Digital Lifescapes

Who is Deborah Tate? That's a question that many people in the telecom sector will be asking in the coming weeks. Nominated by the Bush administration to replace an exiting FCC commissioner, we should all be concerned. Why? From 1979 to 1985, she was on the senior staff and as assistant legal counsel to then Governor Lamar Alexander. Fast forward to January 2004, now Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN), and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist became famous for their unrelenting attempts to apply a new tax to internet access services. A month later, when that effort failed to gain enough support, Senator Alexander said he instead wanted to increase the federal excise tax on telecom services. "Congress should raise the federal excise tax from 3 percent to 4 percent," said Alexander at that time. Senator John McCain of Arizona had previously made the case to end the Federal Excise tax, but was unable to gain enough support for the bill. Note, many democrats and republicans se...

The BBC plans to test high-definition delivery of its programs to cable and satellite TV providers, as well as on digital terrestrial TV, in the U.K. in mid-2006. The HDTV trial is expected to last a year; the BBC said it plans to offer all of its programming in HDTV format by 2010, when the U.K. digital TV transition will be complete. The BBC added that it hopes to offer live sporting events, such as the World Cup, in high-definition as part of the trial. "Our promise to our license payers is to give them the highest quality television, so the time is right for the BBC to get involved in high definition," BBC director of television Jana Bennett told BBC News Online. "High definition may take time to grow in Britain, but as with the other technologies we helped to build, the BBC wants to prepare now to be able to deliver the benefits of HDTV to all its license payers in the long term."

The TeleManagement Forum adds to its list of solutions being highlighted this week as part of the Catalyst Project Showcase with a focus on consumer VoIP automated provisioning. The project is supported by BellSouth Corp., EMBRATEL, BEA Systems, MetaSolv Software Inc., Cognizant Technology Solutions, Pantero, Juniper Networks and Sun Microsystems. The expert solution addresses the process for providing consumers with VoIP services with immediate service activation. The Catalyst solution scope is architected using the TM Forum�s eTOM process framework, including the fulfillment processes, and its NGOSS architecture as a conceptual systems framework. The Catalyst system demonstrates a layered, service-oriented architecture (SOA) solution that enables consumer customers to order IP services such as VoIP over the Web. Through the TM Forum�s standards-driven integration and interoperability, as well as rapid flow-through service fulfillment and resource provisioning processes, consumers can...

�NGOSS distilled� by John Reilly and Martin Creaner outlines how all the Next-Generation Operations Support Systems (NGOSS) components fit together and how today's telecom solution designers can bring immediate benefits to their businesses by adopting NGOSS. Written by two of the world's leading authorities on the subject � Reilly, an advisory product architect and principal member of the technical staff for MetaSolv Software Inc. and Creaner, vice president and CTO of the Telemanagement Forum � �NGOSS distilled� gives a step-by-step explanation of the core NGOSS components including: eTOM: the enhanced Telecoms Operations Map is an industry-agreed set of integrated business process descriptions, used for mapping and analyzing operational processes and created with today's customer-centric market in mind. SID: the Shared Information and Data model is a comprehensive information architecture for the telecom industry. NGOSS Integration Framework: the core architectural princi...

The TeleManagement Forum has launched a new online product directory for the telecom industry. The directory will serve as a one-stop-shop for Operations Support Systems (OSS) and Business Support Systems (BSS) products and services. TM Forum members can submit their product and service offerings free of charge to be included in the new directory, and visitors to the TM Forum Web site will be able to view the products listed in the directory. Entries to the product directory will be categorized according to the Forum's Telecom Application Map (TAM), a framework for categorizing products and services in pre-defined application areas. Product directory users will be able to search by company and application area as defined in the TAM.

According to In-Stat, although the broadband customer premises equipment (CPE) market is in the process of transitioning from being heavily dominated by modems toward a heavier focus on gateways, this process is not occurring overnight. Within the category of broadband CPE, we include broadband modems, residential gateways and SOHO routers. Service providers are behind this transition to enable back-end managed home networks and opportunities for additional revenue. A major increase in worldwide broadband subscribers this year, not to mention the hot popularity of wireless- and VoIP-enabled equipment, is resulting in a healthy CPE growth this year that is on track to approach 20 percent. Many consumers are attempting to save on their traditional phone bill by trying out several flavors of VoIP that are available today. With this interest, the market for VoIP-enabled CPE has benefited, and will continue to benefit.

The Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) announced completion of its first �Plugfest�. At the Plugfest, eight member companies tested eight products to verify that they interoperate and perform at levels consistent with the specifications set by the MoCA Certification Board. The Plugfest featured an 8-node MoCA network using all companies� products simultaneously sharing three HD videos, eight SD videos, and interactive gaming for a total of more than 90 Mbps of full motion, no excuses digital entertainment. Companies taking part in thePlugfest included Actiontec Electronics, Entropic Communications, Linksys, Motorola, Mototech, Panasonic, 2Wire, and Westell Technologies, which tested various home networking products including, residential gateways, Ethernet/coax bridges, reference designs, and chipsets. Comcast and Verizon attended the Plugfest as observer proctors. By participating in Plugfest, these vendors were able to increase their ability to have their products pass the suite of...

Samsung Electronics introduced 5 new mobile phones for the European market. The average of the newly unveiled phones are under 15mm thick and offer the latest multimedia features -- such as music playback capability, megapixel camera and Bluetooth connectivity. The lineups include two 3G phones, two slide-up GSM/GPRS phones, and a credit-card size mobile phone. Samsung said the current trend in mobile phone design is moving towards "slim & wide" design. The slim & wide design concept offers better portability with its light weight and thinness, and enriches multimedia features in a mobile environment with larger screens.

Pyramid Research estimates that 42 percent of the roughly 1.05 billion new mobile subscribers over the next five years will come from the BRIC countries � Brazil, Russia, India and China. According to a recent study, 20 percent to 50 percent of mobile subscribers surveyed in BRIC countries said they had not received much information from their service provider about the types of mobile data services available to them or how to use them. In India and China, roughly 20 percent of the wireless subscribers surveyed reported they hadn�t been educated by their carrier about mobile data services, while in Brazil and Russia, nearly half felt they hadn�t received much information about available services or how to use them. �It appears that operators should not be hasty in making positive assumptions regarding subscriber awareness of mobile data services; our survey suggests that as many as half of subscribers in some countries simply do not know about mobile data,� comments Pyramid Research se...

Ironically, more than one in 10 new DirecTV additions are coming from its telco deals with Verizon Communications, BellSouth and Qwest Communications International. On its third-quarter earnings call, DirecTV said it generated 180,000 new additions from its telco alliances out of 1.1 million total additions -- the seventh consecutive quarter of telco-addition increase. Telco DBS TV Q3 2005 Subscriber adds were as follows. BellSouth (DirecTV): 460,000 SBC (Dish): 419,000 Verizon (DirecTV): 300,000 Qwest (DirecTV): 95,000 TOTAL: 1,274,000

Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNOs) are in a second phase of growth, made possible by the advent of 3G mobile phone services. 3G's data-centric capabilities have opened up new markets for MVNOs targeting specific high-end subscriber groups. With CAPEX and running costs far lower than those of the facilities-based operators whose networks they use, MVNOs can succeed with far fewer subscribers. In the past MVNO markets were dominated by low-cost providers buying wireless access wholesale and reselling it under their own brand names, offering plans aimed at a low-cost customer's needs. Now 3G allows MVNOs to offer more than just low cost: data services that may not be available from the mainstream, facilities-based operators. Tier 1 operators focus on the broad customer segment that mainly wants voice and SMS and may send the occasional picture, but is less interested in things like 3D gaming or broadband video. "These new MVNOs recognize a market segment that is ripe fo...

U.S. consumers, teenagers in particular, show distinct preferences for short, easily consumable content, including music videos, TV sitcoms, and movie trailers, when it comes to portable streaming video and downloads, according to a new study from Parks Associates. Chief among the favored content are music videos, which received strong interest from 15 percent of all U.S. Internet households and 38 percent of teenagers. The strength of this content in a portable video context validates the early efforts of such players as Apple Computer Inc., which has started deploying short, targeted videos to complement its existing iTunes� music service. Further, as a growing number of existing television providers - including major cable operators - seek to enhance their offerings, they may augment their deployment with these types of mobile video content. These findings, according to Parks Associates' analysts, may augur well in light of last week's news that Sprint Nextel Corp. will supp...

It's easy to get free music over the Internet. At least that's what most online young people think, according to a new Pew Internet & American Life Project report that examined "Teen Creators and Consumers." This is a formidable potential audience. About 21 million Americans ages 12-17 use the Internet, and half of this group logs on every single day. Many (57 percent) of these tech-friendly respondents also have created their own content specifically for the Internet. That means there are about 12 million people between the ages of 12-17 who have created a blog, worked on a Web page, shared some type of media or remixed others' online content into a new creation.

While Japan's total theatrical film market has expanded by nearly 25 percent over the past five years, the portion of total boxoffice claimed by the five U.S. majors has not kept pace. One reason: Japanese independent importer-distributors, often distributing local films acquired at markets like the American Film Market, are taking a greater slice of the boxoffice pie. This might be a significant trend because Japan is traditionally the largest theatrical offshore market for the American majors and film sellers. According to distributors, boxoffice rankings for the period covering January 1 - October 25, show that the nation's leading distributor by far is Toho Co. The Japanese giant handles the output from the nation's most commercially successful domestic film producers: Fuji Television and Studio Ghibili, the source of the smash animation creations of Hayao Miyazaki.

