January 2011

The Next Net

[Commentary] The moment the "net neutrality" debate began was the moment the net neutrality debate was lost. For once the fate of a network - its fairness, its rule set, its capacity for social or economic reformation - is in the hands of policymakers and the corporations funding them - that network loses its power to effect change.

The mere fact that lawmakers and lobbyists now control the future of the net should be enough to turn us elsewhere. That's right. I propose we abandon the Internet, or at least accept the fact that it has been surrendered to corporate control like pretty much everything else in Western society. It was bound to happen, and its flawed, centralized architecture made it ripe for conquest.

Shall we use telephony, ham radio, or some other part of the spectrum? Do we organize overlapping meshes of WiMax? Do we ask George Soros for some money? MacArthur Foundation? Do we even need or want them or money at all? How might the funding of our network by a central bank issued currency, or a private foundation, or a public university, bias the very architecture we are trying to build? Who gets the ability to govern or limit what may spread over our network, if anyone? Should there be ways for us to transact? To make the sorts of choices that might actually yield our next and truly decentralized network, we must take a good look at the highly centralized real world in which we live - as well as how it got that way. Only by understanding its principles, reckoning with the forces at play, and accepting the battles we have already lost, might we begin to forge ahead to create new forms that exist beyond any authority's ability to grant them protection.

2011: The Future of Consolidation In The Online Video Industry

[Commentary] In this season of reflection and predictions, the online video industry continues to be a trending topic. Among the top digital media stories in recent weeks have been news of multiple mergers between leading video ad networks -- and speculation of additional tie-ups to come.

Part of the driving force here, of course, is the simple fact that YouTube already reigns as the top video ad network and in 2011 will expand its ad products, targeting capabilities and ad exchange, forcing continuing consolidation among the other video ad networks. YouTube delivers more reach than any of the ad networks, offers the same quality of video content, and is investing the resources to develop tools to support advertisers looking for mass audiences and commodity content. Ad networks will have no alternative than to consolidate to compete with YouTube. But consolidation among video ad networks is only the first step; the next phase will center on the increasing importance of content verticalization.

In 2011, expect to see consolidation among video content companies, especially among destination sites that attract meaningful audiences by focusing on a specific content category. The focus on building out vertical content offerings in online video will mirror what we've seen in the cable TV industry over the past several years. The consolidation will happen in two ways: 1) the aggregation of properties within a content category; and 2) the aggregation of properties across content categories. Viacom is a model for both forms of aggregation.

[Hachenburg is CEO of Metacafe, an independent online video site]

House Oversight Committee to post complete hearing videos online

New House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) announced with Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) that the committee will post complete videos of every hearing online in hopes of spurring other committees to do the same.

"No Congressional committee has done this before. Going forward, we'll keep sharing high-quality videos of our tough oversight work," Rep Issa said in a video announcement. "Under Speaker John Boehner, transparency through technology will be crucial to shaping a government that does more with less."

Cisco Introduces Videoscape System in Bid to Simplify Television Industry

Cisco, the world’s largest maker of networking equipment, introduced a system called Videoscape that aims to tie together television from broadcasters, cable companies and Internet providers.

The idea is to help service providers deliver any kind of media, including social-networking content, to any kind of device, Cisco said during a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. As services offered by Comcast Corp.’s Xfinity, Hulu LLC and Netflix Inc. blur the lines of the television industry, Cisco is trying to capitalize by simplifying the market. It also benefits from surging use of Internet video because it boosts demand for routers and switches, which direct the flow of Internet traffic.

Google Wins One Against Microsoft

Google won a key victory in a lawsuit against the US Interior Department, two months after the Web giant accused the agency of improperly favoring rival Microsoft in a contract bid to provide a new email system.

Susan Braden, a federal judge in Washington (DC), on Jan 3 issued a preliminary injunction that prevents the Interior Department from deciding to use Microsoft's email and collaboration tools for its 88,000 employees as part of the federal government's move to Web-based applications software. In an order unsealed late Jan 4 in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, Judge Braden wrote that Google had made a preliminary showing that the agency "violated the Competition in Contracting Act," which was passed in 1984 to promote "full and open competitive."

Google Was the Busiest Startup Acquirer of 2010

Google missed out on prized daily discounter Groupon in 2010, but it still acquired far more start-ups owned by venture capital firms than any other company last year.

Google acquired 10 U.S. venture-backed companies this past year, double the amount of the next most-active acquirers on the list. Its acquisitions ranged from larger land grabs like AdMob Inc., the mobile ad network that sold for $750 million, to small scoops like the acquisition of 15-month-old online travel-guide service Ruba Inc. (VentureSource only counts deals that have closed, so Google’s deal to buy ITA Software Inc. for $700 million — which the Department of Justice is scrutinizing — doesn't make the cut.) Google chief Eric Schmidt lived up to his word after telling analysts on a conference call in October 2009, “We’re open for business, making strategic acquisitions, both large and small.”

Nielsen: U.S. consumers crave TVs, mobile devices

Here's what you need to know about media and tech consumers ahead of the Consumer Electronics Show. There are a whole lot of TVs and cell phones out there and more and more people are using those technologies to access the Internet.

According to a handy fact sheet by Nielsen:

Average Number of TVs per U.S. Household: 2.5
Percentage of Americans with 4 or more TVs: 31 percent
Number of Mobile Phone Users (13+): 228M
Percentage of U.S. Mobile Subscribers with Smartphones: 31 percent
Number of mobile phone Web users: 83.2M

LG SmartTV Upgrader aims at AppleTV and GoogleTV

LG unveiled its SmartTV Upgrader set-top box for HD TVs at CES -- taking aim at both the Apple TV and Google TV. The SmartTV Upgrader, which is a little bit larger than a hockey puck, connects to any TV with an HDMI connection and uses a Wi-Fi connection to allow users to download and use LG's Internet-connected apps on their TVs through the box, said Tim Alessi, LG's director of new product development, at a press conference at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Intel's effort to lure Hollywood to PCs with new chips

Intel showed off its second-generation Core chips at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Or rather, the company showed off what the chips could do, particularly the graphics capabilities that aim to make separate graphics chips redundant.

The most impressive thing to me was the ability to render photorealistic, 3-D images in real time. Oh and yes, the images move -- for example, mimicking the expression of whoever's facing the computer's webcam. One can imagine all sorts of gaming applications, as well as some not-so-welcome capabilities to assume someone else's (virtual) persona. The company also unveiled Intel Insider, a new security feature on the chips designed to enable more circumvention-resistant electronic locks. The technology -- essentially, the ability to embed into the chip itself part of the security protecting a piece of content, so that the content can be unlocked only by the chip -- was good enough that at least one major studio, Warner Bros., was persuaded to make high-definition versions of its movies available for downloading.

Government flocks to Vegas for tech show

Government officials are heading to the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas this week for the world's largest technology show, where they can attend events on policy issues such as network neutrality, spectrum, and distracted driving.

"We have more than 50 government officials, two Cabinet secretaries, all four FCC commissioners, and one chairman," said Jason Oxman, the senior vice president for industry affairs for the Consumer Electronics Association, which hosts the show. That list includes Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk. To attract the government crowd, CEA bills the show as a chance to see the kind of technologies their constituents are using and to meet with top technology officials. The show also makes tech issues more tangible for policy makers, Oxman said.

Benton

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