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Intel Launches Wi-Di
Barence writes "Intel has launched a new display technology called Wi-Di at CES. Intel Wireless Display uses Wi-Fi to wirelessly transmit video from PCs running Intel's latest generation of Core processors to HD television sets. Televisions will require a special adapter made by companies such as Netgear — which will cost around $100 — to receive the wireless video signals. Intel also revealed its optical interconnect technology, Light Peak, will be in PCs 'in about a year.'"
if you can broadcast a signal to every set in your house, or even your entire apartment floor, then there goes a bunch of lucrative descrambler box fees. then again, they can all only show one channel at a time. however, media companies seem to all be losing income nowadays, and have all taken a hostile attitude towards new technology. they seem to need very little reason, however slim and irrational, to pick a fight with new technology
of course, the future is all streaming media over the internet, mostly on demand and mostly free, so they're all fucked
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
bada-bing-TISH! Thank you ladies and gentlemen, I'll be here all week.
Seriously, though, did their advertising people not spot what a silly name Wi-Di is?
Even better, now that it's wireless and just like my wireless internet, I'll get free TV, maybe even get to watch what they watch from the neighbor's houses!
http://www.beanleafpress.com
It was specifically mentioned that this "Wi-Di" link does not support HDCP(and thus won't count as a "protected link" for the purposes of playing back blu-ray disks, won't Joe consumer be confused and angered by that one?) so I suspect that that isn't the reason.
I'd chalk it up to a mixture of "don't want the hassle of having to test and tweak and validate on large numbers of old components not designed with it in mind" and the desire to drive the sale of more laptoops with new intel silicon in them.
I agree that it doesn't make sense for a desktop PC. However you are neglecting to consider a laptop. It can be a pain to attach and detach a laptop to a television or digital projector using a VGA cable. Imagine being able to sit down in your living room with your laptop and, from the couch, use only the laptop controls to transmit your screen to your television or projector. Imagine if everyone in the house had such a laptop, and they could all take turns using the same television to display their movies, music, games, etc.
Imagine if you could be at a business conference with a large video projector and hundreds of businesspeople all with laptops that were capable of wirelessly connecting to the projector to display their slide presentations, graphs, or videos, and if anyone in the audience could do this without even leaving their seat.
In the old days of computer, we used to have dummy monitor terminals connected to mainframes. The cost of the computer was greater than the cost of the monitor so we set up one computer to work with many monitors at once. Today, the cost of computers is much less, and the paradigm shifted; a monitor is more expensive (or as expensive) as a computer. So we rig our computers to use multiple video monitors. We are truly entering a golden age where it is possible for everyone to have a small computer, like a PDA device, that they can use to plug into dummy monitor/keyboard terminals or projected video screens. Imagine if they could do all of this without cables.
I'll get off your lawn now.