Gonzalo Martin's List: De internet al televisor

• Regardless of my own stance, there are still a host of issues surrounding the Apple TV. First off, it is estimated to have sold just 400,000 units, according to Forrester Research, which is an astounding 600,000 units shy of what the research firm originally believed Apple would have sold by now.

    
• Step 1: Allow users to do more
• Step 2: Start working with movie studios for a change
• Step 3: Apple must pretend like it cares
• Simply put, Apple seems like it doesn’t even care what happens with the Apple TV. And while it will talk about the iPod and iPhone until its PR people are blue in the face, it has failed to even speak to the issues that are plaguing this device

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• The most popular Web source for full episodes of television shows is ABC.com, according to a study conducted by The Nielsen Company and released today.
• The study demonstrates the increasing popularity of full-length streaming video on the Internet. The survey, of 1,599 Americans in October, found that 25 percent had watched complete television episodes online in the past three months. Among age groups, 39 percent of users in the 18- to 34-year-old demographic had viewed episodes online, compared with 23 percent of 35- to 54-year-olds and 11 percent of people 55 and older.
• But the popularity of online video is growing surprisingly fast.
• Among respondents who had viewed video online, 50 percent had used ABC.com, 41 percent had used NBC.com, 37 percent had used CBS.com and 24 percent had used Fox.com. YouTube (17 percent) and iTunes (15 percent) were used less often.
• Significantly more women than men said they had visited ABC.com for streaming video, a presumptive nod to the popularity of “Desperate Housewives,” “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Private Practice.” Considerably more men than women said they had visited Fox.com.

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• About 61% of high-speed Internet users download online video content at least once a week and 86% do so on a monthly basis, compared to 45% and 71%, respectively, in the 2006 study. News and user-generated, non-professional content are the most often viewed genres, followed by movie previews/trailers, music videos, and previews/segments of TV shows.
• NBC and ABC are the networks that Internet users mention the most frequently for online TV content (unaided), with "Grey's Anatomy" being the most often mentioned TV program viewed online (unaided).
• While consumption of broadband video has grown, the study shows that television is still the preferred platform for traditional TV content. About 70% of Internet users who watch TV online say do so because they missed the episode on TV. About 18% of these respondents say they watch TV shows online to watch them a second time (after having watched them on TV), or that they watch TV shows online just when they happen to find them or when someone else tells them about them (20%). Conversely, 13% of Internet users who watch TV shows online say they watch them directly online, and not on regular TV.
• "More and better broadband content, particularly entertainment content in video form, is bringing more consumers to the platform, either on their computers or on their handheld devices," said Howard Horowitz
• The data suggests that broadband video is not cannibalistic to linear video, but rather, an enhancement to the consumers' "traditional" TV experience, he said.

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• Others have also depicted Apple's move as a direct strike at Netflix, but I think this battle is illusory. Rather, I view Apple's introduction of rentals as clear competition for the likes of Movielink, CinemaNow, Amazon Unbox, XBox LIVE and other rental stores, but not a blow to Netflix. The value propositions are very different. That's because Netflix very wisely has made the Instant Watching feature a value add for its subscribers, not an incremental fee.
• From an economic standpoint alone, the breakeven is only 4+ movies, which is likely well below the monthly consumption of most of Netflix's full unlimited subscribers
• Apple's rental model, users are still subjected to all the same online movie limitations all the other services have suffered from: no easy playback on TVs, lack of portability, viewing window limits, etc. Granted iTunes downloads enable watching on-the-go (vs. Netflix's streams), but I don't see that as a big differentiator. With Netflix you get the best of DVDs' advantages and now unlimited online delivery
• if Apple were to pursue subscriptions, that would be a direct attack on Netflix
• The fact is, Netflix has spent heavily on marketing over the years, and its strong brand awareness and 7 million subscriber base are quite meaningful advantages.
• Online movie delivery, whether rental or owned, still has a long way to go to achieve mainstream success. Apple will certainly nudge the category forward, but not dramatically. Still, Netflix needs to remain aggressively on offensive to retain its leadership mantle. This is a category with lots of moves yet to be made.

