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New Agreement May End the Cable Box
esocid clues us to news that Sony and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association have come to agreement on the way forward for two-way TV without set-top boxes. The actual agreement was not made public, pending review by other members of the Consumer Electronics Association, and as a result the coverage of the agreement is uniformly pretty incoherent. The background is that the NCTA and the CEA submitted competing proposals to the FCC on how to handle two-way, interactive TV services. None of the articles I turned up made clear what the future of the CableCard is to be. This was an interim solution to allow competition in set-top box manufacture, but its adoption has been plagued with problems. "Sony and the cable companies — Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cox, Charter, Cablevision, and Bright House Networks — agreed to adopt: the Java-based 'tru2way' solution powered by CableLabs; new streamlined technology licenses; and new ways for all those involved to cooperate in the development of tru2way technology at CableLabs."
Like this would really happen. Do they expect people to buy new TVs so they simply don't have to use a cable box? People go with the cheaper option.
new streamlined technology licenses;
Engineer: Faster, cheaper, more reliable, more efficient.
Businessman: Slightly less annoying, but still entirely arbitrary, restrictions on how you can what you already paid for.
Next time you wonder "what the hell has gone wrong us as a species", ask yourself which of those two run the world.
Sorting Through the Analog to Digital TV Mess
Many Analog TV Watchers Aren't Aware of Upcoming Switchover
FCC Says Analog TV Lives Until 2012
A streaming webcam built into every TV. What could possibly go wrong?
At least now, I really do have a use for all that duct tape I bought a few years back.
without set-top boxes
Set-top boxes have been gone for ages..
flat-screen TVs are just too thin for that
-- LP-Research
A lot of cable companies rely on the ignorance of the average consumer to put cable boxes out there. Cable boxes are a way of insuring higher rates. If they have to have a box to watch TV, then the company can charge per box. There's more than one cable company that doesn't even have analog TV going over their cable anymore with lame excuses to the customer sighting imaginary technical reasons such as "you can't do regular analog cable once you deploy digital" or "The FCC says we have to do digital now" (that's broadcast, not cable). A lot of them refuse to do QAM, etc.... on the same basis so you have to pay for the proprietary box and lock in.
A standard is good for consumers, not for cable companies.
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It looks like those of you who wanted a brand-new Internet might just get it.
You guys actually *watch* TV when you have the internet??
Seriously though... this opencable platform has some undeniable hacking potential. Replace a MythTV box with an opencable compatible media center application... in Java! Somebody should do up some perl bindings...
BLAM!
Thanks to regulation and corporate agreements CableLabs now gets to be the new "standard". Translation: latest pseudo monopoly courtesy of the cable companies. American capitalism hard at work.
That is, if you actually have any. Motorola, once great, has been sent to oblivion by management with no clue of their business, just Wall Street stuff. Cable boxes were about the last thing they made.
what a sad story, from greatness to ruin.
* Carthago Delenda Est *
I have a strange suspicion that a standard decided upon by Sony and the cable companies will be good for no one...
The history of the CableCard is long and confusing. Particularly because the cable companies don't want you to adopt it. Then they lose their cable box renting fee. 2truway is just the next step in the CableCard evolution.
Originally, CableCards only had one directional transmission capability. This prevented services such as on demand, pay per view, and guide data. At least, that's what the cable companies wanted you to think. In actuality, the hardware (developed by independent companies) for the cards supported 2-way transmissions. The hardware complied with the CableCard 2.0 specification but the software for each card did not. The cable companies didn't want manufacturers to use their own software in the boxes/televisions/DVRs that would be using the cable cards. No, the cable companies wanted them to use OpenCable Application Platform (OCAP). Of course this isn't an open platform at all.
Picture your Tivo now, with its great recording software. Compare that to the crappy software your cable company uses on their DVR. Well, the OCAP part of the CableCard 2.0 standard requires all hardware be running the cable company's software. In other words, your Tivo would have to be running Comcast/Cox/whoever's horrid interface instead of the standard one. At least, that's how I understand it.
