After a recent catch up with Microsoft, and in light of the recent retirement of its founder, I thought that it may be worth reflecting on what role Microsoft are likely to play in the future of the Internet TV industry.

In general, the company seems to be leaning toward the enterprise and appears to see the move of applications away from the desktop to the server as a done deal. However, their approach and pricing for this market – especially for their excellent database products – remains restrictive. Aaded to this is the fact that the media sector is a very thin slice on their revenue pie chart, so has never really commanded enough attention.

Silverlight seems to have been a success and the Expressions Encoder, which replaced Windows Media Encoder, is a very, very impressive application, although restricted to the VCV1 codec. However, video players developed in Silverlight, such as those from Narrowstep, seems incredibly slow to load and have problems on pre-Intel Macs. Adobe’s Flash technology is proving to be ubiquitous and even powers the video on MSN – an admission of defeat if ever there was one.

Microsoft’s DRM remains the only real option on the market – I’ve yet to see really successful implementation of rival solutions such as WideVine on any scale. This is a real strength that the company does not seem to leverage.

Microsoft IPTV has been less of a success and I’ve heard nothing but horror stories about its implementation including the first customer, Swisscom’s decision to quietly drop the technology.

On the desktop Windows Media Centre Edition was a real let down. It was difficult to develop for and even more difficult for users to set up. Most people who bought computers with this OS just ignored the EPG interface and this has continued with its integration into Vista.

There’s little doubt that Microsoft has figured out that it will not be able to charge top dollar for its products forever in a world where things are increasingly free or advertising driven. This is why they have persevered with the millstone that is MSN and bought Accipiter and their Atlas online ad system.

Now, this is where things begin to unravel. Microsoft is never going to catch up or even compete with Google in this space, even teaming up with Yahoo! would not have brought them the clout they required and would have turned them into something they will never be – a media company.

The reality is, Microsoft are going to become increasingly dependant, as many, many major corporations are, on Google for their future.

Excerpt from:
Microcosm

So, as I write this Bll Gates will be logging off and leaving work for the last time.

He has long been admired and derrided in roughly equal measures, but I have nothing but huge admiration for him, the way he has conducted himself and for his ongoing mission.

Microsoft under Steve Ballmer is a corporate beast that is unlikely to innovate again and is increasingly ‘getting it wrong’.

Gates was never the fashionista that Steve Jobs is and has never really attracted the praise he deserves for creating one of the best companies in history, ranking with GE and his original nemesis, IBM.

Of course, without him we might now be living in a different world. Better or worse, who can really say. I reckon better.

The only thing he didn’t perhaps do was create a more democratic information society, but what does IT matter when so many people have no food, water or shelter.

At the end of that day I quite like the idea that I’ve been taxed by Bill and much of that money is now being funnelled into good causes. It sure beats letting governments do it.

But the one industry where Bill must be considered a failure is TV. Cludgy attempts at IPTV, seriously poor technologies and an obsession with the OS did the company no favours. The only successes were the quality of the codecs and the DRM. Having long ago lost the creative community, the rest was just pushing water uphill and the forays into content (MSN) and advertising (Atlas) are cursory at best. When the history of TV is written, Steve Jobs’ name will loom large, but Bill’s will be missing.

As Bill clears his desk and takes his cardboard box home on the bus from Redmond I don’t think that he’ll give a second thought to this, a minor failure in the overall scope of things.

Curing the world of TB, now that’s a whole different matter…

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Eulogy

Starting a company from scratch can be a lonely experience; I’ve always worked with someone, if only as a sounding board and fellow after work drinker. So, if I was just doing Project V from my home office in the Welsh mountains I’m pretty convinced that I would drive both the cat and myself crazy very quickly.

One particularly difficult element of an online business is that there are long hiatuses whilst software is being developed.

Thankfully, I have many other commitments that get me out and about and keep me occupied. Indeed, these I take more seriously than Project V since I’m both passionate about the companies I’ve got involved with and feel a great responsibility where others are involved.

Still, I have a newfound respect for people who go out on a limb and do it all themselves from a room at home. It seems idyllic during a morning commute on a packed train, but it’s not as easy as it seems.

Project V – So Lonely

The CDN market is set for some startling changes between now and the end of the year. The Level3 and AT&T moves I’ve previously blogged about and now a new product to be launched soon by Swedish company Edgeware has me very excited indeed.

This company already provides ultra high bandwidth and low power server to the IPTV industry and are soon to launch an Internet TV box.

So, with a couple of these 1u boxes and a couple of 20GB pipes you could easily handle 50,000 concurrent connections. Power issues are minimal (one of the real problems of running a CDN) and flash storage is far more reliable than mechanical hard drives, so reliability and management time should be reduced. Basic load management is also built in.

To date, this has been an expensive and difficult industry to enter, but this latest development means that there’s a further shadow over the established players such as Akamai (AKAM), Limelight (LLNW) and Internap (INAP).

Go here to see the original:
CDN In A Box

The ICANN proposals to review the top level domains probably makes a lot of sense, and will clearly make some people a lot of money. It may hit the income of the islanders of Tuvalu as .tv competes with .tele, .epg and .media, and is unlikely to make life any easier for viewers trying to find content. It’s also a good development for Google as the unpredictability of domain names increases.

But it does make the internet a place of greater possibilities, which is to be welcomed. Now, if we can only effect the transition to IPv6.

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Namesake