Unable to agree on terms for a new contract, more than a dozen Viacom channels were pulled from DirecTV on Wednesday.
DirecTV customers lost access to Comedy Central, BET, Nickelodeon, MTV, VH1, Comedy Central and other cable channels owned by Viacom.
Viacom claims it is seeking “only a couple pennies per day, per subscriber,” while DirecTV has countered that Viacom is pushing for “customers to pay more than a 30 percent increase, which equates to an extra $1 billion.”
“On DirecTV’s side, it’s claiming it sent proposals but never heard anything back and as such was forced to pull the channels,” reports Engadget. “Viacom has been running ads and notices all day to make sure kids big and little call DirecTV to apply pressure about missing their television shows.”
“The two companies blamed each other for the blackout, which began around midnight as a result of a dispute over a new carriage contract for the Viacom-owned channels,” reports The New York Times. “About 20 million households are affected, representing one-fifth of all the nation’s subscribers to cable or satellite television service.”
DirecTV is suggesting that customers access Viacom content online and via services such as Amazon Prime or Netflix until the situation can be resolved.
“Viacom took action to make that more difficult Wednesday afternoon — not just for DirecTV customers, but for all Internet users,” according to NYT. “The company took episodes of ‘The Daily Show,’ ‘The Colbert Report’ and some other popular shows off its Web sites.”
In an effort to rally public support, Viacom posted an image of Nickelodeon’s SpongeBob SquarePants on Facebook with the accompanying quote, “Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? I don’t know. I have DirecTV.” However, initial public complaints seem to be directed at both companies.
The European Commission aims to reform music licensing revenue collection with standardized methods of collection across European borders.
The Commission’s press release explains “new digital technologies are opening up great opportunities for creators, consumers and businesses alike,” but notes that many European nations currently employ inadequate licensing laws.
All 27 European Union member states have iTunes, but the Apple service only accounts for 19 percent of music revenue sales in Europe. Comparatively, iTunes “generates almost half of equivalent revenue in the U.S., according to figures from the IFPI industry body,” reports The Verge.
“The proposed changes would force collecting societies to comply with strict new standards, including a requirement to publish an annual transparency report,” notes the post. “The ultimate aim is to prevent situations where societies are too disorganized or ill-equipped to engage in international revenue collection, choosing to simply restrict distribution instead of offering suitable licenses.”
“All collecting societies should ensure that creators are rewarded more quickly for their work and must operate with full transparency,” says Michel Barnier, commissioner for Internal Market and Services. “This is paramount to sustaining investment in creativity and innovation which will in turn lead to additional growth and increased competitiveness.”
“The U.S. judge who tossed out one of the biggest court cases in Apple Inc’s smartphone technology battle is questioning whether patents should cover software or most other industries at all,” reports Reuters.
“Richard Posner, a prolific jurist who sits on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, told Reuters this week that the technology industry’s high profits and volatility made patent litigation attractive for companies looking to wound competitors.”
Posner effectively ended Apple’s lawsuit against Google’s Motorola Mobility last month. “He canceled a closely anticipated trial between the two and rejected the iPhone maker’s request for an injunction barring the sale of Motorola products using Apple’s patented technology,” explains the article.
Posner suggests that the proliferation of patents in the software realm is a problem. “It’s not clear that we really need patents in most industries,” he says.
However, he notes that some industries, such as pharmaceuticals, “had a better claim to intellectual property protection because of the enormous investment it takes to create a successful drug,” reports Reuters.
In canceling the Apple-Motorola trial, “Posner said an injunction barring the sale of Motorola phones would harm consumers. He also rejected the idea of trying to ban an entire phone based on patents that cover individual features like the smooth operation of streaming video,” according to the report.
Posner wrote that Apple’s patent “is not a claim to a monopoly of streaming video!”
Not all judges share Posner’s view of the patent wars. Last week, for example, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in California granted Apple two pretrial injunctions against Samsung regarding the Galaxy Tab and Galaxy Nexus phone, specifically citing Apple’s patent for the Siri search feature. Samsung is appealing the injunctions.
According to a Reuters report: “Congress is considering whether companies that hold patents essential to a standard, such as a digital movie format, should be forbidden from asking that infringing products be banned from the U.S. market.”
The Senate Judiciary Committee will discuss the antitrust impact of sales bans this week, and will hear testimony from members of the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department.