Consumer electronics companies didn't like this at all. So they fought and protested, allowing the CableCard standard in general to slowly die. That's why most new TVs now don't even have card slots.
CableLabs eventually realized that this just wouldn't work. So, they decided "hey, let's just rename OCAP to something cooler." Thus, Tru2way was born from the remnants of OCAP, a subset of the CableCard 2.0 spec. The cable companies also lightened up on the licensing restrictions for the software. Now, the Tru2way standard is getting much more support. Why? I'm really not sure. All I know is that more television companies are saying they'll be adding support for it (and thus cablecards) in their upcoming television models.
I think that's a fairly accurate summary of the history of CableCard and tru2way. No, this will not replace CableCards. Actually, this is just another step in the process towards adopting them.
Frankly, my only concern is that I'm allowed to use my open source MythTV box with a CableCard in order to record shows off encrypted QAM channels like Discovery HD. Currently, I cannot do this due to the ridiculous certified media center PC and Vista requirement. If anyone knows a way around this, please tell me. The analog cutoff is looming and I don't want to lose my recording ability.
Two non-flamebait Java-related stories in a row? WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO THE REAL SLASHDOT??
No, but seriously. First Bluray wins and now this. There must be some wailing and gnashing of teeth going on at Redmond now.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
You said "Java" TOO FAST. You need to sssslllllooooowwwwww ddddoooowwwwnnnn.....
I already canceled my cable tv service, and life is just so much better without it. (no, I did not switch to FiOS TV or to satellite either) TV sucks more than an MMO.
Modding Trolls +1 inciteful since 1999
Yes, the cable companies love to rip on consumers. I've got a Sony TV with a built-in OTA and cable tuners with a cable card slot. Both Comcast and Charter claimed they do not know what I am talking about when I ask for a card for my TV's tuner. Both services had install people who also claimed they didn't know what I was talking about even while showing them the slot on the back of the TV.
I find it hard to believe that three people (Comcast sent two monkeys to set up my last service, Charter sent one the year prior) who install cable for a living had no idea what a cable card is, not to mention not knowing TVs come with built-in tuners. It wasn't a huge deal, but I wanted to use the third tuner while both of the PVRs tuners were tied up recording things my roommate wanted and I wasn't interested in seeing.
While Java is good for many things, low cost embedded devices don't typically run Java. It's not the best language for real time systems.
The reason cable providers are trying to offline analog (2-125) cable channels is very simple, bandwidth. In the space of one of those analog channels, we can push 6 SD digital channels and 2-3 HD channels down the pipe, It's a hell of a lot cheaper to the cable company to force the "cost" (a cable box/cablecard) for every connected device to the end user than to implement higher frequency plant or try switched digital video. It levels the playing field as well, Sat TV and most FTT* networks have terminating boxes per TV or a centralized terminating device and RF remotes (Next Level/Motorola's DSL based video product).
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
The parent really could use a bump to the top of the conversation. The bit about OCAP/tru2way is the critical bit of information out of this announcement.
When Comcast wins, we all lose. This agreement signifies that the CEA has gone ahead and finally agreed to CableLabs terms; compliant devices will have to run the local cable company's Java middleware. This severely limits what 3rd party cable tuners can do, it will allow manufacturers to add functionality that doesn't relate directly to manipulating the signal (e.g. playing back movies from a file server) but it will prevent manufacturers from offering anything that involves the signal (no custom guides, no additional recording options, no custom interface, etc). Basically cable TV is now a Java application in hardware enforced authentication chain - your cable company will dictate what you get to watch and how. If they (or the networks they partner with) decide you can't keep a recorded program forever for example, then their middleware can be set to enforce that, and there's nothing you can do.
Crappy middleware for all, freedom (both to record and to innovate) for none!
I do not have Digital Cable. The reason is I don't want to use a Digital cable box to get cable because I have a MythTV PVR and the cable box would ruin that. So I need to ask, is there a ATSC based Digital cable standard that my MythTV PVR can use to get the unencrypted Digital channels from the cable company? Is this availible as part of say, a VHS VCR?
