UCLA Media Tech Class Winter Quarter 09 Class #4

Guest Speaker Next Week
I am happy to announce that next Wednesdays guest will be Deedee Gordon founder and principal with Look-Look (www.look-lookmagazine.com) . This is an ethnographic market research company with a global network of over 30,000 “correspondents”, and a true innovator in trend-spotting. I think it relates to our topics because she focuses on youth culture and we can discuss her observations about behaviors and trends related to technology.

News
We discussed Piracy and if it really cannibalizes DVD and BD sales as much as the studios say it does. We also delved into how much digital downloading and streaming will impact DVD sales and how quickly. That thread was triggered by news of Netflix 45% quarterly earnings boost and why it happened. More “cocooning” during hard times? A bump from BD? A bump from Netflix deals for online delivery including via some Samsung TVs and via set-top-boxes. News form NATPE is that this was much discussed. Israel is posting clips of missile strikes to show how “surgical” they are. I watched some hair raising videos of other ops as well. Oh, and the Vatican now has a Youtube Channel too. There were over 27 million streams of the inauguration.

Lectures
History of Content
Mark covered the macro timeline from the dawn of radio through to broadcast TV, CATV and the multi-channel universe of today. As an aside, a fascinating historical novel on the dawn of radio and Marconi is THUNDERSTRUCK by Erik Larson. It really shows just how revolutionary the invention of “wireless” and the first transatlantic transmissions really were.
Trends Part 3
OK, I’m really almost done with the trends already. I got through how advertising is transforming to being hyper-targeted and budgets are shifting online at the expense of traditional media. Sphere: Related Content

UCLA Media Tech Class Winter Quarter 09 Class #3

Diaries
Thanks to Stephen, Annie, and Gary for breaking the ice on discussing diaries. Stephen discussed his rather conventional scheduled TV viewing habits while in stark contrast, Annie watches no scheduled TV at all and relies on her DVR. Gary uses On-Demand services from his DirecTV however he goes live for sports. Others in class mentioned they are two or three screeners; keeping their PCs, Laptops and / or Mobile going in the background as they watch TV.

The point of this exercise is to understand how media consumption behaviors are changing and fragmenting and thus, changing nearly all aspects of media and entertainment businesses.

Please continue discussing you diaries over the next several classes.

News

• Down the thread of Tracy’s story last week of how Google wants to help newspapers, several of noticed that Google announced that it’s shuttering its print advertising division because the revenues were too low!

• Sony opened a BD factory in China, in spite of rampant piracy. Could it be that consumers WILL pay more for better quality? I mentioned that I thought that BD was more difficult to pirate than DVD and I was promptly contravened. Sure enough the AACS DRM has been cracked ( http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080325-blu-ray-drm-definitively-cracked-update.html ).
• Clearchannel was discussed via a vis its layoffs and its constant push to economize, standardize and centralize “local” terrestrial radio.
• Virgin Records gave up its Times Square location to Forever 21. Another music industry landmark bites the dust.
• The 3D TV superbowl presentation carried lots of interest. It is jointly sponsored by Pepsi, Intel and Dreamworks for a commercial, a trailer and cartoon episode.
  
  

Although I risk pre-empting some discovery on Wednesday, I can’t help but notice that today’s NYT is almost a reader for the class:

• $200 Laptops Break A Business Model http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/technology/26spend.html?_r=1&ref=business
  The price performance ratio keep improving for IT and the trend is to cheaper, open source and cloud computing contributing to the woes of the giants.
• http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/technology/26techjobs.html?ref=business
  President Obama’s $825 billion stimulus plan presented this month by House Democrats called for $37 billion in spending in three high-tech areas: $20 billion to computerize medical records, $11 billion to create smarter electrical grids and $6 billion to expand high-speed Internet access in rural and underserved communities.
• Paying for Digital Music
  I believe this will be the way it will work in the future. You will simply pay a flat rate for all-you-can-eat at the ISP or mobile carrier level as proposed by the Isle of Man…
  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/business/worldbusiness/26music.html?ref=business
• Another article was all about repurposing TV content for Youtube and the Internet:
  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/technology/internet/26vault.html?ref=technology

Lecture
Social Networks, Social Media and Internet Video
We introduced the rise of social networks and the most recent ascent of Facebook. We began the comparison between Facebook and MySpace to find the reasons for its success. I introduced the Social Media trend exemplified by Imeem, Ilike and Playlist.com with latters spectacular hockey stick ascent to the 20 plus million user level over a year. People like sharing their tastes, collections, and playlists as a form of self-expression and communication. Embedding into social networks or using open standards such as Open Social and Facebook Markup Language and Facebooks API enable “plug-in” Apps like Imeem to succeed. Imeem succeeded in making the uber deal with the majors so that users have access to the full pop song library.