As is standard now, the companies holding these essential patents are expected to license them, even to competitors, on fair terms. “The expectation is they will make less on each license, but will license the technology so broadly that the patent will still be extremely lucrative,” details Reuters.
But as lawsuits and competition related to smartphones have increased in number and intensity, Motorola Mobility (recently purchased by Google) has even asked for sales bans on products that infringe on some of these essential patents.
“The FTC, in recent comments to the International Trade Commission, which can ban infringing products from the U.S. market, warned that the owners of standard essential patents can sometimes demand too much for licensing fees and use the considerable threat of an injunction to win unreasonable rates. It urged the ITC to refrain from barring infringing products from the U.S. market if the patent in question is essential to an industry standard,” according to the article.
But Motorola Mobility argues that such bans will help to prevent rivals and competition from refusing to pay licensing fees.
U.S. Representative Lamar Smith of Texas has introduced the Intellectual Property Attache Act, which “revives one of the sneakier portions of SOPA to create a global intellectual property task force, charged with aggressively promoting anti-piracy law around the world,” reports TechCrunch.
Open Internet advocates are concerned the new proposal may represent some of the over-reaching principles that served as the basis of SOPA. Proponents of the bill have suggested it would streamline a complex system of management.
Additional concern has been expressed that the bill is being fast-tracked without time for public debate. And several public advocacy groups have suggested that we already have enough federal entities that address IP regulations.
“The specifics of the bill appear to go further than the version in SOPA,” suggests Techdirt in a related post. “It is clear that the bill itself is framed from the maximalist perspective. There is nothing about the rights of the public, or of other countries to design their own IP regimes.”
“The bill also ‘elevates’ the IP attaches out of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and sets them up as their own agency, including a new role: the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property,” adds Techdirt.
According to an email from one of Smith’s aides, the bill is not a follow-up to SOPA. “The bill that the Committee currently is working on is a narrow piece of legislation to ensure better use of Patent and Trademark Office funds,” states the e-mail. “The current draft increases organizational efficiency at the PTO and moves the IP attache program squarely within the PTO to ensure direct accountability of the IP attaches.”
Surprising to some, Representative Darrell Issa (who we earlier reported had posted a proposed Digital Bill of Rights online and was recently the first politician to sign the Declaration of Internet Freedom), has announced his support of the IP Attache Act, but is seeking to exempt “clear IP exceptions like fair use,” according to a statement from his office.
Issa was a vocal opponent to SOPA and similar proposed legislation.
As the current generation of consoles grow old, and as gamers await the next generation, PC gaming looks to capitalize on the console lull.
PC games were once the standard of multiplayer gaming, and as consoles become dated, gamers are again turning to PCs to deliver more current graphics and engines.
In May, “Diablo III” sold more titles than any other game, marking the first time since July 2010 that a PC-only game was the top-selling game.
“Historically the PC game market has taken a lead in commercial innovation compared to the console sector,” explains Piers Harding-Rolls, senior principal analyst and head of games for IHS Screen Digest. “This innovation has extended to business model — the introduction of subscriptions and micro-transactions — and across digital business.”
New technology, such as Nvidia’s GTX 680 GPU and Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 4, “could spur resurgence for those looking to purchase game-specific PC, such as those offered by companies such as Digital Storm or Dell’s Alienware division,” reports Fortune.
“The issue now is whether the game developers will respond with software that takes advantage of new technology,” notes the article.
Sony’s recent acquisition of cloud gaming company GaiKai, prompts TechCrunch to question if Sony may consider releasing a cloud-based gaming service rather than an expensive console device.
Typically, companies sell the expensive consoles at a loss, hoping to profit from the sales of games and other services. But cloud-based services could dramatically reduce the costs for consumers and allow the companies to profit more quickly. A cloud-based console could sell for as little as $100.
However, there are problems with cloud-based gaming, starting with the fact that Sony does not have the infrastructure in place to host a full network of cloud-based gamers. Building such a network would be expensive.
Cable companies also have begun to introduce tiered broadband plans. Cloud-based gaming would stream HD content, which could require a a great deal of bandwidth, even for casual gamers. Hardcore gamers would rack up enormous cable bills, which would essentially punish the company’s most valued customers.
However, a low-cost game console could attract new customers and free the likes of Microsoft and Sony to create services that are not tied to a specific piece of hardware.