The problem is far worse than 99.9% of the public realizes yet. Why? SDV (Switched Digital Video) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switched_digital_video
It is being rolled out even now, and creating chaos for users of cable cards, TiVo, Media Centers, Myth, etc. Why is this a nightmare? Because SDV is *INCOMPATIBLE* with *EVERYTHING* out there that doesn't belong to the cable company. I bought a new HD TiVo months ago and it worked great. I had access to everything I wanted, and in ways far superior to the Cox-rented "DVR". Then Cox suddenly, without warning, without TELLING anyone, without even training their support staff, rolled out SDV and all the new HD channels were suddenly unavailable to anyone that didn't have "approved" Cox-owned equipment.
I was FURIOUS! SDV totally defeats the ENTIRE purpose of cable cards. There was nothing TiVo could do about it. And I wasted countless hours on the phone with clueless "support" techs at Cox and with them coming to my house. Their only suggestion? Throw away all my equipment and rent the "wonderful" Cox "DVR". And after weeks of this nightmare, Cox suddenly stopped using SDV on the new HD channels and everything returned to normal. Why? Who knows? They wouldn't say. Perhaps a lot of people like me were complaining? (Every person using anything with a cable card was affected). Perhaps Cox even had problems with their own equipment.
But one thing is for sure, it is not going away... I am positive it will be back. Other cable companies are either experimenting with it now or have already ruined the experience of many of their customers by implementing it "permanently".
Supposedly TiVo is working with the cable companies to develop yet another "box" that would sit between the TiVo and the cable to address SDV. But how much will THAT cost? What other problems will it cause? And that does nothing at all for non-TiVo users.
The real kicker is that Cox didn't even really NEED to implement SDV, there was plenty of bandwidth to add all the new HD channels (as they have now proved). And if they were running low on bandwidth, why didn't they put only some of the obscure/(IMHO "stupid") channels on SDV, not things like History Channel, National Geographic, Discover Channel, etc?
My advice? Email your cable company's PR departments NOW and tell them you do not want SDV, especially in its current form. And if nothing else, they should act responsibly and tell all current AND FUTURE customers, EXACTLY what SDV means.
It takes a /. user to put cable company conspiracies on par with our war troubles.
:)
Then folks wonder why facebook has a higher average IQ according to that 60 second test the other day.
You should send a complaint to the FCC.
Seriously, how is this a win? I've had a perfectly adequate TV for years and years now, and three or four different cable boxes in the same time frame. Each cable box has had better features that I wanted, but I've never felt the urge to replace my TV. What's so great about a system that would force me to replace BOTH devices when I only wanted to upgrade one? I mean, it would cost me a lot of money--
Ah. I get it now.
Never approach a vast undertaking with a half-vast plan.
...I only subscribed to the basic package. My VCR had a cable tuner and all was well. But, that isn't two-way.
Frankly, I don't know if I like the idea of cable company knowing what channel I was watching at every moment of the day. From a marketers PoV, that sort of the data would be far more valuable than Neilson, as it would be a representation of the literally the entire viewing audience.
Bearded Dragon
Basically you had the cable companies pushing one option and the likes of TiVO pushing another option.
The TiVO proposal involved defining standard data formats for video on demand, pay per view, TV guide, that thing where they map multiple channels to one physical channel space on the cable etc. The head end would only send data to the device which would interpret it and display it using a UI designed by the device manufacturer.
The cable companies proposed (and seem to have gotten) that all boxes supporting the 2-way functionality implement a custom Java variant and that the programs and data for 2-way functionality are all delivered from the head end. The cable companies wanted this because A.They can then control the look and feel of the UI for the TV guide, video-on-demand, pay-per-view etc and B.They are able to use OCAP as a platform for all the interactive voting, interactive games and other stuff (which makes the cable companies even MORE money than they already get from subscription fees and advertising)
I don't want a cable company spying on me. I started being concerned with this around 1982 when I was a subscriber to QUBE cable system. I had read about people claiming to be charged for movies they never watched. That actually happened to me once at an overnight hour I was asleep though they did delete the charges. Then I found that QUBE had managed to pull my credit report even though I had not given them an SSN. I was also getting 2 to 3 times as much junk mail and telemarketing phone calls compared to before and after I lived in Columbus.