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• Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX), which has been experimenting with making its online movie service unlimited with a few users, is now expanding it to everyone starting Monday, a day before Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is supposed to make some major announcements about its new online movie rental service
• Also, AP says this unlimited streaming option could erode Netflix’s profits because it isn’t raising its monthly rates even though its expenses may rise if increased usage drives up the licensing fees owed to studios.

• A major theme of the show was the ability to send online video or applications directly to the TV, bypassing the need for a set-top box altogether. This could become important for online IPTV services like Joost N.V. and for new video-distribution services like NBC Universal Inc.’s Hulu portal. It could also change the telco IPTV landscape, particularly if it eliminates the need for DVRs, although this would likely not be seen for quite some time. Sharp Corp., Samsung Group and Panasonic Corp. all made announcements on this topic.
• In other news, Sling Media Inc.’s SlingCatcher was finally revealed — a set-top box that delivers broadcast TV, Internet content and personal media to the TV. The SlingCatcher includes three built-in applications: SlingPlayer for TV, SlingProjector and SlingSync. SlingPlayer for TV offers the ability to send programming to another TV in the home or to a TV in a remote location without a PC. SlingProjector enables viewers to project Internet and PC-based digital content, such as downloaded movies or YouTube videos, directly to the TV. SlingSync gives users the ability to sync files over their network connections and store them on third-party USB flash drives or other portable hard drives attached to their SlingCatchers, giving them the ability to use the SlingCatchers to replay content on demand and manage content from PCs via the SlingCatcher user interface.

• D-Link Corp. also announced a media player that allows a user to stream Web-based content available on his or her PC to a TV, either wired or wirelessly , without the need for a proprietary media player. Virtually any local video content can be sent to and viewed on a TV using a media player such as iTunes, Nero, Windows Media Player or RealPlayer.

  Whether set-top boxes will become obsolete remains to be seen, but the development of Internet-enabled TVs is worth watching. As more consumers want content delivered to the living room, such developments are not surprising. More advanced solutions will come, and IPTV players will want a piece of the action.

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• Jake would be just another broadband personality except that now he's self-syndicating The Edge to 40 local ABC stations, paying them somewhere between $150-5,000 per half hour to get his show on the air. He's also been able to convince these stations to give him some on-air promotion and not to list him as paid programming.
• For now he understands that TV is better suited to full-length while broadband is better for clips. He has commitments from the 40 stations to do two 13 week series, so the show should be on through the fall. For the first year he doesn't see any big financial gains, rather, it's all about building his brand's awareness with every tool at his disposal

• Here's how it works: RE/MAX and Carat are using ad-targeting software from Navic Networks to target some of Cox's Southern California subs when they watch home improvement programs; those audiences are supposed to be likely home buyers or sellers. Targeted homes will see a banner at the bottom third of their screen; viewers can use their remotes to click on a graphic that directs to a RE/MAX promo page. "We are teeing this up now as we speak," Mitch Oscar, executive VP of Carat Digital told Mediaweek.

• intelligently and automatically pulls content from the internet to match whatever TV show is on sounded nice enough, but we wanted to see it in action.

• A new Samsung set-top box, called See’n'Search, is a search engine of sorts for your television. Using closed captioning and program listings, the box automatically searches the internet to give viewers more information on the shows they’re watchin

• The goal of the project is to build an open-source solution that would include video-on-demand functionality as well as community features for a range of devices. Who knows, maybe this is even going to power the next generation of the BBC’s iPlayer

• TiVo's (intelligently) dipping its toes into the social networking waters by delivering the My TV application on Facebook. Granted, you don't have to have a TiVo in order to join in, and while it'd be much nicer if you could import programs from your Season Pass, it's not a half bad start.