Slashdot Mirror
Video On Demand Almost Here For San Franciscans
BeatlesForum.com writes: "Looks like San Francisco-area folks could be in for a taste of video when you want it, according to this article from Reuters. The article mentions that we will be able to start and stop the on-demand stream whenever we want. Kinda sounds like TiVo now, except you still have to fit around the broadcast schedule. Interesting statistic quoted from the article, though: it is expected that 5.5 million homes will have VOD by the end of the year. Imagine being able to pull up 2001: A Space Odyssey at 2:38 a.m.."
The way the article makes it sound, you could even pull it up at 2:39!
.sig last updated Jan. 14, 2000
On Long Island we have this. It is called I/O (Interactive Optimum), and it is provided by Cablevision.
blog & fiction: jd87
Porn on demand.
WRONG!!!!
:-) so you dont have to watch an ad on how amy has a nasty yeast infection. But instead you get assulted with steve pushing dell computers. These things can also operate as DCT's and will probably offer that feature at a "cost" in the future.
These boxes insert ad's at the beginning and end. and there can be a myriad of ways to use it. Hell these things can start the targetted advertising. (already built in guys
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I've had digital cable for about 2 years or so here in Hawai'i - And we've had video on demand at least that long. In the beginning the selection was small and quality would sometimes degrade during 'prime time.' But for the last year or so quality has been perfect, and selection has steadily increased (To about 200 movies, usually 5-10 new movies every 2 weeks or so).
- James
Last time they tried this, the major roadblock was that no one could figure out how to build a server fast enough to stream multiple, unique video streams. Even assuming you're using conventional televisions and the stream size is limited to 500kB/s, you've maxed out Fibre Channel bus at 40 users under ideal conditions - and for each such group of 40 users, you need a complete copy of all the video material available, at perhaps a terabyte. There's just no way, using today's technology, to get more data on to the network - so the cable company will be stuck with tens of thousands of VoD servers, all reading information off their hard drives at the maximum rate for 24 hours a day.
I just can't see them making that kind of investment.
As someone who works with this type of technology day in and day out, I can tell you it is here, and it's here to stay. Just about all of the cable companies that my company services, have said that there digital box returns after VOD was rolled out went from aroun 50% to less than 10%. It's a good source of revenue for the cable providers. As far as streaming the movies, the way that we do it, is if there are say 5 people that order the same movie within say 60 secs of one another, then they will actually all be receiving the same stream, which of course takes less bandwidth, until one of them decides to pause, rew, ff, etc, and then they break out of that stream and will have a single stream of their own.
One of the really cool offshoots of VOD is SVOD (Subscription VOD) which is currently being deployed through a number of operators. SVOD is where you can watch past episodes of shows on premium networks, such as The Sopranos or Band of Brothers, which means you could finally get to see that episode that you may have missed.
Cheers
Time Warner Communications is preparing to roll out their VOD service pretty soon here in Brevard County, Florida. Average price is $3.99 a video, and will be available for multiple viewing for a single customer within 48 hours of purchasing the movie. The digital cable remote controller already has VOD featurs, such as a switch that allows us to control the VCR or VOD. There are buttons like those you'd expect in a VCR, such as Rewind, FF, Pause, etc. Yes, you can pause a VOD!
Mmm... LotR in DVD-quality through VOD...
"Black holes are where God divided by zero." - Steve Wright
Clearly this is possible, but what are the costs like?
Pretty rare that Australia is actually somewhat close to leading edge ;)
... err ... early adopter. They are using Liberate as the platform, and Pace STU's.
Optus are trialling a digital VOD system in Sydney. You can subscribe to the commerical trial, and pay to be their guinea pig
The movies are about 6 months old, which is 12 months better than standard pay TV.
Ok, I work for a major cable company on VOD, and I'd like to clear up some issues you guys are talking about...
1. Price. VOD is simalar to PPV. expect to see movies costing about $3.00 (more for porn) you have the movie for 24 hours, and can stop rewind, fast forward, and watch it as many times as you'de like in 24 hours.
2. Quality. Digital cable picture quality is really really good. bit rates run about 3.5-4.5 Mb/s. this is just about where the average bit rate of a DVD falls (although DVDs peak higher) Now, if you operator's plant is fucked, your picture quality will suffer... I've seen AT&T systems that macroblock constantly.
3. Advertizing. its like PPV. content providers get a cut everytime a movie is watched. (same with the operator) avertizing never even enters the picture.
4. Content. currently the plan is to roll out servers near the customer with commonly viewed content, and less requested content will sit in a main library. whjen obscure stuff is requested it streems to the systems near the consumers, and then played out. ive seen systems right now with 500 titles. HBO is about to provide their content soon. Sapranos any time you want.
5. Porn. porn far and away is the biggest money maker.
"Imagine being able to pull up 2001: A Space Odyssey at 2:38 a.m.."
Wow, you Californians are high-tech!!!
Ever heard of Kazaa, Lopster, or freakin' BLOCKBUSTER?
Bowie J. Poag
This is a whole new infrastructure to support sub-NTSC quality video. Will this slow the transition to HDTV? Or will you be able to order movies as a 1080p 24fps 16:9 stream? If you could do that, getting a HDTV monitor would be worth it.
I work in the ITV industry and I have to say that this will not happen overnight. Most digital cable plants out there broadcast over a 27 Mbit pipe. This pipe is not wide enough to accomodate more than a couple of channels of really low quality VOD (they lower the quality of the mpeg compression to accomodate the bandwidth).
In order for most cable plants to offer true high quality video on demand with more selections than this, they have to upgrade everything from the equipment in the cable plant to the wire running into your home. Given the speed at which Cable Companies change the technology that they use, I give this five to ten years before we actually see it.
Sorry to burst everyone's bubble.