未來我們怎麼看電視？
要
想弄清不久後電視可能會發生多大的變化，不妨參觀一下英特爾(Intel Corp. INTC +0.60% )位於加州聖克拉拉的一個部門，這個部門的運營方式頗似初創公司。出 生於荷蘭的前英國廣播公司(British Broadcasting Corp.)高管哈格斯(Erik Huggers)組建了一個有350人的團隊，其中的人才遠不止研究電腦芯片的人員，還包括程序員、工業設計師、藝術家和視頻編碼等領域的專家。這個團隊 正在創建一種基於網絡的服務，這種服務不僅可以提供點播節目，還會令直播電視發生翻天覆地的變化。
在任何節目的中間打開電視，用戶都可以返回到節目的開始。哈格斯說，這就是直播電視，但你可以倒回去看。
英特爾只是電腦行業眾多加入起居室地盤爭奪戰的公司之一。這種爭奪戰可能帶來語音激活、新式遙控器、新型屏幕界面以及人與電視機之間互動方式的其他重大改變。
其他正在推動電視進步的科技巨頭包括蘋果(Apple Inc. AAPL +1.23% )、微軟(Microsoft Corp. MSFT +0.98% )、索尼(Sony Corp.)和谷歌(Google Inc. GOOG +0.98% )。谷歌上周公布了一種名為“Chromecast”的設備，這種設備可以將移動設備上的內容無線傳輸到電視上。據知情人士說，谷歌和索尼還一直在研制基於互聯網的視頻交付服務。
20年來，電腦行業內的公司一直在為電視業開創新領域，結果明顯是好壞參半。有線電視和衛星電視提供商有著強有力的地位，康卡斯特(Comcast Corp.)等大公司也在準備進行重大升級。
與媒體公司就內容版權進行的談判可能令新服務的推出延遲，並限制一些功能，不過英特爾誓言將在今年年底前進入部分市場。
瑞典電信設備巨頭愛立信(Ericsson)首席技術長艾華信(Ulf Ewaldsson)說，目前電視業的創新程度是我從未見過的。愛立信計劃加大力度進軍電視業。
這背後的推動力量是使互聯網成為一種更可行交付介質的各種變化，包括有寬帶接入服務的用戶的比例不斷上升。
盡管有了這些進展，基於互聯網的服務仍有很多不足。包括體育賽事和新聞直播在內的頗受大眾歡迎的節目由於許可証限制，常局限於傳統媒體。
有了大型音像資料庫後，找到具體節目可能比較麻煩，特別是用傳統遠程遙控的方式。在幫忙發現新內容方面，大多數電視服務也落後於網絡和移動應用程序。
數字硬盤錄像設備先驅TiVo Inc.的首席執行長羅傑斯(Tom Rogers)說，電話、筆記本電腦和平板電腦取得了突飛猛進的發展，電視被遠遠地落在了後面。
蘋果是試圖改變這一點的科技公司之一。2007年以來，蘋果開始發售名為Apple TV的流媒體機頂盒，但它對提供電視機新產品卻一直保持沉默。蘋果供應商高管說，蘋果已對其電視機設計進行了測試。
知情人士說，蘋果探索了電視機產品的很多新功能，包括整合數字硬盤錄像設備存儲、iCloud互聯網同步和數據存儲服務以及語音交互功能等。
微軟也在推進語音識別功能，欲讓其遊戲機和kinect控制器在家庭娛樂中發揮廣泛作用。微軟定於今秋發布Xbox One，用戶可通過口授命令來觀看具體節目，如“打開ESPN(娛樂體育節目電視網)”或“我想看《絕命毒師》(Breaking Bad)”。
一項基本挑戰是要管理日益增多的內容選項，包括Netflix的電影、YouTube等網絡產物、傳統直播電視節目和消費者自己錄的視頻等。
康卡斯特目前承諾，X2將在搜索方面有諸多改善，而且會配備個性化功能。X2是這個電視巨頭建立的一個新娛樂操作系統。
康卡斯特計劃今年年底之前開始推出該軟件，它可追蹤用戶以前的瀏覽習慣並根據推特(Twitter)及Facebook上的熱點話題來推薦正在直播的節目內容。康卡斯特說，X2可與電視、個人電腦和移動設備相連，也可支持語音搜索功能。
英特爾決定目前暫不追求的一個功能是配備人臉識別軟件的攝像頭，該攝像頭有助於為家裡的每一個用戶提供個性化服務。哈格斯說，看電視時普遍是低光環境，該技術在這樣的環境下工作效果不是很好，並且會產生隱私問題。
Don Clark / Ian Sherr
Rethinking How We Watch TV
Intel, Apple and Others Push New Technologies to Take Control of the Living Room
SANTA CLARA, Calif.—To understand how much television could soon change, it helps to visit an Intel Corp. INTC +0.60% division here that runs like a startup.Erik Huggers, a Dutch-born former British Broadcasting Corp. executive, has assembled a 350-person team with talents beyond computer chips—programmers, industrial designers, artists and experts in fields like video encoding. Working in bright, newsroom-style offices that differ from standard Intel cubicles, they're creating an Internet-based service that doesn't only serve up on-demand programs but overhauls live TV as well.
