Monday January 19, 2009 – Antonette Goroch
The wide array of Internet to TV products at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas made it evident that the link between TV and Internet is only getting stronger. How this trend will ultimately reshape the landscape of television content is unclear, but some effects can already be seen in a variety of new services and products from existing players.
On the one hand, there were a number of products that enable direct connectivity between Web content and televisions. Internet connected TVs were all the rage, with new models from Sharp, Samsung and LG, among others, that allow consumers to access Internet and video content, such as that made available by Yahoo or YouTube, directly to their TVs. Meanwhile, Internet-PC-TV connected products also gained momentum with new products like D-Link’s PC-on-TV player or Buffalo’s LinkTheater, which wirelessly stream Internet content from a users PC to the TV via a home network with unprecedented ease of use. Buffalo’s products allow remote access to one’s home network content via the Internet, and the ability to automatically queue BitTorrent files.
Additionally, existing TV related products continue to evolve to incorporate more Internet-like features, such as search and personalization. Tivo, for instance, unveiled a new software release for its set-top boxes which integrates new search functionality that not only lets users search for programs from their cable listings, but also brings in content from Amazon, CinemaNow, Jaman and YouTube. Fee-based content can automatically be purchased directly from this interface and added to the DVR.
Another example, which more clearly reveals how these trends might shake up the traditional pay TV business, is Macrovision’s radical change in product offerings. Once solely a content protection business, building its success around scrambling and encrypting content for pay-per-view and premium cable TV, Macrovision is now focusing on its more recent intellectual property acquisitions that create extensive program guides and search.
The move is telling, for Macrovision and others, because it foreshadows a TV landscape where value is created not so much by owning and restricting content, but rather better enabling navigation through vast quantities of content available through a multitude of sources.
