Independent
Telco Local Content Workshop Information
THE VIODI VIEW
by Ken Pyle (ken.pyle@viodi.com), Viodi, LLC
In this Issue: VoIP Review, IP On Your Parade & more.......
July 8th, 2004 Issue
It has been over two weeks and I am still recovering from Supercomm. I still haven’t pored over my notes yet, but, in this issue, you will find a few pictures from the IPVideo@Supercomm conference. For those that attended, we are still working on uploading all of the presentations that were not in the proceedings book. Simultaneously, we are starting the process of synchronizing the audio of the presentations to the overheads. This process is really good for me, as it gives me a chance to absorb what the speakers were saying. We are still evaluating how we will be distributing this content, so if this is of interest, please email us at ipvideo@viodi.com.
Just Stream Them On The Internet……
A few months ago, I would have said the Internet is the best way to distribute this sort of content. Let people get the content when they want, as they want and charge them on an on-demand basis. Now, I am not certain whether or not this would violate a patent from the Acacia Research Corporation. Acacia has been going after operators of both web and cable television systems. To date, they have obtained licensing agreements with 145 different organizations including well known content providers, such as Disney, Playboy and OnCommand, as well as smaller operators, like Central Valley Cable TV.
This is something interesting to watch, as telcos are also apparently beginning to get notices from Acacia Research suggesting that they may be in violation of Acacia’s patents. There are some who think this patent can be fought and there are a couple of sites that provide much greater detail of this interesting development. One site, www.fightthepatent.com has even been created to….well, it should be obvious. This is something to monitor closely as it could eventually affect us all.
Six, eight, seven, four, five, eight, eight. Well, this phone number may not be exactly the same as the one from the song about that fictional girl Jenny, but at least it works. Actually, this phone number is what Packet8 supplied, along with associated terminal adaptor, for an evaluation I am currently performing of their VoIP service. So, far, I have been impressed. I have over 4 hours and 13 calls logged on the phone so far and have been generally pleased. I plan on evaluating this service for a few more weeks with various conditions and will have a more thorough report in a subsequent issue. In the meantime, feel free to call me and help in the evaluation process (408) 687 4588.
One of the places I will be testing the Packet8 service is on a broadband connection in Calgary. VoIP will be one of the many topics of discussion at next week’s OPASTCO summer convention in Calgary next week. I am honored to be part of one of the marketing sessions. Specifically, my session will focus on marketing as it relates to VoIP. I will be recounting my experiences evaluating different VoIP services and tossing out ideas as to how telcos can retain a competitive edge in a world that is increasingly going IP.
In today’s world, Internet Protocol is supposed to be the cure-all for all things that ail a telecom carrier’s network. And it is probably true, as IP allows the decoupling of applications from the transport network. As I have heard over and over the past few weeks, with IP a network does not need to be optimized for a particular application, such as the case with, say, POTS.
So, what is my problem with IP? As long as IP can meet the customer demands for things like fast channel changes, multiple televisions per household, etc., I don’t have any problem. From everything I can see, the industry seems to be making great progress in these areas. My concern is the lack of standardization to allow for a true “plug and play” implementation of IPTV. Click here to read an outlandish idea to address this concern.
Krazy Ken’s Korner: But Everyone Loves A Parade:
One of the points of Viodi’s local content workshop is that creativity is not limited to certain locales, such as Hollywood and New York, or to the youth. To prove my point, I look no further than to my brother-in-law’s father, Ed Batinich. Ed, who is a spry 83 years young, exhibits the same sort of creativity today that he exhibited as a young heroic B-17 pilot over the skies of Germany in World War II. Back then, he fashioned scrap metal into a seat cover to, literally, protect his bum and augment the poor armor protection of the bottom of the B-17.
Using that same sort of ingenuity, he turned a bland golf cart into an award winning parade float for the Fourth of July festivities at his retirement community. He amazes me with his ability to turn “junk” into something useful and, in this case, artistic. Actually, the other 50 or so floats in the parade were also pretty impressive. What amazes me is that a community of 4,000 plus people could hold such a big parade. The point being that, even in small communities, there is a great deal of talent from which independent telcos can draw upon to create unique local content offerings.
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