The keynote event at the Future of Television East conference here in New York a few weeks ago was a conversation with Paula Kerger, President & CEO of PBS.  During the discussion, the subject of the iPhone NPR app came up as a model of  what digital distribution of PBS content could someday look like.

Although the tremendously successful  BBC iPlayer might have been a more apt example, I was happy nonetheless to hear one of my favorite iPhone apps getting some recognition.

Of course, the ability of internet radio to provide access to any station regardless of the geographical limitations of its over-the-air broadcast range were touted -  Kerger, as it happens, enjoys listening to Maine public radio (where she has a summer home) while traveling.  However, what was left unsaid about the NPR iPhone app was what I feel is its most notable feature:  the “Programs” section, a comprehensive implementation of all available on-demand streams organized by program rather than station.  Not only that, but news shows such as “All Things Considered” are broken down by individual segments, so one can actually browse within the show (of course, for a more passive experience you can still play all segments sequentially via a playlist).

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Comcast has bought a controlling share in NBCU.  Maybe you’ve heard.

Just what this means for hulu is now topic du jour.  For those unfamiliar with the service (are there any left?), hulu is a browser-based premium video website that launched a year and a half ago as a NBC/Fox joint venture and has since became wildly popular (and deservedly so: on a technical level, the streaming is very well implemented, and on a user experience level, the UI is  very cleanly designed).  Since April, when Disney bought into hulu, CBS has been the only major broadcast network left outside of the hulu fold.

More than any other service, Hulu was looking like the future of premium online video.

Then along comes Comcast and makes things interesting: the largest company in the vertical industry most threatened by the advent of online premium (non user-generated) video is now part owner in the nascent medium’s industry leader.

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For while now, we’ve been puzzled by the surprisingly large number of industry analysts operating under the assumption that “internet video” represents just another (albeit fast-growing) computer/web browser use case.  It  comes up most often during panel discussions and articles covering the seemingly intractable problem of how to monetize internet video - “how can we get internet video users tolerate a TV-like higher ad load?” is often the point at which shoulders start to shrug, hands get thrown up in the air, and the discussion grinds to a halt.

“By making the internet video user experience more like TV” is one obvious answer - and one that at least allows the discussion to continue…

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Peter Kafka from All Things Digital writes today that Apples is thinking about launching a $30 per month iTunes-based subscription service to carry cable and broadcast television programming early next year.

According to unnamed sources, over the past few weeks Apple has been pitching the idea to several of the major broadcast and cable networks.  As the article correctly points out, it’s a tough sell: cable networks will are not going to do anything to jeopardize the lucrative business model currently in place, in which they receive both a large cut of the advertising revenue as well as subscription fees from the cable carrier - and everyone is probably tremendously cautious about the effect on ad load, given the inability so far to monetize internet video through advertising (even industry leader hulu has had trouble selling its inventory).

However, there’s something we think the ‘All Things Digital’ article misses…  something important…

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Several decades after the advent of CAD, electronic ignition and anti-lock brakes, digital technology continues to make new inroads into the auto industry. A few of the more interesting examples:

Advertising?  There’s an app for that. Volkswagen is planning to promote their new GTI (the performance version of the Golf) exclusively via a licensed and rebranded mobile game app released for the iPhone and iTouch.  Recognizing a substantial overlap between the iPhone and GTI demographics, VW is apparently counting on the free app alone to get the job done, and at a much lower cost than traditional commercials and print ads.  The game uses the iPhone/iTouch motion-sensing, includes a virtual VW showroom (at left), and in a clever promotional move, VW plans to give away free cars to the six highest-scoring players.  If effective, look for more convergence between apps and advertising going forward…


The car network Another innovation from Germany: the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, in collaboration with manufacturers such as BMW, Audi, and Daimler, is working on the specification of a network standard to unify the various (until-now) standalone digital systems found in the modern automobile. Dubbed “Security in Embedded IP-based Systems“, the research project is aimed at reducing complexity and ensuring security, and will be based on Ethernet networking technology and the same Internet Protocol upon which the internet is based. We’re thinking such a system could easily find its way into the aviation industry as well. Yet more uses for ethernet - after over 30 years, maybe the most successful, extensible and long-lived networking technology ever invented.

Listen! I know how digitized and rapidly changing our world has become. I live in New York. I am a new media analyst for a major telecommunications company. I co-write a blog.

In other words, I eat and drink the stuff our increasingly digital real-time media reality is made of. But ever so often, I am still amazed if not puzzled about how much the times they are a changin’.

The other day I had to check the Web site of what used to be my local savings bank back when I lived in Germany — a good fifteen years ago, no less.

Turns out, they’re now into Twitter. Yes, Twitter! I was stunned. The old-fashioned local savings bank of my childhood days is now condoning micro-blogging, for that purpose flaunting its very own Twitter account.

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Not that I want to harp much longer on my apparent screaming media fascination but hey, the past week has provided ample sound bites to back up my tongue-in-cheek theory.

You remember? South Carolina Republican House rep Joe Wilson hackles the US president during a major public speech, tennis-great Serena Williams looses it on the court, and rapper-extraordinaire Kanye West opts to rudely interrupt a major video awards show snatching the micro in the middle of a peer’s acceptance speech.

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Come to think of it, here’s a couple additional thoughts on my previous screaming media missive.

Both a recent Variety and Utne Reader article got me thinking again about this post-Walter Conkrite, post-Don Hewitt era of 24-hour noise channels.

In a somewhat tongue-in-cheek way, I believe my screaming media concept is indeed a deserving (albeit absolutely made up) label, as “yell TV” continues to spread far beyond its original cable roots.

First off there’s satellite TV of course, plus, increasingly, telecom-powered “broadband” IPTV. Other ways TV programming is being delivered to you and me these days includes an ever-growing number of mobile video services, media receivers, gaming consoles and Internet-connected TVs.

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The open source software development model has made substantial inroads into the mainstream consumer and enterprise markets over the past few years – to the point that even Microsoft is now tentatively testing the waters by supporting the Apache Foundation (the folks behind the ubiquitous open source Tomcat web server) and even contributing some code to the underlying kernel of the open source Linux operating system.

Software created by an open community of contributing developers with full access to pre-compiled source code - how secure and stable can it be?   Such long-held concerns have now largely faded, as robust and secure open source applications have flourished over the past few years.

When it comes to online video, though, open source remains a bit of a work in progress.

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Last week Glenn screamed at me again. So did Ed. An hour later Bill yelled at both me and his guests. What could I have possibly done to deserve this kind of treatment?

I know we’ve never really been friends per se, but these guys have been over to my house quite frequently. For years actually. When they are at your house, I suppose they are yelling at you, too?

Cynicism aside, the more television I watch these days the harder it gets to circumvent loud-noise anchors and their talking heads literally screaming out their parts.

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