So I guess I will have to use a reverse blocking amplifier to prevent any reverse signals from the TV that might expose what channels I'm choosing to watch. Of course that won't work in the future when cable systems go entirely to switched programming (but that would be an all new standard for TVs so it's still at least a while in the future).
Oh, and before anyone tries to tell me that they could be spying on my internet traffic right now, all they see are SSH sessions between my router and one of several servers I have access do. Dynamic (SOCKS based) port forwarding is a nice feature. Yeah, yeah, the server providers could be spying on me, but I'm not so worried about them.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
A custom-made for each network plug-in card that conforms to a standard (user-interface menu & cable signal inputs, video & menu output) that plugs inside the television backpane could do the trick here. With a plug-in, every "competing" network could have all the "features" it wants without having to kow-towing to a deliberately debilitated, unupgradeable television standard.
What I really care about right now is making sure that it's easy and cheap/free for content creators to make their work available on the next generation platform. (And there should be some kind of del.icio.us-like system to allow content to get popular by word of mouth.)
I perused the applicable sites, and I can't seem to find any indication on how "open" this platform really is. Does anyone know?
That was then, now it's about control. I've been out of the Biz long enough and my NDA's have expired so I can talk about it.
Cable companies DESPERATELY want to force cable boxes on everyone for 3 main reasons.
1 - it allows them to cut their installer workforce by 2/3rd's. if you can leave the CATV connection to every home live and use cable boxes to disconnect service you save way more money and can increase profits and executive salaries.
2 - It allows demographic data collection. right now they pay Nielsen and Scarborough for Demo data. this is expensive and old data (last month, Last quarter). By forcing the use of cable boxes I can gather and monitor demographic data hour by hour and minute by minute. I can tell advertisers that 65,000 people in the #23 market saw their ad. This allows my sales people to pressure the customer (not you, people that BUY ad's are the customer you are the product) to buy more.
3 - Content protection. By going cable box only it eliminates these damned Tivo's and other PVR's thjat allow commercial skip. Fast Forward is OK because you still view the commercial and the company's name get's imprinted. with more and more content companies buying voting shares in cable companies they also want to protect their assets from you damned consumers.
THOSE are the only reason they want the cable box forced upon everyone and in that order. They will save a CRAPLOAD by getting rid of a huge chunk of their workforce. and then being able to generate their own demographic data instead of buying it is next in line.
every bit of it is about making them more money and none of it is about you.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I wouldn't put a Sony set top box on my TV, or want to buy a TV with Sony proprietary patented technology inside. A company that would install a deliberately install a computer rootkit on a music CD cannot be trusted inside my home.
Besides that, I was a victim of their rootkit and don't want another penny of my money going to them either directly of indirectly. If Sony is getting patent fees for any devise whatever, I don't want that device.
Why is a Japanese company in negotiations with American broadcasters? Isn't Motorola or Apple or some other American company competent to do this? Would this company please go away, or at least stay in Japan?
And finally, why do we need "interactive TV" anyway? Computers are for interactivity, TVs are for passive watching. What's next, interactive movies? I thought those were called "video games"?
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I like my sweet, sweet analog cable coming in straight to my tv. No broadcast flag, no CableCard, and no cable box. Do you really need more than 100 channels?
Calvin:Do you believe in the devil? Hobbes:I'm not sure man needs the help.
"Marketing" is killing entertainment in this country (perhaps the world). I'm seriously at a loss to try to think of something that someone hasn't tried to attach marketing to. The earth the sky, the water, the very air we breath.
I turn on the TV, I'm assaulted by ads, I browse the web, I'm assaulted by ads, I drive my car, I have at least two advertisements in my field of view at all times, I sit at home with my doors locked they call me on the phone or knock on the door. If I pay to watch a movie without commercials I see product placement that goes beyond just happenstance within the story.
