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Cisco Plans Its Home Invasion
theodp writes "Despite lots of scars from earlier consumer craziness which included an Internet-connected fridge, Newsweek reports Cisco has set its sights on your living room, including videoconferencing which would let CEO John Chambers watch his beloved Duke basketball with far-away relatives. While recent acquisitions of Linksys and Scientific Atlanta make Cisco the only company that can come in on top of technology that's already inside homes, some skeptics say speaking to the consumer is simply not in Cisco's genes."
Just because the CEO thinks something is cool doesn't mean the general public will. I've used all kinds of high end video conferencing systems and none of them come anywhere close to replicating the experience of being in the same room with other people. And that's in a business setting. The difference between being together and being hooked up on video conference would be even greater for social situations. Throw in the lesser quality that they're going to have to go with for a home system over a business system for cost reasons and things look really dim. Which isn't to say there would be any market, just that the experience is not likely to be compelling enough to become a big seller.
The dude writing the article should not should not just copy/paste something produced by Cisco market department. The remote controll as it is today is quite simply not suited for this expanded functionality, and I like my remote control to be small and not a big keyboard.
I'm not worried. I have a panic room.
Are Cisco intent on stopping all social interaction of any kind? If i want to watch the football and ogle the cheerleaders with some friends, i generally invite them over to the house, light up a barbecue and get beer out of the fridge. Cisco possibly suspect that we are all germophobes who hate leaving the confines of our house or interacting with humanity of any kind. Humanity may be evolving, but there is still that caveman/woman in us that needs to have our own social groups and interact with them. Half of the human language is based on physical presence, and this just takes all of that away. John Chambers must be living in some deluded Lawnmower Man fantasy land.
The only way consumers will have any control is if Cisco-SA-Linksys stay the hell out of the content business and have enough money and clout to tell the content business to get stuffed.
Otherwise it's Sony all over again. The consumer isn't seen as the real customer.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
"While recent acquisitions of Linksys..." 3 years ago.
Microsoft, Intel, AMD and now Cisco all have this strange belief (mostly via their idiot CEOs) that they're going to make this triumphant entry into peoples' living rooms. I'm afraid they are PC software and hardware companies, and nothing more. They just don't have what it takes in the same way as Apple, LG and other consumer electronics companies do.
There's also the issue of the use OF DRM, and the paradox that the only way you can make a digital home is to make content flow like water i.e. it's free (like peoples' MP3 collections today) or ridiculously cheap. There's no way that's going to happen legitimately.
There's also the issue that the average home user can't afford a home network, a central Windows Media server or ridiculously expensive Cisco equpment.
These silly PC companies are all pissing patterns in the snow.
The home networking scene is a mess! There are overlapping wireless frequencies everywhere and plenty of security holes. Linksys has done well, but so much more is possible. How about for starters; whole-property roaming coverage, media server hooked to my stereo, backup storage, a bot system to handle my chores, multi-channel video capture, an inbound VPN listener for access into my home network while out and about, and a personal Web server. I welcome cisco into my home if it can give me these things - and it can. However, I am a consumer and demand much from my sources of technology - including transparency.
Cisco obviously has the technology, it's the marketing that needs to change. I guarantee that my mother would have trouble identifying Cisco's core technology and even if she knew of their domain, would have trouble identifying them as a brand she should look for at Best Buy. -- Jim http://www.runfatboy.net/
Well, if you look at the top left corner on this site, you'll see that Linksys is a division of Cisco Systems. The very same Cisco that is the subject of the article.
I really don't think they are planning on selling the standard home user a 7200VXR chassis!
"Well, good luck finding a judge that doesn't run a bestiality site."
I know it is just a nit-pick, but using the example of video conferencing with friends that are so far away made me think about game broadcast blackout areas. I mean, how can I watch a football game with friends across the country if they're not "allowed" to watch the game anyway?
Or, more to the point... will the NFL/MPAA/[insert anti-digital copying lobby] go after this device since, to get around said blackout, I could point it at my TV and share the experience with said friends?
Diplomacy is the art of saying, "Nice doggie!" until you can find a rock.
(previously on Slashdot...) Non-business customers won't tolerate the scam that Cisco make you go through when buying second-hand kit -- that they make sure you "relicense" the embedded software to the new owner when selling on your old kit (the software that's completely irrelevant to anything other than the hardware they sold it with). The list price of a "relicense" is usually 60-90% of the original hardware cost ... Cisco say they're only getting what's due to them but it's just rather dubious attempt at control over a legitimate after-market.
I'm not sure that the business culture that produced this kind of revenue scraping is going to know how to sell to the general public.
Matthew @ Bytemark Hosting
I don't know about the states, but around here when we say "home invasion", we mean "Kick in the door and beat the crap out of the residents so we can take their stuff."
It's a term they use in the criminal code too; it's not slang.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
Jeez, it must be tough being the super-successful CEO of a super-successful company. You come up with this great idea to invade people's living-rooms - why bother to be asked in? - and then learn that you'll have to take your place in the queue. A few other guys are eager to knock the door down and start lifting Joe Sixpack's wallet: Microsoft, Apple, Intel, AMD, Sony, Samsung, AOL Time-Warner, Google, Amazon, a dozen telcos, a couple of dozen huge media combines like NI, several hundred ISPs, a clutch of VOIP outfits, Blockbuster, Hollywood, the music industry, major retail chains, and a few thousand internet fraud artists and phishing rings. One at a time boys!
