywhere they choose in the home, the “wireless TV solution offers service providers the means for faster service activations and consumer self-installation with easy-to-use Wi-Fi kits…The integrated Wi-Fi receiver also offers service providers the ability to monitor the device’s performance via the network, as the receiver comes equipped with remote diagnostics.”
The Surface 2.0 SDK, demonstrated at last year’s CES, will be released sometime early next year. Pre-orders can be placed with Samsung resellers in 23 countries (including the United States).
The $8,400 table-sized tablet, also wall-mountable, is four inches thick and recognizes hands, fingers and objects placed on the screen. It is currently known as the “Surface” or “Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface.”
“Running Windows 7 and Surface 2.0 software, SUR40 has a 40-inch screen measured diagonally, 1,920×1,080 resolution, a contrast ratio of 2,000:1, an AMD GPU along with 2.9GHz Athlon X2 dual-core processors, 320GB of storage, and 4GB of memory,” reports Ars Technica. “Ports include Ethernet, HDMI, and 4 USB 2.0 ports.”
Microsoft targets the Surface for professional use and envisions it being used in a number of industries including automotive, education, finance, healthcare, hospitality and retail.
The original Surface is already in use by the Hard Rock Cafes, Microsoft retail stores, MSNBC, Disney, Sheraton hotels and others.