I'm so inundated with marketing I only watch 1 TV show now, use an IRiver instead of the radio, and I visit a select few websites on a regular bases. None of those website attempts to inflict the ever sophisticated back door pop-ups or the ever annoying flash hanging over the article tactic. (thought they may link to them)
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why can't they have a system like in hotels that use a mini box and card in the tv and has a control link so you can use the TV remote to use the menus. They had 2 way links for years you can even play games over them. Right now they have SDV, VOD, PPV, in room check out, and more. They of had this for a long time also. The cable co will just mess this up and find a way to make you pay $6.99+ per tv or even more for a DRV. Sat is at $4.99 a box.
Those systems were completely different cable technology than what the cable companies use. Buy "cable tech" I mean "network protocols". The hardware in the hotels was completely different.
The company I work for used to make those systems but is now involved in more modern cable systems. Those hotel systems were great - blazingly fast and reliable. They were not scalable - a few 100 simultaneous users at most.
"You need a license to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp." - Red Green
Rigged elections, pollution and the environment, and a war based on lies does not really concern Joe six-pack; but mess with his TV and you WILL feel the backlash.
I suspect cable companies don't realize how angry people will be once they realize that the 4-5 TVs in their house will no longer work (without a box) as digital cable is forced down the throats of their customers.
Just recently Cablevision started to move analog channels to their digital service which means one day you have a channel, and the next day you don't unless you rent a box from the cable company.
Cablevision just did this to me. It would cost me another $20 a month just to get a couple of perfectly fine analog TVs working again, on top of my $160/mo I already give the cable company. My solution was to go to Dish Network - they gave me all the boxes I need for about $20 LESS a month than I pay now - and no contract.
Soon I'll be moving my voice service to Broadvoice. Eventually my plan is to buy NO services from Cablevision at all.
Vote with your wallet and these idiots might start listening to their customers.
-ted
This isn't entirely true. Cable companies still rent out the cable cards, so they don't lose the fee. The real reason they don't want you to adopt it is that they want you to be trapped in their "interactive TV" system, instead of seeing somebody else's screens.
This also misses the big point that most people miss when it comes to CableCARD 2.0. Specifically that there is no reason for the card to support bi-directional communications for any of the services that the cable companies claim it will be used for. Switched digital video, video on demand, pay-per-view, etc... Those can all be supported with any device at all doing the transmitting. Since the CableCARD is supposedly a decryption device primarily, there's no reason that outgoing communications need to pass through the card. This is especially true since in a CableCARD 2.0 bi-directional device, the DOCSIS hardware is in the CableCARD compliant device, and not in the card itself. The only reasons to have a bi-directional CableCARD are so the cable company can choose what data to send back (things a third party box might not choose to send, like what channels you're watching, etc..), and to lock you into their screens. A bi-directional CableCARD is essentially a PCMCIA form-factor cable box.
This will never happen. The cable industry has tricked the FCC into a back-door in the integration ban. You will have a cable box, but it will be tiny, and unlike old-style cable boxes they can now also dictate what you can attach it to. This is why this new spec is suddenly getting more support. They are claiming more control over their customer's use of their signal, while claiming openness.
> In the space of one of those analog channels, we can push 6 SD digital channels and 2-3 HD channels down the pipe
Great... 6x more CRAP or 3x more CRAP at high resolution.
Neither of these is anything I care about as a consumer. I am not convinced that
anyone else really cares about this either. Although it probably is easy to "wow
the rubes" with absurd claims about how many channels you have.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
For those that don't want two-way communication, they need only add a CableCard to their recent TVs. Older sets are stuck with cable boxes, but cable companies must, under FCC mandate, allow third-party systems like TiVo to access their networks, provided they use an authenticating technology (CableCard or tru2way, in this case). I believe that even the new cable boxes being bought by cable companies are required to use these technologies, though they can still use older inventory to replace existing installations.
