Solving SOPA

Monday January 23, 2012 – Stewart Wolpin

Wikipedia, Google, Reddit, Wired, et al, all have had their say about SOPA – the Stop Online Piracy Act, officially H.R.3261, and the Senate version, PIPA (Protect Intellectual Property Act), officially S.968 with their Web blackouts and/or protests on January 18. In the wake of the blackouts and White House opposition, several former Congressional supporters on both sides of the aisle have now turned against the measures as well.

Now what?

Silicon Valley may rightly disapprove of SOSA and PIPA, but no one disputes the need for some measure(s) to stem the tide of illegal content flowing from foreign servers serving the less scrupulous amongst us.

Many, including CEA, urge support and passage of the shockingly bi-partisan Digital Trade (OPEN) Act, which purports to more surgically target rogue Web sites than the more blunt instruments wielded by SOPA or PIPA. It's not known how the Web community will react to OPEN.

But it doesn't matter if what seems to be the perfect piece of legislation is composed and passed. If history has taught us anything, it's that it's impossible for the law to keep pace with technology. Hollywood studios ended up breathing a sigh of relief when its ill-considered law suits against Sony and the VCR failed, and it took 60 years for lawmakers to update the Telecommunications Act of 1936, and even then the 1996 bill fell short of dealing with the implications of the then-new Internet, to cite two examples.

An Anti-Piracy Prescription

What is needed is not continued division between copyright holders, Silicon Valley and Congress, but cooperation to wage a hearts and minds campaign. After all, these foreign Websites wouldn't be in business if folks in the U.S. didn't use them. And apparently, consumers don't conflate illegal downloading with walking into a store, shoving DVDs and CDs into their pants, and blithely walking out without paying.

For instance, Wednesday's Web blackouts and the attendant media coverage have raised the public consciousness of the issue. Someone/anyone/everyone should continue this education process to educate consumers about legal and illegal behavior where uploading and downloading copyrighted content is concerned, to make it clear what kinds of behaviors by ordinary citizens are legal or not.

Someone/anyone/everyone should create some sort of a "not-watch list," a directory of offending Web sites, technical methods – perhaps in parental controls – to restrict access to offending sites by children, and an FAQ on how to recognize illegal content and sites.

Search sites, ISPs, ad companies, financial institutions and Web sites themselves should publicize self-policing efforts and showcase successful efforts to keep sites legal.

Someone/anyone/everyone should initiate a social media campaign by anti-SOPA Web entities (Wikipedia, Google, et al) to equate illegal downloading with shoplifting, or otherwise socially demonize cyber content theft until the activity is considered akin at least to smoking.

Hollywood studios should stop acting – or at least appearing to act – so greedy. For one thing, studios should more quickly adopt UltraViolet, the industry effort to make it easier for consumers to enjoy content legally bought on a variety of devices and formats, regardless of how or where said content was originally purchased. (Or, something akin to it).

Finally, everyone needs to stop treating online piracy as a divisive advocacy issue. No one wins if the Web turns into a criminal paradise. A concerted social, economic and legal effort to combat online piracy would ultimately be more effective than a single piece of legislation, no matter how well-intentioned or written.

Can Dish Make the Set Top Box Cool Again?

Monday January 16, 2012 – Greg Scoblete

It's hard to remember a time since the advent of TiVo when the set-top box (STB) was actually cool. Sure, gadget connoisseurs might keep tabs on them, but few consumers pay them any mind.

Satellite provider Dish came to CES hoping (or rather, hopping) to change that with a new multiroom DVR/client device dubbed Hopper and Joey. The idea, explained CEO Joe Clayton during an introductory press conference, is to break the downward cycle of the pay TV price war and woo new customers with a technology-first pitch.

The Hopper is a multiroom DVR/server with a gargantuan 2TB hard drive. It’s a device capable of recording more TV than is healthy for any individual (or family) to consume. Indeed, when introducing the Hopper at a CES press conference, Dish communications director said that consumers were absorbing an average of 30 hours of TV a week – a figure that, astoundingly, has actually increased over the last year by 40 minutes.

The Hopper will incorporate three satellite TV tuners (a Dish spokesman also indicated an over-the-air tuner box would also be made available later in the year) to enable a feature Dish is calling "Prime Time Anytime." Simply activate Prime Time Anytime and the Hopper will record all of the major broadcast networks' prime time lineups in HD for up to eight days. An Internet connection will give the Hopper access to Blockbuster@Home, a streaming service owned by Dish that's designed to compete with Netflix.

Joining the Hopper is the Joey - a thin client set top box that connects to the Hopper via coaxial cable to deliver all the features of the Hopper to multiple sets in the home.

So how important will the Hopper be for Dish? Well, it has its very own mascot - a kangaroo - which Clayton explained was in keeping with his corporate heritage (Clayton headed both RCA and Sirius, two brands with animal mascots).

It's interesting to contrast Dish's approach, which plays up the speeds and feeds of its hardware, with DirecTV. While DirecTV also has its own multiroom DVR server/gateway product (which beat Dish to market by several months), it came to CES touting a partnership with Samsung that eliminated the need for a set top box entirely. Well, almost entirely. Samsung will include DirecTV's RVU protocol in its lineup of Smart TVs, which essentially makes those TVs "thin clients" for DirecTV customers with the company's HD Home Media Center. But unlike Dish, DirecTV hasn't tapped the animal kingdom for branding purposes.