“Making gaming a streaming service rather than based on the physical purchase of games also opens up new potential business models,” suggests TechCrunch. “Xbox Live already has a membership fee attached, and subscription games — where you get the software for free but then pay a monthly fee to access the game online — are nothing new, particularly in the MMORPG world. But without the need for physical downloads or actual distribution of discs to consumers, subscriptions could become even more popular for cloud-powered games.”
Congressman Darrell Issa of California has become the first elected official to sign the Declaration of Internet Freedom, a broad document that hopes to keep the Internet free and open.
As previously reported via ETCentric, the document currently has an eclectic group of supporters and addresses areas such as expression, access, openness, innovation and privacy.
Issa, a vocal opponent to the earlier proposed SOPA legislation, recently posted his own suggested 10-point digital Bill of Rights.
“We need to frame a digital Bill of Rights,” he wrote on KeepTheWebOpen.com, which uses a new tool called Madison to open the legislative and treaty process. “This is my first draft. I need your help to get this right, so I published it here in Madison for everyone to comment, criticize and collaborate. I look forward to hearing from you and continuing to work together to keep the Web open.”
The Declaration of Internet Freedom “is very broad and vague, most likely by design,” explains TechCrunch. “As the Atlantic Wire points out, this language makes it very difficult for the government and citizens behind the Declaration to reach a solution. Perhaps having a government official cross sides and sign the Declaration will help move things along.”
Google shuttered the collaborative coding project that programmers Scott Blum and Jamie Yap had built, but the company has released their work to encourage open-source development.
The project, named Collide (short for “Collaborative Integrated Development Environment”), allows multiple programmers to work on a single project at the same time in a similar fashion to Google Docs.
“Yap said he hopes releasing some of the Collide project as open-source software will give it a new lease on life outside Google or lead to improvements at other online development tools,” reports CNET.
“This is a small slice of useful functionality that we hope can serve as a catalyst for realizing what our original intentions were with our project,” explains Yap.
“There are some pretty gnarly ideas around code review and version control workflows floating around (not enabled) in some of the client code in Collide that we hope will see the light of day soon,” he adds. “There are some pretty crazy things you can do with a hosted development environment.”
With Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal both reporting that Apple will launch a smaller version of its iPad later this year, the mini iPad seems to now be more of a reality than a rumor.
The new device may potentially lead to devastating competition for other products in the smaller tablet market including the Kindle Fire, Nook and Nexus 7.
Apple will likely sell its device at a premium, but the company “would do well against its competitors purely on the strength of its apps,” suggests TIME.
Other companies have tried to compete with Apple in the 10-inch tablet market, but none have succeeded, and companies may experience similar frustration as Apple and its ecosystem of apps migrates to smaller tablets.
Apple likes to profit from its hardware (Apple makes $150 on each Wi-Fi iPad 2), which means it will likely sell its mini iPad for $250 or $300.
With Apple dominating the market while selling at a premium, other companies will likely drive prices lower, “but they won’t come up with better products that way — only cheaper ones,” speculates TIME.
Walt Mossberg offers his take on the $199 Nexus 7, an Android tablet from Google set to launch next week. The new tablet, built by Asus, is Wi-Fi-only and features a 7-inch screen.
“After testing the Nexus 7 for a couple of weeks, I consider it the best Android tablet I’ve used,” he writes. “It’s a serious alternative to both Apple’s larger $499 iPad and to a more direct rival: Amazon’s $199, Android-based, 7-inch Kindle Fire. I prefer the Nexus 7 to 7-inch models from Google partners like Samsung, whose comparable product costs $250.”
Mossberg notes ways in which the Nexus 7 does not keep up with the iPad: no cellular connectivity option, no rear camera, less screen resolution, less memory, fewer content choices and fewer available apps.
“But Google’s tablet is a better choice than the iPad for people on a budget; for those who prefer a lighter, more compact tablet that’s easier to carry and operate with one hand; and for those who prefer Google’s ecosystem of apps, services and content to Apple’s,” he notes, adding that he found the Nexus 7 battery life to be better than that of the iPad.
The Nexus 7 touts an artificial-intelligence feature that “presents a screen, called Google Now, with information it considers relevant to you at your present location and time — like the weather, traffic conditions between home and work, your next calendar appointment, and information for flights you’ve been researching,” writes Mossberg.