I've been desperately holding onto my Moxi system (holdover from Adelphia) pending the release of the TiVo Series 4, which is waiting on tru2way to be completed, even though it's starting to have some recording glitches, because the standard TW DVR is a maddeningly frustrating beast which will never come into my home. Series 4 has an uncertain delivery time frame, but I will gladly give up my existing DVR and pay more monthly for the TiVo (I get the DVR now for $12 per month, and the TiVo, presuming a $400 box and a $299, three-year subscription works out to just a little shy of $20 each month).
It is about making money. But they're making no money if the customer refuses to buy the service because it's either too onerous or because they can find a better deal elsewhere, such as satellite or telcos.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
I'm not saying they are all good channels but someone must be watching if they stay on the air.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
CableLabs has been the standard for almost the last 20 years. It was founded to standardize cable television and data technology.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
4) Upsell. This takes a couple of different forms. A cable box allows them to control the channel-listing UI and force you to see what's showing on the channels you did not choose to subscribe to. It's like the telemarketers who want to call people on the Do-Not-Call list because if you hammer people enough some of them will get tempted by your product anyway. The cable companies won't get this with Tru2Way. Another form of upsell is Video-On-Demand which I'll assume your work in the "Biz" made you well aware is highly profitable. This is a key differentiator between CableCards (even two-way CableCards) and Tru2Way -- no VOD for CableCards; VOD with Tru2Way -- and gives me reason to believe cable comapnies (other than mom-n-pop ones) will embrace Tru2Way better than they did CableCard.
Interesting side-thought: SDV allows cable companies to perform their own demographic data collection even from subscribers (love the way they use that term instead of "customers"!) who are using a CableCard host or Tru2Way host. Your comment on the value of in-house demographic data collection suggests that cable companies have an economic incentive to move a majority of their channels over to SDV even, or especially, if those channels are high-viewer channels such as the broadcast networks or ESPN.
***The above comment was brought to you by IRiver. Remember, the next time you get sick of ads, get an IRiver. IRiver will make your life better than you ever though it could be. IRiver is guaranteed to reduce the amount of marketing you take in. IRiver should not be used by people with liver or kidney problems. IRiver should not be used while driving, until you have used it long enough to know how IRiver will affect you. Use IRiver responsibly.
In fact in some european country, the set-top boxes provided aren't designed to be connected to anything else but a TV set.
Whereas with a VCR, you don't depend on an exernal box and on what the provider decided to let you do. You just plug the damn VCR to the cable and do pretty much whatever you want to do.
You don't need a specific box obtainable only from your provider. You only need a VCR that you can acquire from wherever you want or even build one yourself given enough knowledge (and in a way, that what thousands of users are doing by building HTPC using MythTV, VDR or whatever)
With the new DRMed settop boxes you lose that freedom.
Yes, the cable company needs to have some global access control, just to be sure that only paying customers have access to the paid content. But they should only limit themselves to that. Standards already exist for the satellites (CAM - control access modules). As long as you insert the correct card into a compatible CAM you can do pretty much everything.
But instead, what we are starting to see is cable companies who force you to rent *their* box and that's the only single way to access the content of their channels.
This situation may not apply in all countries, but that's what I'm seeing here around (Switzerland).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Poorly written, but insightful - everyone should memorize this.
TV watchers are the product. Advertisers are the buyers of the product. Don't get it backwards.
"I'll be annoyed when my analog antenna stops working, but hopefully by then a digital antenna + tuner will be $20."
Sorry, but no matter how you send the information, it all ends up as an analog waveform. Your analog antenna will NEVER be useless. Digital DOES NOT FUCKING EXIST. It's really sad nobody can get that thru their heads. That electrical 'digital' signal traveling thru the silicon in your processor? Analog waveform in the form of electricity. The damned tech should be called "Partialog" since they're only using parts of an analog wave to create 'digital.'
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
In fact, I'd pay extra just for the "your box votes for the shows you like" feature.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
This has been in the works for a long time.
Most of the cable box vendors are already standardized on DOCSIS3.0 and OCAP. OCAP is an OpenCable Application Platform that is based on Java and most cable boxes already are using it, this is why they are so darn slow when pulling up channel guides and flipping channels, and let's not forget the occasional crash.