Intel's plans include a server farm to record every piece of programming aired—local, national and international—and store it for at least three days in the "cloud." With an Intel-designed set-top box, people won't have to own DVRs or even plan to record programs.
Switch on the TV in the middle of any show, and a viewer can simply go back to the beginning. "This is live TV—but you can rewind it," Mr. Huggers says.
Intel is just one entry in the computer industry's growing land grab for the living room, one likely to bring voice activation, restyled remotes, new on-screen interfaces and other major changes in the way people interact with TVs.
Other tech giants pushing TV advances include Apple Inc., AAPL +1.23% Microsoft Corp., MSFT +0.98% Sony Corp. and Google Inc., which last week announced a device called Chromecast that expands a category of devices that wirelessly transfer content from mobile devices to TVs. Google and Sony have also been working on Internet-based video delivery services, people familiar with the matter have said.
Computer industry players have been pushing new TV visions for 20 years, with decidedly mixed results. Cable and satellite TV providers have strong positions, with big players like Comcast Corp. CMCSA -1.59% preparing major technology upgrades of their own.
Negotiations with media companies for content rights could delay new services and limit some features, though Intel vows to enter some markets by the end of the year.
Yet there is a growing consensus that underlying technologies are evolving to the point that major changes in the TV experience are all but inevitable, whether delivered by new entrants or incumbents.
"I've never seen as much innovation in television as there is right now," says Ulf Ewaldsson, chief technology officer at Swedish telecom-equipment giant Ericsson, which plans to step up its own TV efforts.
Propelling the activity are changes that have made the Internet a more viable delivery medium, including the growing proportion of customers with broadband service that can accommodate high-quality video signals.
Many customers now have Internet connections in their living rooms through various devices, used largely to stream or download video programs from a variety of sources, including Netflix Inc. NFLX -0.49% Consumers also use tablets and smartphones to view movies and TV shows as well as to serve as companions for action on the big screen.
Despite the developments, much is missing from Internet-based services. Popular programming, including live sports and news, is often limited to conventional carriers by licensing restrictions.
When large video libraries are available, finding specific programs can be cumbersome—especially with conventional remotes that weren't designed for entering text. Most TV services also lag the Web and mobile apps in helping discover new content.
"The phone, the laptop and the tablet have advanced so dramatically," says Tom Rogers, chief executive of TiVo Inc., the DVR pioneer. "Television has been drastically left behind."
Tech companies trying to change that include Apple. The Silicon Valley trendsetter has since 2007 sold an add-on box called Apple TV for streaming content, but has been mum about new TV offerings. The company has tested designs for its own televisions, executives at Apple suppliers have said.
Apple has explored a number of new features for such a product, people familiar with the situation have said, including integrating DVR storage and its iCloud Internet syncing and data-storage service, and voice-interaction capabilities—which Apple's Siri brought to its mobile devices.
Microsoft is also promoting voice recognition as it positions its videogame consoles and companion Kinect controller for a broad role in home entertainment. The company's Xbox One, due out this fall, allows customers to turn on multiple living-room devices by simply saying "Xbox On," the company says. They can also navigate to programs by speaking commands such as "Go to ESPN," or "I want to watch Breaking Bad." Some Xbox apps can also be used while watching television; a Skype video chat or fantasy sports scores, for example, can appear on TVs alongside a game.
Microsoft has experimented in other areas—including offering an Apple TV-like set-top box without videogame capability, building Xbox circuitry into TVs and adding DVR capability to Xbox models, people familiar with its prototypes have said.
Sony, which hasn't commented on plans for a content service, has been less vocal about technologies like voice interaction. But it has been active in other areas to improve the TV experience.
The Japanese company, for example, has developed a tablet and smartphone app called Sony TV Sideview that augments TV program guides. It supplies information on topics such as shows and actors—while also letting people incorporate searches across Netflix, YouTube and, of course, Sony's own video and music services.
One basic challenge is simply managing the growing array of content options, including movies from Netflix, Web-originated fare like YouTube, conventional live TV and video consumers have recorded. TiVo has been particularly active in offering interface software that searches through the varied offerings and works on mobile devices as well as set-top boxes.