Analog to Digital Switchover and Asian Growth to Foster Moderate Growth

Monday January 9, 2012 – Jing Sui

As countries continue to transition from analog to digital terrestrial TV, set-top boxes (STBs) and Integrated Digital TVs (IDTVs) that receive terrestrial signals are in high demand. Digital TV receiver shipments, including both STBs and IDTVs, are expected to continue rising in the near future. DTC estimates that nearly 340 million combined units shipped in 2011, and continuous growth is expected throughout the forecast period, yielding a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 7% between 2011 and 2016.

As an impact for DTT STBs, IDTVs log a CAGR of 12% from 2011 to 2016 as more and more TVs are built with internal digital terrestrial tuners. Worldwide STB shipments for the digital terrestrial platform fluctuate because of the varied analog shut off schedules, the increased presence of digital tuners on TV sets and the proliferation of hybrid STBs, but overall the category is projected to produce a 4% CAGR between 2011 and 2016.

Digital Cable STB shipments overall exhibit stability even though they face competition from other pay TV platforms. The long-term outlook for DTH satellite and IPTV STBs is positive due to robust demand in Asia. Shipments of IPTVs have an especially good outlook, with shipments expected to double between 2010 and 2016, reaching 43 million units shipped.

The Coming Wi-Fi Revolution

Tuesday January 3, 2012 – Stewart Wolpin

Like the stirrings of a small cabal of rebels in the mountains, the seeds of a revolution are sprouting in the Wi-Fi world. But this is not mere blogging hyperbole. Before the end of the decade, all the current folderol over 3G and 4G high-speed cellular data connectivity could become an anachronism in a planet bathed with ubiquitous Wi-Fi connectivity.

Actually, there are two separate revolutions brewing: Wi-Fi Certified Passpoint, popularly known as Hotspot 2.0 (for those who have ever heard of it), and Super Wi-Fi.

The first, due to rollout in less than a year, will make Wi-Fi as easy to automatically access as cellular service is now; the second will create hotspots measured not in feet, but in miles.

Combined, these two efforts will disturb nearly every portable product paradigm, completely change how consumers interact with their gear and create entrepreneurs who are able to grasp and exploit the implications better than others. Like previous tech revolutions, the old and complacent will either adapt or die, and the new will rise to replace and dominate them.

It's all a matter of understanding what the revolution is bringing.

Wi-Fi Certified Passpoint

Its promoters are promulgating the idea that Passpoint will make Wi-Fi as easy to connect to as cellular.

The Wi-Fi Alliance is now readying the first version of the Passpoint standard that will enable mobile devices worldwide to automatically detect and automatically and securely connect to Passpoint-certified hotspots. Consumers will be able to move seamlessly from hotspot-to-hotspot just like they can from cell-to-cell (although they haven't quite figured out hotspot-to-hotspot Passpoint VoIP call handoff – yet).

Meanwhile, the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) is forging the business partnerships between hotspot providers such as Boingo, cellular carriers and cable providers, all of whom will simply add Wi-Fi connectivity to a consumer's current bill, offering per-usage or buckets of monthly connectivity plans, similar to cellular minutes.

Passpoint's implications are tantalizing. Wi-Fi connectivity is capable of theoretical speeds of 450 Mbps (and I'll be speaking of theoretical speeds so this is an apples-to-apples comparison). 4G LTE has a top theoretical speed of 12 Mbps. If my math is right, that's a nearly 400 times speed advantage. Future LTE revisions may bring theoretical top speeds of 50 Mbps; if Wi-Fi technology doesn't improve, that's still a hefty 9x speed advantage.

For mobile-optimized Web surfing, sending emails, uploading photos, this extra acceleration is nice, not critical. But if you enable it, they will come. Video calling can be buffer- and grain-free HD. HD video shot from a smartphone can be as mindlessly uploaded and passed around as photos are today. And I'm sure there'll be apps I can't even think of that will take advantage of this revolutionary blanket broadband coverage.

Super Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi hotspots are plentiful in urban areas; out in the hinterlands – not so much. And current hotspots are limited by their pitiful 150-200 foot range, if you're lucky.

Super Wi-Fi will change all that.

Instead of transmitting in the 2.4 or 5 GHz bands, Super Wi-Fi, promoted by the SIG-like Wireless Innovation Alliance, lives in the so-called TV White Space band, 470-698 MHz.

This lower frequency band widens Wi-Fi signal propagation – at low, 40 mW power, a home or local Wi-Fi hotspot will reach three- to five-times the coverage as current Wi-Fi (future routers will likely be dual-mode since Super Wi-Fi speeds may be slower than high-frequency Wi-Fi); broadcast at a high-powered 4 watts, a rural Super Wi-Fi hotspot could stretch as wide as 40 miles, depending on terrain. Lower TV White Space frequencies also mean more robust signals that more easily travel through obstructions that hamper regular Wi-Fi.

Because the 470-698 MHz TV White Space band is unlicensed, rural entrepreneurs could rush to build 4-watt multi-mile hotspots, then make deals with cell carriers to get them incorporated into Passpoint networks. Forward-thinkers may find Super Wi-Fi a new cash crop once the first Super Wi-Fi gear starts rolling out in late 2013/early 2014, a process that has just started.

The downside is a Super Wi-Fi land rush that could force the FCC to impose stricter rules or open up more space to accommodate expected expansive usage for spectrum.

But imposing order on what promises to be a wild Wi-Fi West is further down the road, after the Passpoint and Super Wi-Fi revolutions succeed in disrupting the current Wi-Fi status quo.