Ben Mendelson
Our guest speaker Ben Mendelson, CEO of the Ineractive Television Alliance (http://www.itvalliance.org/ ) presented a succinct history of the Interactive TV including some of the seminal companies like Open TV, Microsoft TV, TiVo, NDS and many others. Ben talked about the sea change in TV advertising including the changes in the “Upfonts” and how targeted advertising is on the rise while advertisers feel a decreasing need to commit to expensive network spots (The increase in informercials on prime time TV is evidence of the increase in avails). Ben described the ITA’s activities and 4 annual events: Queen Mary Conference, Tech Walk, Ad Lab, Content Lab/Incubator at NAB. To Ben and the ITA we extend out thanks!




Commentary
Co-Opetition? Search for SNL on Youtube and watch a Saturday Night Live video clip. First see the HULU front billboard, then as the video plays, in the lower third appears the copy: “Hulu offers full episodes of current hit shows … 30 Rock, House, Family Guy, The Office, ….to classic shows like Buffy the Vampire and hundreds more TV episodes, movies and clips.” The end HULU billboard boasts: “Watch your favorites. Anytime. For Free. This is weird for several reasons. First Hulu was put into business to compete with Youtube. NBC and Newscorp wanted their vids off Youtube and on to their own Internet Real Estate. Why should Google benefit from NBC Uni/Fox content? Second, is Google/YouTube sowing the seeds of its own downfall by directing traffic to Hulu, which is a much better viewing experience? Third, Hulu is not using the Google/Youtube pop-up / overlay ad methods. Rather, the ad is embeded into the video. Maybe Hulu and Youtube need each other? Maybe they will each find long term niche. As mentioned in todays NYT Article, $200 Laptops Break a Business Model,
“Mr. Title, a 35-year-old new-media manager at a film production company in New York, has dropped his cable subscription and moved to watching most of his television online — free.” Indeed, so have I.
Form more reading on Internet TV/Video, read my article: YouTube and The Revolution in Internet Video Sphere: Related Content

UCLA Media Tech Class Winter Quarter 09 Class #2

Sorry for the delayed post.

I watched the inauguration this morning at a the Church in Ocean Park with a couple hundred cheering people. Of note is that it was on CNN projected on to a large wall out of a laptop connected via WiFi to the Internet. A complete end run around CATV and DBS and there were very few hitches.

Also notable was the parnership between CNN and Facebook whereby about a million folks could "share" on screen concurrent with CNN's coverage. CNN cut to Facebook's offices periodically to get the "Facebook" report. Another shift in media tech and an attempt at synergy.

Class #2 was mostly devoted to my brief on CES which I posted last week.
Thanks for your participation and the news contributions:
Tiffany discussed www.youtube.com/senatehub and www.youtube.com/househub .
This is amazing. A mashup map UI allows you to visually drill down to your state and find your Senator or Congressman and then you get a lineup of videos on them. So simple yet so profound. A direct line to these politicos on-demand. Of course they only post what they want, and you could probably watch Cspan all day, but this is still a major end run around traditional TV and a yet another part of the social media wave.

Stephen discussed AOLs reorganization into a variety of verticals with its formation of MEDIAGLO (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10141044-36.html) . We can debate how well their strategy will work. Are these verticals synergistic? The Time Warner, AOL Merger was obviously one of the great failures of M & A history. Maybe AOL will yet find a way to thrive. Its still mystifies many, as well as me, why they paid $850 million for Bebo! As an aside, be sure to listen to an excellent interview with Stephen about the THRs 100 most powerful women list on KCRW’s THE BUSINESS podcast (http://feeds.kcrw.com/~r/kcrw/tb/~3/510272329/tb_2009-01-12-182216.mp3 ).