I guess this is some kind of bullshit bubble. There aren't enough living-rooms to go round to service this lot even once, and when folks discover that the "living-room of the future" offers the same crap TV as today except with overpriced and murky video-conferencing, they are likely to fit a few new locks on the door and get out the big scissors when they see Mr Suit's fingers straying towards their wallet again. Me, I'm going to stay inside and watch a couple of dozen CEOs brawling and shouting on the lawn outside.
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Let's see what Cisco has done with one of their product lines - the venerable WRT54G. They've taken the G, then the GS, chopped the RAM, chopped the flash, installed an OS that can't be readily enhanced (and charges a royalty), released a buggy-as-all-getout software image, and raised the price. Linksys has sold dozens of these things by making a good product in the consumer space, then Cisco [apparently] came in and screwed up the company. I've recommended hundreds of these over the past few years and that's been thoroughly squelched.
Don't get me wrong, I love a 3560 switch as much as the next guy, but their success in the technology aisle at Staples is a stinker.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I agree entirely. I would like to add to your point (if I may). One area where a command line owns over GUIs (and will for quite some time) is usability over a slow link. My employer's network has many sites that are literally hundreds of miles apart, and frequently unmanned. We have dialup modems hooked into console servers should we lose our internet link to these facilities. They're a little choppy, but they work. I can not imagine being able to run a GUI of any sort over that kind of connection. I don't wish IOS had a graphical way to set things up, in fact I'm glad it doesn't.
"Who's going to believe a talking head?" - Herbert West
comcast-sub03225697>
Password:
comcast-sub03225697#set vod op adult yes
comcast-sub03225697#set vod channel 561 on
comcast-sub03225697#set vod purchase hotsexynudenurses-ep1 confirm
I don't see them being too swift on the need for enabling one-handed remote use among today's cable and satellite users. Sort of like Cisco writing Windows. It would be like using Linux to surf for pr0n. Oh, wait...
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Anyone else have visions of a $2000 4MB Flash PCMCIA card inserted rectally in the privacy of one's own kitchen?
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
it's perfectly legitimate assuming part of the purchase involves signing some sort of actual pen and paper contract licensing the software. unlike most EULA's which tend to only stand up in court along the lines of "if you do x we will do y" and the buyer suing over action y, if you sign a contract that the license is non-transferable and the software is licensed not sold then you have no right to transfer the license.
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
OK let me bring some insight as to what potential is avaiable for Cisco to enter the home market.
h tml?CMP=ILC-001) also brings them in to the home security market.
Time Warner is one of Cisco's biggest customers. Time Warner is also a huge player in the broadband and home cable market.
Cisco's aquisition of Scientific Atlantic brings a Cisco owned product in to the home user cable market.
Cisco's recent agreement to purchase SyPixx Networks Inc (http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2006/corp_030706.
Now let's put the peices together.
Time Warner and Cisco are partners. Time Warner purchases Cisco equipment to provide VoIP and broadband services. Now lets add in a set top cable box. It is not unfeasable that Cisco will develop a way to utilize its virtual private storage solution in to this equation. What does this mean? Cisco becomes a service like TiVo. In fact take this to the service provider level instead of the home user level. Virtual Private Storage provisioned out to ever customer Time Warner has. Can you imagine 200+ channels of on demand video streams over IP to your TV through the cable box? Every single channel Time Warner provides stored on cisco storage clusters to provide consumers with prerecorded (or live) video 24 hours a day! It is actually a TiVo killer unless you want to record, but I dont think Cisco will leave that capability out of its set top boxes when this solution is offered.
Now add home surveilance in to the equation. Not only will your cable be provided on demand via IP video streams, 24 hour a day surveilance is now available. A home security system for your house provided by Cisco Systems, fully integratable to be accessed by your cable set top boxes so you can be weary of intruders before they know you are aware of them. Not only that, the slightest storage capability of these set top boxes can record the video and archive it on a storage solution offered by Cisco Systems, and remember, all provided through Time Warner Cable service.
For those that say Cisco is incapable of speaking to the home user market on the home user level, I have one word for you. Linksys.
-anonymous cisco employee
ps. Attn Cisco: GIT'R DONE! I love this company!
You know, I can just see some real tech guy, testing him to see how much disinformation he can get away with, trying not to choke with laughter..
Real Tech Guy: hehe. And uh, so we have this new hightech stuff that's just out on the market, it's called "category 5" cable. They uhm, they call it that because it's like hurricanes. Like, a category 5 hurricane is super powerful. So the network manufacturers stole that idea, and a category 5 cable is super powerful. Like a hurricane.
Brad Stone: huh. thats so cool.
Real Tech Guy: And uh, (choking sounds, as he tries not to laugh) uhmm, what else. So anyway, Cisco, they --
Brad Stone: Sysco?
Real Tech Guy:
Brad Stone: Mmmhm. I've heard of that.
Real Tech Guy: You can just call them "IRC" for short. hehehe. hhehehe...
Brad Stone: Thanks man! I'm gonna write all this up right now!
I was told that I could listen to the radio at a reasonable volume from nine to eleven...