Comcast is promising similar search advances as well as personalization features in X2, the cable giant's name for what it calls a new entertainment operating system.
That software, which Comcast plans to begin rolling out by the end of the year, is designed to recommend content currently on live TV based on tracking a customer's past viewing habits as well as topics trending on Twitter and Facebook. Comcast says X2's interface can work on TVs, PCs and mobile devices—allowing users to manage their options from multiple screens—and supports voice searching capability.
Intel's Mr. Huggers, who spearheaded development of a popular BBC content app called iPlayer, sees advantages in starting from scratch. For one thing, his developers can exploit Intel technologies such as new chips for servers and set-top boxes, configuring them to call up programs and change channels noticeably faster that other living-room hardware.
One feature Intel has decided not to pursue for now is a camera equipped with facial recognition software to help personalize offerings for each user in a household. Mr. Huggers says the technology didn't work well enough in the low lighting common when watching TV and raised privacy questions.
Intel is testing its technology with 2,500 Intel employees in California, Oregon and Arizona. Documents that surfaced this month suggest Intel may call the service OnCue, though the company has declined to comment on that possibility.
Whatever the name, Intel and others planning to create new Internet-based services are widely expected to face tough sledding in negotiating rights for video content. Such companies are in a position to demand lucrative terms, says James McQuivey, an analyst who tracks TV technology for Forrester Research.
But he doesn't expect licensing hurdles to stop long-term trends that will weaken the influence of TV incumbents. "The business is very quickly shifting away from the people that have controlled it forever," Mr. McQuivey says.
http://www.cw.com.tw/article/article.action?id=5050848.......付費電視台高層也決定加入這場解放運動，向訂戶提供「隨處看電視」的服務；研究公司指出，目前幾乎每個美國電視頻道商都為訂戶提供這類服務，許多其他國家的頻道商亦是如此。
如果要提供隨處看電視的服務，線上平台的建置成本僅需要數百萬美元，但卻可讓訂戶繼續訂閱那些昂貴的付費電視方案，同時有助於吸引年輕顧客訂閱付費電視。
等到現在的青少年成家立業，到時候便可帶來真正的豐厚報酬。根據專家估算，每一位年輕的付費電視訂戶，一生中可能會支付約4萬美元的訂閱費用，依此計算，如果隨處看電視可以成功阻止5％的現有訂戶停止訂閱，每年就能留住42億美元的營收。
但截至目前為止，隨處看電視的推廣速度十分緩慢。電視台高層因為擔心盜版問題，所以認證過程極為嚴格，有的電視公司將此服務限制在家中使用，另外還有許多企業並沒有積極推銷。
不 過，取消訂閱付費電視的家庭並不多，因為如果沒有訂閱，便無法立即觀看熱門的電視節目。但是即使如此，新的競爭者已開始爭搶控制權；據報導，Google 正在與電視公司協商，希望能建立自己的網路串流服務，Netflix、Amazon等企業今年也會大舉投資，製作自己的專屬節目。
這場保護 舊系統、前進新系統的爭鬥，情節高潮迭起的程度直追肥皂劇。Hulu的大股東包括迪士尼、二十一紀福斯和NBC環球，由於三家電視頻道商無法針對Hulu 的未來發展取得共識，因此決定出售Hulu。但在7月12日，它們又取消了出售計劃，表示會留住Hulu，並投入更多資金。它們大概是擔心，如果新的擁有 者真的讓Hulu成功，可能會回過頭來傷害自己的業務。（黃維德譯）
©The Economist Newspaper Limited 2013
intel not here yet
過去幾個月以來，英特爾和多家媒體公司密談，推銷「虛擬有線電視網」的概念，類似有線電視業的營運方式，但是透過網路傳送全美各電視頻道的節目。英特爾將自行開發電視機上盒，提供節目推播的服務。根據英特爾向媒體公司進行的簡報內容，預計在今年年底推出這項服務。
這項計劃再度確認了現任執行長保羅‧歐特里尼（Paul Otellini）的經營策略：英特爾將不再只是一家電腦公司。
去年，英特爾挖角負責為英國國家廣播公司（BBC）建置線上影音播放服務平台iPlayer的大將艾瑞克‧休格斯（Erik Huggers），並在去年10月，任命他為英特爾媒體事業群（Intel Media）總經理。
但新市場競爭程度，不下於PC市場的激烈，已有多家廠商搶進。稍早之前，索尼宣布和Dish Network合作推出類似的服務；另外，包括蘋果、微軟和Google都曾和媒體公司會談過。
儘管，早在多年前英特爾已開始祕密布局，但看來這條路似乎不太好走。去年10月，英特爾解散了負責開發網路機上盒與電視機的某個研發團隊。
此外，未來的節目播送也將是一筆可觀的成本，目前美國有線系統、衛星系統與電信公司每年購買版權的費用就高達380億美元。另一個關鍵問題是網路頻寬，一旦高畫質電視變得普及，要提供多大頻寬、讓多少消費者同時線上觀看，這些都仍是未知數。
英特爾的虛擬有線電視夢，未來將有重重難關要過。
這項計劃再度確認了現任執行長保羅‧歐特里尼（Paul Otellini）的經營策略：英特爾將不再只是一家電腦公司。
去年，英特爾挖角負責為英國國家廣播公司（BBC）建置線上影音播放服務平台iPlayer的大將艾瑞克‧休格斯（Erik Huggers），並在去年10月，任命他為英特爾媒體事業群（Intel Media）總經理。
但新市場競爭程度，不下於PC市場的激烈，已有多家廠商搶進。稍早之前，索尼宣布和Dish Network合作推出類似的服務；另外，包括蘋果、微軟和Google都曾和媒體公司會談過。