Tracy brought up a story on Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt attempting to aid the print media business! It was commented that Google needs print because it is a driver for online searching. Even though Google has sapped the guts our of print advertising, they still need print and they need competition. They don’t want antitrust. Interestingly, Google just announced that it is shuttering its 2 year old Print Ad division (
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/21/technology/internet/21google.html?emc=eta1 ) due to poor revenue!

Reed pointed out the imminent arrival of 2TB SD cards within 5 years. Indeed I saw this as well at CES. Look for 100GB sizes this year. All this to say that there is a quiet revolution in personal cheap storage that will no doubt elicit new applications.

To follow-up on the question about the palm sized D.J. rig it was the Pacemaker from Tonium:
http://www.tonium.com/ out of Stockholm Sweden. Sphere: Related Content

CES 2009 Briefing

A few thoughts on CES 2009

My Photo Gallery form CES

Storage
A shift happens when something becomes so plentiful it is almost free. New applications and economies erupt. So it goes with digital storage. Thanks to MP3 compression, cheap micro hard drives and plentiful flash ram, iPods, and even a few other digital music players proliferated. Movies and TV, especially HD needs an order of magnitude more space than music. NAS or Networked attached storage was something known only to Network engineers a few short years ago. They have been part of the storage solution for professionals for nearly over decade, offering a simple way to add mass storage, without new servers and even more expensive arrays. Over the last couple of years these devices have migrated to the consumer level and this year they are poised to become an essential appliance for millions of homes swimming in digital media. Offerings from HP, LinkSys, LG, Samsung, Sony and others, provide consumers plug-n-play mass storage for all media types on their home networks. Many feature removable drive bays so that you can reload anytime with better, bigger and cheaper devices.

Most impressive is the progress in flash memory in the form of memory sticks and SD cards. There is a shift going from gigabytes to terabytes that makes it viable for the consumer as well as the professional to record, shoot, transfer and go mobile with an almost unlimited canvas.


Connected Consumers
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin was quoted in USA Today (August 8th 2008) in an article entitled Martin wants broadband across USA quotes Martin: "There's a social obligation in making sure everybody can participate in the next generation of broadband services because, increasingly, that's what people want." Of course one persons broadband is another persons super-slow. Ask your average Internet user in Seoul about the “broadband” speed in the US and they will wonder why our Internet is broken.

However it happens, I am betting that the US is well on its way to nearly ubiquitous Internet access at relatively high speeds wired or wireless. WiMax is being rolled out via Sprint and Clearwire under the Xohm brand (www.xohm.com). It will be a less expensive ($35/month for home service, $30/month for mobile) alternative to DSL or Cable ISPs and will be able to provide access in areas not yet reached by DSL or digital CATV. Cheap wireless broadband fuels the need for cheap mobile internet devices beyond the current gen of smartphones and laptops. The iPod Touch is an example, which is found a bevy of bedfellows although iPhone-like smartphones will continue to enjoy double-digit growth. The LG DARE, Vu and VOYAGER hold up well to any iPhone with additional tactical feedback and mobile TV capabilities. That last point is not to be overlooked. Mobile TV can use a separate radio band and deliver 20 some channels of crisp TV to a handheld device. They are common in South Korea, which uses the DMB (Digital Multimedia Broadcasting) standard. In the US Qualcomm’s Media Flo has gripped some traction. I will bet that Mobile TV will catch on to sustainable degree. Other companies such as MobiTV (www.mobitv.com) are delivering TV content re-formatted for mobile IP delivery. This will be slow to catch-on in the US because we are already immersed in TV. But inevitably I believe it will find a critical mass following via mobile Internet devices or very cheap dedicated receivers.

Of greater significance to me this year is the connected home, moving beyond simple WiFi to seamless interoperation between a wide varieties of devices. DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance, www.dlna.org ) has caught on as an industry standard. According to their representative, about 4,000 devices have been certified. Once one of these devices is on, it automatically senses the network and can share functions and files with other devices. Music players, phones, storage devices and yes, HD TVs become connected with now set-up beyond a password. Watch your phone on your flat screen and play your music collection from your laptop to your WiFi music player. Add this to the mix with broadband and the promise of convergence is substantially fulfilled.

