If Network DVR Prevails, Would Set-Top DVRs Die Off?
Washington — What happens if Cablevision wins its case before the Supreme Court, and a network DVR is ruled good to go?
Jim Chiddix, moderating the panel “Cable Technology and the Platform for Change” at the Cable Show ‘09, posed the question to several top cable operator execs, asking, “If Jim [Blackley from Cablevision] prevails at the Supreme Court, will you call up your set-top provider the next day and cancel your orders for DVRs?”
No one in the group wanted to bite.
“Mike?” Chiddix asked, attempting to elicit a comment from Time Warner Cable CTO Mike LaJoie.
LaJoie responded: “You must mean Mike Lee.”
Mike Lee, Rogers Communications chief strategy officer, paused then said: “I agree with Mike.”
Added Comcast CTO Tony Werner: “Ditto.”
taco commented:
I just wish that Cablevision / Optimum would offer multi-room dvr…
John in Detroit commented:
I\’m concerned about bandwidth as well, Now as it happens I have a \”network\” of up to six DVR\’s here in this house (currently 4, 3 working) 3 are Dedicated DVR\’s the other 3 are computer/DVR\’s This allows me to view a show recorded on any of the 3 computers can be either viewed on the computers (any) or set up for viewing on the 3 dedicated DVR\’s as well. Control of the actual Now Even with this fairly small system I occasionally (Like right now) run into bandwith issues (And this is on the local 10/100 router. Imagine how bad it would be if I had to stream over the net.
No, I\’ll keep my set top boxes
Reg Dunlap commented:
I concur with Nick\’s comments about latency making a big difference for customers. The STB DVR has very precise control of pause, frame advance, FF that is very different than the VOD experience. VOD playback from a server is not nearly as responsive and isn\’t desireable for regular viewing, imho. The timeshifting experrience allowed by STB DVR\’s is such a favorable experience, it\’s hard to step back to a user interface that isn\’t as responsive.
Nick Hamilton-Piercy commented:
Not sure how transparent the network PVR will be compared to STB in things like latency. Throw enough capex would work but in \”real life\” this might be the make/break issue for giving up an STB.
Jim Gee commented:
Most people will not call up and cancel same day however they would over time switch to the operators network service. 12-24 months you can expect more that a 50 percent switch.
Jim Gee commented:
Most people will not call up and cancel same day however they would over time switch to the operators network service. 12-24 months you can expect more that a 50 percent switch.
