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Premium Movie Channel Paradigm Could Soon Face Extinction by Terry Mitchell

(Contd. from page 2...)

Fortunately, led by the apparent impending TiVo-Netflix undertaking, the landscape is about to change and a new era of genuine VOD is about to be ushered in. PC-based broadband VOD services like Cinemanow (www.cinemanow.com) and Movielink (www.movielink.com) have been up and running for several years and are about to broaden their offerings. In addition, SBC Communications and EchoStar Communications have already announced that they are teaming up to provide an online-to-TV VOD service this year, while several similar phone company-satellite operator projects are still in the negotiations stage.

Also, Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) platforms, offering hundreds of television channels via a broadband internet connection to a TV set-top box, will be coming online this year. One of the major features of these services will be advanced VOD technology. Microsoft has developed its own version of IPTV technology. See Microsoft’s website (www.microsolft.com/tv) for details. The nation’s two largest phone companies, Verizon and SBC, plan to utilize Microsoft’s technology in the rollout of their respective IPTV platforms later this year.

Not to be outdone, several smaller companies also plan to compete in the broadband-to-TV market. Akimbo Systems (www.akimbo.com) debuted its service last fall and is currently in the process of expanding. Similar ventures such as DAVETV (www.dave.tv), TimeShift TV, (www.timeshiftv.com), and VCinema (www.vcinema.com) plan to enter the market later this year. All of these companies plan to offer almost unlimited amounts of movies, TV shows, sports, specialty programming, and international programs via a set-top box interface between a broadband connection and a TV set. This programming will be culled from the vast internet universe and made available for TV viewing. For a more detailed description of these services, see my related article entitled, “The Coming Television Revolution.”

 

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About Terry Mitchell
Terry Mitchell is a software engineer, freelance writer, and trivia buff from Hopewell, VA. He also serves as a political columnist for American Daily and operates his own website - http://www.commenterry.com - on which he posts commentaries on various subjects such as politics, technology, religion, health and well-being, personal finance, and sports. His commentaries offer a unique point of view that is not often found in mainstream media. terrymitchell@verizon.net
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Did you know?
In High Jump the Fosbury Flop is prevalent.

Heh Heh Heh...
One day a little girl was watching her mom make a roast beef. She cut off the ends, wrapped it in string, seasoned it and set it in the roasting pan.
The little girl asked her mom why she cut off the ends of the roast. Mom replied, after some thought, that it was the way that her mother had done it.
That night grandma came to dinner and the little girl and her mom went to her and asked why she had cut the end off of the roast before cooking. After some thought grandma replied, that was the way her mother had done it.
Now great grandmother was quite old and in a nursing home. But the little girl went with her mom and grandma to see her and again asked the question.
Grandma looked at them a bit annoyed and said, "So it would fit in the pan, of course."

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