Convergence Delivered
Nothing is one-thing, everything is many things. Phones are full blown 8 megapixel, GPS aware cameras (LG Renoir) and, music players are mobile TVs, TVs are Internet Appliances. Witness the offerings of connected Blu-Ray Players with IP onboard. They Stream YouTube, Netflix, Pandora and other content services via wired and wireless Ethernet. The Samsung HT-BD8200 Home Theater in a Box includes a sound system and optional WiFi. Panasonic’s Viera Cast lineup has a connected BD Player as well as LG BD300 Network Blu-Ray Disc Player. Samsung has partnered with Yahoo to add “Widgets” to its TVs for accessing Internet content without leaving your couch. Sony has a full lineup of new, connected “Bravia” HDTV’s with both built, and outboard optional IP.

HD TV
Brighter, bigger, clearer, sharper, better contrast, more vibrant colors, endless options price points, HD TV is still being touted as the centerpiece for convergence in every home and almost any budget. Panasonic, LG, Samsung, Toshiba and Sony all have a mind numbing selection of sets at nearly every size, and price. New brands have come on the scene such as China’s Haier, which made the leap from white goods and digital music players. At a nominal $1,355 for its 47 inch HL47K, you will be likely to find this alongside the Vizio 47’ SV470XVT at $1,399 at Wall Mart, where you won’t find Sony’s top of the line Bravia KDL-46XBR8 46 inch. For comparison, and to illustrate the range, the latter model’s MSRP is $4,699. It will take an entire class session to analyze the specs on HDTV’s. In summary, they will continue to offer better value, better imagery, leaner profiles and more connectivity via direct Internet access and home networks.

3D TVs were also gaining momentum and are clearly headed towards some degree of commercial viability. The 2009 Super Bowl on Feb 1st will feature the first 3D Superbowl spot form Pepsi (The SoBe Lifewater Lizard), Intel and NBC. There will also be a 3D trailer for the Dreamworks Monster Vs Aliens movie. 125 million 3D promotional glasses will have been distributed, possibly giving some folks a taste for more 3D TV.

Philanthropy
www.smallthingschallenge.com
“At least 80% of humanity lives on less than $1/day and 75 million children worldwide are not in school.” So says the promo for the Intel sponsored Small Things Challenge. The Chairman of Intel, Craig Barrett, and Chairman and CEO of Cisco, John Chambers, presented their views of the world and how appropriate application of technology can help developing countries. Both agree that the highest priorities should be education and health care. Without those societies are not sustainable. Barrett showed off the durable cheap classroom PC (Save the Children Foundation) and how Intel has funded mobile bus computer classrooms in India. Both Chambers and Barrett demonstrated cost effective telemedicine health care solutions. Mr. Barrett using a live video conference to a remote clinic in India, and Mr. Chambers showing off the Cisco telemedicine “Booth” complete with consulting physician in Africa.\

Misc. Random Standouts

• Wearable personal camera www.vievu.com

• LG 3G Watch Phone
  (http://www.lge.com/about/press_release/detail/21062.jhtml )
  LG hits it out of the park with one designed by PRADA. This thing is sleek with a touch screen and a Global dual mode (GSM and UMTS) transceiver along with 7.2 Mbps HSDPA. If you don’t know about those acronyms, take my class. Who cares, its still amazingly cool to have a real Dick Tracy / Star Trek watch. Of course it has a built-in still / video camera for making video calls to the mother ship.
  

• Rhapsody Ibiza personal multimedia player (http://www.haieramerica.com/en/ibiza )In the challengers to the iPod / iTouch category The Ibiza. Made by Chinese digital media upstart Haier, this has WiFi, FM Radio, touch pad, bright clear screen, 30GB HDD and 4/8 GB Flash RAM. Coupled with Rhapody, you have almost any song anytime anywhere.
  

• The Tonium Pacemaker
  An all-in-one palm sized portable music player and D.J. Mixer! Complete with a community to share you mixes at www.pacemaker.net . Its like holding two turntables and a mixing console in one hand.
  

I always balance out CES with a day on the rocks...

Sphere: Related Content