Cable TV people don't do anything fast or radical, I don't know if I'd call them conservative as much as lethargic.
So now the marketing people have invented a new pretend technical term "tru2way" and we are supposed to believe they have done something innovative, while really they are just starting to roll out 5 year old technology. Yawn...
These cable boxes really are terrible.
At some point far enough out in the future we will just have a flat TCP/IP network for everything and everyone will live on the same even playing field.
Then I will be able to watch Star Wars IX on opening day using 3D video goggles in 4K Digital Cinema resolution on my Google IPTV Set top box streaming live in real time.
I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso
"Technology license" is code for "Only an elite club may make interoperable devices." In other words, they're working hard to create a situation where cable TV remains obsolete and downloading (maybe even pirating) content over IP is the smartest (and more importantly: easiest and most trouble-free) thing to do.
Sheesh, it's like the jerkwads are trying to kill themselves.
Wanna stay in the TV business? Give us a standard. I mean a real standard, where developers can read the specs for free and implement a receiver without having to pay or agree to anything. You know, like just about everything on the Internet. Licensed "standards" are not standards.
They should be making making it as easy as possible, for developers to create incentives for people to become or remain cable company customers. Instead, they're just talking with the "big" electronics manufacturers, to continue to maintain barriers for people to add value and usability to being cable TV customers. Brilliant.
Wake up, cable company stockholders. Your assets are being sabotaged.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
If you think TV's all crap then why do you care at all? Why are you even in this thread? I mean, other than to whine.
its the law they have to provide you one http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2005/octqtr/47cfr76.640.htm
-- if you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine
additionally:
- They get to PROFIT from loaning the cable box. They're typically paid for in less than a year (HDTV DVRs take about 3). After that it;s all profit, and don't forget the remotes too
- They don't have to mess with supporting hundreds of TV sets with built in adapters, and can quickly replace a troublesome cable box, typically by making YOU bring it to THEM, saving onsite services. TVs are not nearly as portable, so diagnosing cable card issues will be expensive and time consuming.
- Cable cards, like satelite cards, can almost certainly be hacked to allow additional chanel access, or potentially, completely free service.
- Expanding on the control of what type of DVR you use, they can make certain you can't offload content to DVD or PC easily or at all. This both ensures you actually BUY freely broadcasted TV programs either online or in box sets if you want to own copies, and also ensures you can't rip wreslemania or some HBO movie to DVD and bring it to a friend's house who didn't pay to see it. You can allways use a settop DVD recorder, but then you get stuck with commercials forever embeded in the media...
- further expanding on the DVR, most people leave a significant amount of unwatched content on their DVR, and canceling your service means loosing all those recorded programs, something that's kept some people I know from switching to competitors.
- The old line "with a 3rd party box, or with cable card, some services you use today won't be available or won't work the same" FUD scare tactics that keep the ignorant (90% of their clients) in line.
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
WARNING OBLIGATORY POSTING
"Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television"
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28694
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
I'm a Cox customer and every spring I cancel cable, and every winter I sign back up. I've been doing that for about 6 years now, and every time they can do it all immediately when I call customer service. So at least in my area, connecting and disconnecting the signal is something that can be toggled on/off from the station. I have a box, but also have a few tv's that I just run the analog signal from, so I know it's not being controlled by the box, and the actual line is being turned on and off. Since the advent of the DVR, the Nielsen ratings are kind of messed up. I thought I read that they will count shows as being watched from a DVR if it's within some reasonable amount of time( I thought it was 48 or 72 hours). I'm not sure how they do that, they would have to be worknig with the DVR manufacturers and services to get that data. I think companies like Tivo are sitting on a gold mine for advertising. It seems like it's in their best interest to not sell Neilsen any information and try to one-up them. I wonder if it would be possible to do a sort of "nader trader" web site for tv shows with horrible ratings. People with DVR's could agree to swap tv shows with some other tv show that has horrible ratings, and play it back on the DVR at night while they are sleeping and possibly artificially inflate the ratings?
