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Unfortunately, Intel was about 20 years ahead of the times when it began to promote the ProShare videoconferencing system. And, like the Intel digital watch before it, the product was discontinued after a hearty fight.
Now we're in the midst of another video revolution. Apple Computer, Sony and others are promoting video-on-the-go systems--most notably now, an iPod that plays video--while Samsung, among others, hopes to turn cell phones into TVs.
Then others, such as Sling Media, are promoting systems that let consumers access their own home movies or shows stored on their TVs from any location.
Most of these ideas, however, will flounder. Here's why:
1. Navigation problems
The average person can walk down the street and listen to music on an MP3 player at the same time. Try doing that while watching an old episode of "Barnaby Jones." Invariably, you'll run into mailboxes and other pedestrians.
These devices might work in large urban centers like Seoul, South Korea, where everyone rides the train, but few places match that description in North America. And even if they did, we still have...
2. The screen issue
I'll never forget the first time someone showed me a smart phone.
"You can view photos and look up stock quotes," the company representative said. "And check this out, you can surf the Net too, if you're insane." Simply put, the screens are too small. The picture is actually quite clear on Sony's Type U, but after a while it is sort of like watching an ant farm.
3. The old 3 minutes 50
Except for a brief concept-album phase in the late '60s and early '70s, most songs are pretty short. You can listen to seven or eight of them on the way to work. Not so with TV shows. Sitcoms go for a half hour, which limits their value. Put another way, in the same time it takes to watch "$40 a Day with Rachel Ray" you can listen to "Waterloo" 10 and a half times, or "Roundabout" three times with enough room to squeeze in the theme song from "Dirty Dancing."
4. The ubiquitous screen
This is probably one of the biggest hurdles facing these projects. TV is pretty easy to find these days, which attenuates many of the reasons to buy a new device. The Slingbox from Sling Media, for instance, is a home device that will sling pictures or video from a home TV to a remote location. Executives at the company will often pose the question, "What if you're in a hotel and you want to watch the TV shows you watch at home?"
Easy, you just turn on the TV in the room--it's next to those glasses of water with the protective doily.
5. Encore
How many times do you really want to watch "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom"? After a few viewings, the novelty sort of peters out. And that movie was good. Imagine watching "Ernest Saves Christmas," "Buffalo '66," or "The Mummy Returns" twice. Perhaps more than any other art form, film usually does not stand up to repeat viewing.
It's no coincidence that one of the more promising video start-ups is Peerflix which lets you dump old DVDs on someone else.
Contrast that with music. Thirty years later you can probably still sing along to "Love Train." Hence, devices that let you carry music around are big business. Games, meanwhile, are compulsive, explaining why Nintendo Game Boys sell well.
6. The lack of an easy problem to solve
MP3 players existed for years before the iPod emerged and jump-started sales. There was a good reason Apple's device took off. Most players had only 128MB or less of flash memory. Putting a hard drive in cured that.
7. They already exist If you really need to watch old episodes of "Antiques Roadshow" on the go, you can get a cheap portable video device. It's called a handheld DVD player.
Biography
Michael Kanellos is editor at large at CNET News.com, where he covers hardware, research and development, start-ups and the tech industry overseas. He has worked as an attorney, travel writer and sidewalk hawker for a time share resort, among other occupations.
See more CNET content tagged:
Sling Media,
TV,
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MP3 player,
video
Steve Jobs on CNBC's "Closing Bell" last night said that the video
iPod was largely an experiment from Apple's side and that they
wanted to see how people would use video on their iPods, but I
think that will contribute to the success of such a device will be
the factors we can call iPr0n and Pr0ncasts.
Early experiences from countries with 3G cell phones are that a
substantial use of the additional bandwidth available to
subscribers are used for sex-related communications. A video
iPod in combination with an easy distribution model for content
will no doubt be used for the same purpose.
Not that I expect such content to appear in iTunes Music Store
any time soon, but I do think the effect of it will be seen on
Apple's bottom line sooner than you think.
So with current momentum for iPod, one might get one more such wave. And there might be new applications coming out of it (note that Steve Jobs might not have thought of Podcasts when iPods started).
Screen size is surely a negative now. However, bigger (palm sized) screen attachments could resolve this. I am sure there are many who are ready to jump on this wagon.
Biggest advantage would be the ease of acquiring content (programs) from anywhere (not just itunes)!!
I can also imagine people carrying their family videos in their pockets.
I therefor think, despite the issues you listed, we might see some more accessories / buzzwords added to our vocabulary next year around video iPods and lots of money to Apple shareholders.
(especially on a small screen) is much less than the usefulness of
portable audio. You can't use video when walking or driving, etc.
when we're talking about the new iPod, however, the question is
whether portable video is even marginally useful. Since the new
iPod costs exactly the same ($299) as the old iPod, the portable
video capability only has to be marginally useful to justify its
existence. In short: while portable video probably will never
match the usefulness of portable audio, the 5G iPod (and other
similar devices that bundle video WITH audio) demonstrate that
it needn't be.
technically, all of this is feasible today. an industrious home-brewer could probably even throw one together with ots parts/software. but there's a huge market for a turn-key product. i'm skeptacle we'll see it, though, because content owners will have cows before they risk that someone who can't afford to buy their content might steal it instead.
indirectly, perhaps the ipod-video will help things along by pushing content owners to realize that they've got to sell content in a digital world to make money.
mark d.
How much do they make us pay for tennis shoes that when we were their age was $5 pair of high top Keds? How much is that map display in your SUV worth compared to the paper maps you buy from the gas station?
The story here is the impact on the brief freedom the artists have had to access the public directly. The effect of M-TV was to narrow the access to bands, force them to become models (or write for models), and to accept look and style over musical depth. Who will want audio when they can have video and the usual suspects are anxious to get the bands in front of the cameras 'if they look good'?
So much for the brief breath of freedom afforded by the Internet. It took only a decade to get back to business as usual.
Handheld gadgets are rapidly reaching a developmental plateau... any smaller and they will not be merely inconvenient, as they now, but totally useless, any more applications in a package and they become as silly as the 125 tool Swiss Army Knife.
I'd like my cell phone to work from anywhere, be no smaller than a pack of cigarettes, sell for less than $20.00, and cost less than three cents a minute to call anywhere, anytime. Now THAT would be some good technology!
That said, when are they going to make a vacuum cleaner with a TV set on the handle so I can tear up the furniture while I'm cleaning?