The MoPR Blog

Is an $800 DVR worth it? It’s a pretty risky move during a rocky economy, but after 10 years of work Digeo is now offering its newest HD DVR to compete with Tivo - but it will cost you. Priced at a cool $800, the dual-tuner Moxi HD DVR can store 75 hours of HD programming and boasts no monthly fee or advertisements.

But with the TiVo HD DVR only priced at $299, will the Moxi be as big of a hit as Digeo expects? Would you pay $800 for an HD DVR?

In the air and on demand. In air on-demand entertainment isn’t just for the traveling elite anymore.  Continental Airlines just announced that it has almost completed installing audio and video-on-demand entertainment systems in coach class for the airline’s Boeing 757-200 aircraft.

The new entertainment system will allow customers to choose from up to 25 movies, 25 short-subject programs and 50 compact discs.

We’re glad to see more features being added to airplanes in a time when scaling services back or changing an extra fee for them seems to be the norm. Remember when JetBlue announced that it would be charging for blankets and pillows?  It’s safe to say that didn’t go over so well.

With with announcement and others, like in-air Wi-Fi access coming to major airlines like Delta, we are wondering what will they come up with next?  In this case, the sky really is the limit.

Good ol’ fashioned TV watching increased in 2008. Nielsen recently reported that U.S. usage of TV, Internet and mobile, also known as the “three screens”, has increased across the board- with the average American reportedly watching 142 hours of TV, viewing three hours of mobile video, and going online for 27 hours.

The A2/M2 Three Screen Report states that “the average time a U.S. home used a TV set during the 2007-08 TV season was 8 hours and 18 minutes per day, a record high since Nielsen started measuring television in the 1950s.”

You CAN take it with you. A morbid yet interesting report from MSNBC earlier in the week says many people under 40 are requesting that their mobile phones be buried with them when they pass away. Some even want their cell phone to ring as their casket is being lowered, like a modern-day Taps. We can’t dig it. Really. Unless you plan on making a few phone calls from the other side, what’s the point?

Well, for one, according to the article,

“People want to surround themselves (or their loved ones) with the things they hold dear, whether that’s their cell phone and headset or some family photos, a fishing rod, a piece of treasured jewelry.

We can only think of one reason to be buried with our mobile phone – and that’s if we happen to wake up, in a casket, several feet below the surface. Hopefully the battery – and signal – would still work.

Video for your iPhone? Well, sort of. 12seconds has released an iPhone application that lets iPhone users shoot video. How? Users take three pictures, record some audio and submit it. 12seconds then turns the photos and audio into a video and post it for you. We couldn’t find any examples of an iPhone video on the company’s web site but we will download the application, give it a try and report back. Until Apple relents and starts offering video on iPhones, this might be our only hope.

We’re famous! In case you didn’t hear from us via Facebook, Twitter or email, here’s our appearance on Good Day Oregon last month that featured our Museum of Mobility History, all seventeen minutes of it. Watch it below or click here.

Watch MuMoH on Good Day Oregon in Game Videos |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

What a week in the world of IPTV … and it’s still only Tuesday.

Monday saw satellite juggernaut SES AMERICOM pull the plug on its IP-PRIME service. A telco equivalent to the cable industry’s popular HITS (Headend In The Sky) service, IP-PRIME gave telcos everything they needed to deliver IP-based TV. A telco just had to install two racks of equipment in its headend, align a satellite dish to receive the programming, rollout the set-boxes to its subs, flip the switch … and count the money rolling in.

Despite signing 70 Tier 3 telcos (e.g. small rural phone companies) throughout the country, SES AMERICOM just wasn’t getting the ROI it expected. So they’re shutting IP-PRIME down, though they’ll keep it operating through July 31, 2009 so customers can “transition.”

So that was Monday and the future for IPTV seemed uncertain, if not bleak.

Then first thing Tuesday morning AT&T (truly a Tier 1 telco) announced that it passed the one million subscriber mark for its U-verse IPTV service.

Why the disparity? I think it has to do with patience.

When AT&T launched U-verse it was to great fanfare and miniscule subscription numbers. Many prognosticated that AT&T would grow tired of the tremendous cost of U-verse and the seemingly unreachable ROI. However through dogged perseverance AT&T is now the thirteenth largest provider of TV services based on subscribers, and its numbers are still growing. Only the nine largest U.S. cable operators, Verizon, DishNetwork and DirecTV serve more subs – for now.

So why couldn’t SES AMERICOM stick it out as well? I believe it’s because the revenue model for IP-PRIME just never fit. With a few exceptions – IP-PRIME being the most notable – SES AMERICOM’s traditional business model has been that of the “fat pipe,” in which a network operator carries the content of others. They maintained an intricate satellite network and charged handsomely for companies and governments to transport their “content” over it.

Unfortunately for IP-PRIME it was to make money in a different fashion, with much of it coming from subscriber revenues. With less than 10,000 total subs – and the numbers growing sloooowly – this revenue stream was not nearly enough. I’m guessing the argument went something like: “we’re a fat pipe people, why do we need a loss leader when we can use the IP-PRIME capacity to expand our existing profitable businesses?”

It’s easy to understand the logic – especially in the current economic climate – and yet, it’s hard not to think a great opportunity is being lost. While it may not fit with SES AMERICOM’s traditional business model, IP-PRIME itself is a proven technological marvel that currently allows some three dozen telcos to provide their subscribers with premium quality TV services, including a substantial amount of HDTV. Hopefully a new owner with the resources and patience can be found because IPTV is clearly the future and rural telcos need just such a turnkey solution.

If I don’t sound very objective on this topic it’s because I was on the Mobility PR team that represented both SES AMERICOM and IP-PRIME. I toured the facilities and worked with the people behind IP-PRIME and I know what a jewel they created.

Every year, CED Magazine compiles a list of the 50 most compelling and important technologies, people and trends influencing the industry.  For 2008, their writers again consulted the industry’s leading technical minds to craft their list.  Not surprisingly, we immediately noticed three trends on the list that strike close to home based on our clients and our own experience.

1. Targeted Ads: This was listed as No. 2 on the big 50 list.  Needless to say, targeted ads have swept the industry and the technology behind their delivery has exploded. RGB Networks announced back in May 2007 their revolutionary approach to targeted advertising with the use of digital overlays and it would seem as though the industry has caught on.  The ability to deliver ads to an advertiser’s specific target demographic is where the operators are making big money these days.
2. Customer Retention: Listed as No. 4, this topic has been arguably the most popular subject for 2008.  As Brian Santo writes, “It’s desirable to play good offense and good defense.” And how to do that?  Monitor, monitor, monitor! Mixed Signals has been at the forefront of this trend- having pushed for content monitoring back at its inception in 2004- and have remained a strong proponent for content monitoring as way for operators to retain subscribers.The need for cable operators to ensure that their subscribers enjoy the highest Quality of Experience (QoE) is a key priority as subscribers are being wooed aggressively by satellite and telecom. Closely monitoring their programming to quickly solve video and audio glitches is a primary way operators can improve QoE.
3. Show Mergers: Combining the big trade shows comes in at No. 18 on this year’s list, which might not be a bad idea, especially to keep travel expenses down as travel budgets are increasingly dropping.As Traci Patterson writes, “In April, Washington, D.C., will host the NCTA’s The Cable Show, CableLabs’ conferences and the SCTE Conference on Emerging Technologies (ET), all at once. And in October, CTAM Summit, the SCTE Cable-Tec Expo, the Cable Center Hall of Fame Dinner and a CableLabs seminar will come together in Denver.”

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if it works. But for now, we’re thinking this has the potential to be very convenient and hopefully successful show.