He also points out that “Apple is rumored to be planning a smaller, less costly iPad, which could give the Nexus 7 a run for its money.”
The post includes a 6-minute video report from Mossberg.
Twenty years ago, Robert Cringely predicted that PCs would be dead by now. While his timing was off the mark, he still sees their demise.
“Fifteen years from now, we won’t be able to function without some sort of machine with a microprocessor and memory inside,” Cringely wrote in 1992. “Though we probably won’t call it a personal computer, that’s what it will be.”
Today, smartphones and PCs each comprise a $250 billion industry. However, the smartphone industry is still rapidly growing, while the PC industry is not.
We continue to rely on devices with processors and memory, but the mobility trend has led us to different devices such as notebooks. Still, hardware is becoming disposable while our data in the cloud becomes more important.
“How long before the PC as we knew it is dead? About five years I reckon, or 1.5 PC hardware replacement cycles,” writes Cringely today. “Nearly all of us are on our next-to-last PC.”
In a recent interview, Bill Gates spoke candidly about Microsoft’s decision to create its own tablet, Surface, that will compete with other tablets by HP, Dell, Lenovo and others running the company’s new Windows 8 operating system.
In an interview with Charlie Rose, Gates justified the company’s new initiative. “I actually believe you can have the best of both worlds,” he said. “You can have a rich ecosystem of manufacturers and you can have a few signature devices that show off, wow, what’s the difference between a tablet and a PC?”
“To Microsoft’s defense, Google is taking the same route with its Nexus 7 tablet and the other ‘Google Experience’ tablets planned in the near future,” writes Kevin Parrish for Tom’s Hardware. “These will be ‘signature’ devices offering the best of what Google has to offer while manufactured by one of its top-tier manufacturers. However, these devices will be competing not only with Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Apple’s iPad, but all the other Android tablets on the market.”
Gates also suggested that tablets like these will replace the traditional personal computer. “You can get everything you like about a tablet, everything you like about a PC, all in one device,” he told Rose. “That should change the way people look at things.”
Liam Casey, chief executive officer of PCH International, has recently noticed a renewed appreciation for hardware makers in an industry that once seemed to praise software developers above all others.
“Silicon Valley is interested in hardware again, and Casey is riding the trend,” writes Businessweek. In the interview, Casey said: “Hardware is the new software.”
This appreciation was highlighted by Microsoft’s recent unveiling of its Surface tablet, seen as “a move that puts the company in direct competition with its traditional PC partners. Instead of crowing about the device’s apps, Microsoft executives gushed about its magnesium finish, kickstand, and a clever cover that doubles as a keyboard,” notes the article.
Google is getting ready to launch its own tablet, the Nexus 7. Amazon has been making Kindle hardware since 2007, making it “hard to find a large technology outfit that traffics only in bits,” according to the report.
It has long been the standard of many technology companies to rely on creating software while outsourcing the hardware-building at a cheaper price.
But that’s changing, largely due to Apple’s end-to-end success over the years, according to Harmut Esslinger, founder of Frog Design.
“They all thought they could get someone else to do the hard work,” he says. “Now they’re realizing that their hardware partners don’t have the vision to create anything holistic. And meanwhile, Apple is eating their breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”
Businessweek notes that last year Apple earned more profits than Microsoft for the first time since 1990.
CBS, NBC and Fox have won the first round in the battle over Dish Network’s ad-skipping technology known as AutoHop.
“A New York federal court Monday denied Dish’s request for a declaratory ruling that the AutoHop does not violate copyright law,” reports the Los Angeles Times.
The networks had filed suit to block AutoHop (launched in May), which lets Dish customers bypass commercials on recorded versions of their shows.
“Now we move on to the real issue at hand — demonstrating that Dish Network has created and marketed a product with the clear goal of breaching its license with Fox, violating copyrights and destroying the fundamental underpinnings of the broadcast television business,” Fox said in a statement.
“We look forward to proceeding with this case, recognizing that it has been 28 years since the Supreme Court’s ‘Betamax’ decision held that a viewer, in the privacy of their home, could record a television show to watch later,” said R. Stanton Dodge, Dish’s general counsel. “Dish will stand behind consumers and their right to skip commercials, something they have been doing since the invention of the remote control.”
Unable to agree on terms for a new contract, more than a dozen Viacom channels were pulled from DirecTV on Wednesday.