In another sign of the growing competition between cable and phone companies, Cablevision plans to announce that it will offer its residential customers some of the fastest Internet connections available. Cablevision, the nation�s fifth-largest cable provider, plans to start selling broadband connections with top speeds of 50 megabits per second to the 4.5 million households in the area where it offers service. Cablevision will also raise the speed of its current broadband service by 50 percent, to 15 megabits per second, at no additional cost. The move comes as Verizon, Cablevision�s chief rival in the New York metropolitan area, introduces its own super-fast Internet service. In places where Verizon has installed new fiber-optic cables, consumers can buy broadband connections of up to 30 megabits per second. The cable and phone companies have been in a battle for broadband customers because the service generates substantial profits, and because customers who get the service are more ...

Yahoo and TiVo announced a deal that will connect Yahoo's vast online service to TiVo's set-top boxes, which, in addition to recording television programs, have a largely unused capability to connect to the Internet. The deal will allow TiVo, which has been struggling to differentiate its service from generic video recorders offered by cable and satellite companies, to offer a range of content and services linked to the Internet. Conversely, Yahoo is working to move its services from personal computers to other devices, including mobile phones and - by way of devices like TiVo - the television set. David Katz, Yahoo's vice president for entertainment and sports programming, described the deal as a first step as Yahoo explores TiVo's technology. "Our core business today exists on the computer because that's where the majority of our users are," Mr. Katz said. "Our goal is to provide our users on any platform with whatever content they are most interest...

In what could be the start of massive consumer take-up of Wi-Fi services, Nintendo will announce that it will offer free wireless broadband access in Europe and Asia for users of its DS handheld game consoles. The news follows an October announcement that the fast food restaurant McDonald�s will offer free Wi-Fi access in the United States to users of Nintendo�s DS handheld game consoles. The U.S. access points are being supplied by Wayport, which will receive an undisclosed sum. In the United Kingdom, gamers will be able to use free hot spots at over 7,500 locations, including McDonald�s restaurants, Coffee Republic coffeehouses, Hilton and Ramada Jarvis hotels, Road Chef and Welcome Break service stations, railway stations, airports, football stadiums, and even at the British Library. Wi-Fi hot spots also will be installed in major video game stores. Access is being provided by The Cloud, and BT Openzone, with Nintendo footing the bill.

According to Forrester Research, now that two-thirds of North American households are online, and broadband has reached 72.5 million US households, value has begun to shift from the business of connecting pipelines and selling products to the market for content. Home networks and cheap devices free media content from the shackles of space and time, opening up distribution, and creating the opportunity for new business models. Fasten your seat belts: The content explosion is only beginning. New audio and video outlets are turning up everywhere. Audio content is reaching a connected audience, as evidenced by Apple's iTunes music store's more than half a billion downloads and the launch of Napster To Go. The old-fashioned 30-minute grids of the TV networks and release structure used by movie studios are weakening as video makes the jump to the Internet, mobile phones, hand-held video games, and recently to Apple's newest iPod. In 2004, more online consumers -- 58 percent -- vi...

With the goal of spurring competition with cable companies and accelerating broadband rollouts, the FCC initiated its rulemaking process to address the issue of local franchising for video services. The FCC has tentatively concluded that the Communications Act prohibits local authorities from refusing to award a franchise, and that it regulates a broader range of behaviors. The FCC believes this legislation empowers it "to take steps appropriate to ensure that the local franchising process does not serve as an unreasonable barrier to entry for competitive cable operators." The FCC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking raises a range of questions, including: * Are local franchising authorities unreasonably refusing to grant competitive franchises? * What problems have cable incumbents encountered with LFAs, including how best the Commission can ensure that the local franchising process is not inhibiting the ability of incumbent cable operators to invest in broadband services? * The No...

IDC's Customer Experience Research finds that 100 percent of IT sales and marketing professionals believe alignment of marketing content and sales approach with the needs of customers is very important. However, IT sales and marketing professionals scored their current alignment with customer buy-cycles at 66 percent, effectively grading themselves a C-. In a recent survey of IT vendors, respondents cited that customer alignment is weakest in the awareness and consideration phases of the buy-cycle, creating significant lost revenue opportunities. However, many respondents indicate that misalignment also occurs in the latter phases of the buy-cycle, resulting in customer retention issues. "The maturation of the tech industry has created unprecedented margin pressure for tech vendors, forcing sales and marketing executives to get a greater return on every dollar spent. But how to execute this remains a mystery to many," states Robert Johnson, vice president of Customer Expe...