Let's be serious here guys, Sony is hardly on the side of the consumer now-a-days and if they're proposing any standard, I shake in fear of the evil DRM aspects going in there. You know Sony would love to shove the broadcast flag down our throat. How ironic the company that invented time shifting ~32yrs ago might become the biggest opponent to it.
What the hell is it with people like you? My roommate is the same way, and because he seems to actively look for an excuse to be vocally and loudly offended by everything that doesn't exactly conform to his worldview, it's just DAMNED annoying to try to watch any form of entertainment with him around.
See, there's a way to deal with being "assaulted" by marketing and advertising...you *fucking ignore* it like everyone else, and resist the urge to bitch. Try it sometime.
Like I've asked so many times before, what's more annoying - excessive advertising, or people who sit there and *constantly* bitch about excessive advertising?
Most of the channels pay the cable companies to carry their programs. And the channel in turn makes money through advertisement. The consumer is not really the customer here; instead, the consumer's eyeballs are the goods that are for sale.
If the consumers weren't so ready to pay for cable service, the cable companies would offer it for free, and still make money from the channels that they carry.
That should give you an idea, why most of the content is so poor and merely a cheap vehicle to help deliver ads.
Pay-per-view and premium channels are different, but those are the once that consumers have to pay extra for.
4. Lock in. For someone like me who has two $700 HD-PVRs the chances that I will switch services is really low. If it wasn't for hardware lock in I would have dropped my service a long time ago. Ok that's a lie, I live in a Condo where the strata doesn't allow dishes so they are really my only option.
Lots of cable networks are at capacity. To fit more channels in, they are deploying Switched Digital Video (SDV). Essentially, their backbone carries more channels than the cable to the homes can handle, so the switches between the backbone and the homes decide which channels to send based on what is being watched.
For this to work, your box (or television) must be able to send a request to the head-end that says "I'd like to watch Discovery Channel 7: All Sharks and Motorcycles," which is then routed to you.
As it stands, people with cablecard boxes like Tivos are discovering that they suddenly lose any less-popular channels put into the "switched" pool, because CableCard is currently a one-way standard only.
You want a bigger pipe to the internet? This is the place to start. Analog eats up that pipe that could be going to your upstream.
Billboards, radio, television, placement etc... Fine, I'll ignore it.
What the fuck do you expect me to do about tresspassing advertising like a ringing telephone (I work nights, a ringing phone in the day is BAD), knocks on the door, spam in the inbox, junk mail that makes it feel like I am the one wasting paper, or jackasses knocking on the window of my car when I come up to a stop light? Those are a little bit harder to ignore.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
cable providers do not make the boxes and do not write the software for them the box providers do so re think who does not want the cable card to go away. also being on the install side of the cable industry i have seen lg pioneer and sony all have issues with the cable card standard. only the hardware interface to the card is dictated each company has to plan how to use it in the tv this hashing of ideas causes continual issues.
Technology will default in society to its most rudimentary level:::stupid computers for stupid users:::
This is just completely idiotic. Do you really have any real world experience with digital cable? Do you know how sensative they can be to signal levels? Have you ever had to manage CLI? Do you know what happens to an unmanaged catv system that doesnt have regular technician intervention?
Once upon a time, you had to turn on a light or pick up the phone or answer the door before somebody could tell if you were at home.
Now, activity on your internet link and/or your set-top cable box and/or (soon) your TV advertises your presence.
Wonder how long it will be until the cable companies automagically feed that info to telemarketers and/or bill collectors and/or your ex and/or professional burglars - for a fee? (And/or one or more government agencies - for free!)
lolll...hey, somebody should patent that idea and lock it away in a deep, dark closet somewhere...
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
Did I miss anything?
Well, considering your attitude instead of paying the trash company to pick up trash I'll just dump it all in your yard, because as you said - recycle bin. It is your friend - when applied to things you didn't request
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Thanks for the heads up...BTW, what time do you plan on showing up in my front yard? I may suddenly have another use for that loaded pistol.