儘管，早在多年前英特爾已開始祕密布局，但看來這條路似乎不太好走。去年10月，英特爾解散了負責開發網路機上盒與電視機的某個研發團隊。
此外，未來的節目播送也將是一筆可觀的成本，目前美國有線系統、衛星系統與電信公司每年購買版權的費用就高達380億美元。另一個關鍵問題是網路頻寬，一旦高畫質電視變得普及，要提供多大頻寬、讓多少消費者同時線上觀看，這些都仍是未知數。
英特爾的虛擬有線電視夢，未來將有重重難關要過。
Google Results Show Struggle With Mobile
By CLAIRE CAIN MILLER
The second-quarter income announcement showed the desktop search business continued to slow, while ad prices fell.
|
Weak PC Market Catches Up to Microsoft
By NICK WINGFIELD
The company blamed the declining personal computer market and
disappointing sales of its Surface RT tablet for missing Wall Street's
quarterly forecasts.
|
Advertising
Pushing the Right Buttons
By BRIAN STELTER
Apple's steps to
reimagine television, like teaming up with ESPN, stand in stark contrast
to efforts by Google to compete with established companies.
Google Said to Weigh Supplying TV Channels
By BRIAN STELTER
The company has
begun talks with major media companies about licensing TV channels,
according to people with knowledge of the meetings.
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| Google Expected to Release New Nexus 7 Tablet, Android 4.3 Next Week ABC News 0. Google's green robot has something brewing, and signs point to it being an improved Nexus 7 tablet and an updated version of the Android operating system. Technology website Android Central has gotten what is allegedly the first images of the ... See all stories on this topic » |
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| Google shares plunge 5% after earnings miss Los Angeles Times Google has been making efforts to make it easier for advertisers to reach consumers on smaller mobile screens, but in the second quarter its average cost per click declined 6%. In February, Google took the wraps off a new push to get advertisers to buy ... See all stories on this topic » |
| Google Chrome For iOS Promises Data Cost Savings InformationWeek "[I]f you prefer to follow directions in the Google Maps app instead of in the browser, you can easily set a preference to open these links in the Maps app instead," explains Google software engineer Peter Lee in a blog post. Through what's known as a ... See all stories on this topic » |
| Google Test-Driving NSA-Proof Encryption for Google Drive PC Magazine Google is exploring ways to encrypt files stored in Google Drive to prevent the the U.S. government and other authorities from demanding access to user data, according to a CNET report. The company is allegedly "actively testing encryption to armor ... See all stories on this topic » |
| Google gets off in Korea anticompetition case CNET South Korea's Fair Trade Commission (FTC) ruled Thursday that Google is in no way violating competition rules by including its search engine with Android, Yonhap News is reporting. The company's chief competitors in the country, NHN and Daum ... See all stories on this topic » |
| Google Unveils New Google Maps App for iPhone, iPad eWeek The updated iOS Maps app, Version 2.0, includes enhanced search and navigation capabilities, as well as Google's "first dedicated iPad mapping experience," according to a July 16 post by Daniel Graf, the director of Google Maps, on the Google Lat Long ... See all stories on this topic » |
| Google competition plan 'not good enough' - EU official BBC News Google has not done enough to address concerns it is unfairly stifling competition, an EU official has said. Google stands accused of using its 90% market share of internet search in Europe to promote its own services. The company has offered to change ... See all stories on this topic » |
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