Translation Please
Stumped by tech gibberish? Veteran technology analyst Leslie Ellis translates the latest in broadband gadgetry, services, bandwidth, and gear.
Inside a Comcast 'AnyPlay' Installation
Last Monday, a new gadget arrived here in the over-the-top video lab: Comcast’s “AnyPlay” streamer, which makes it possible for tripleplay customers to stream live and linear TV to an iPad.What lab, you say? It all started last summer. The point of it is to see, firsthand, how and why everyday consumers visit the “connected” side of connected TVs, and whether the ...... Read More
Comments (1)How Video Slinging Fits in the Upstream
Last week’s mail contained this query from reader Steve, who asked, “How would slinging video up cable’s upstream path work, given how little bandwidth there is down there?” He was referring to last week’s column about Broadcom putting Sling Media’s technology into the silicon that goes inside cable modems and set-top boxes. When available (Q3 of 2012), wh ...... Read More
Comments (5)2012 International CES Musings, Part Two
Things were just starting to sizzle at the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show when last week’s edition went to press, so here’s a part two on overall observations.When one returns from CES - any CES - the first thing people ask is: “What was the coolest thing you saw?” This year, the technology food chain is fragmenting, and each fragment is furiously chasing ...... Read More
Comments (0)CES 2012: The Connector Cacophony
LAS VEGAS - A less-glitzy but persistent thread at last week’s Consumer Electronics Show? Connectors. HDMI, USB, Ethernet, you name it. Yes, even in these wireless times, connectors still matter. As someone who spent chunks of 2011 figuring out how to wire up a pile of over-the-top gadgetry, I can attest: When everything needs an Internet connection, one starts to think more about signals a ...... Read More
Comments (1)How to Talk Like a Gear Head at CES
Well, the holidays blew by and the calendar flipped to a new year. This can only mean one thing: Consumer Electronics Show! If you’re heading there, know going in that tablets and connected TVs will (again) dominate the scene. Beyond that, here’s a lingo guide to the larger CES trends, so that you can maneuver the whole scene with panache. Let’s start with “OLED.” ...... Read More
Comments (1)Big (Cable) Tech Trends for 2012
And here we are again at the last issue of the year. This week, we’ll go more “things in motion stay in motion” than “history is a great teacher,” with a forecast of five big tech trends for ‘12. Here goes: 1. HTML5. This one skips into the shop-talk scene every day, it seems. Remember the big fight between Apple and Adobe about which was better, HTML5 or ...... Read More
Comments (0)TVOT 2011: EBIF, or ACR?
NEW YORK - One of the recurring themes at Tracy Swedlow’s twice yearly “TV of Tomorrow” events is the interactive-TV activity around EBIF. The episode held on Dec. 5 was no exception. This time, though, there was a new wrinkle: EBIF, or ACR (audio content recognition), as the best means to do “companion apps” on second screens, like tablets? Refresher: EBIF, whic ...... Read More
Comments (4)Adaptive Streaming and Picture Quality
Ever wonder what could happen to picture quality when a given screen is displaying a “downshifted” stream of video, sent using adaptive bit-rate techniques? I did, and was glad to soak up a session about it at the recent SCTE Cable-Tec Expo. Short version: Arris CTO Tom Cloonan and colleague Jim Allen built an emulator in their lab to sample what happens when different types of traff ...... Read More
Comments (0)SCTE's Top Tech Trends: Broadband Bonanza
ATLANTA - No shortage of data and deep-dive at the recent SCTE Cable-Tec Expo, held here the week before Thanksgiving. In no particular order, the highlights from my notes: Objects that need or want an Internet connection will number 15 billion worldwide by 2015; Comcast alone anticipates that more than 250 million Internet protocolconnected things will hang off its cable modems within the same ti ...... Read More
Comments (0)Your SCTE Cable-Tec Expo Jargon Descrambler, 2011
The industry’s technical ranks descend upon Atlanta today, and by the looks of the sessions, workshops and meeting requests, this year’s SCTE Cable-Tec Expo is going to be another jargon doozy. Starting with other current events: If you happened to catch last Wednesday’s test of the national Emergency Alert System (hint: pretty glitchy), and wondered how that whole thing gets ...... Read More
Comments (0)Who Did Coin The Term 'Cloud Computing'?
In the Oct. 31 edition of MIT Technology Review, writer Antonio Regalado delves into the origin of this ample ingredient in tech jargon: “Cloud computing.” His research puts the date at November 1996 - almost exactly 15 years ago. That’s when a renegade group of technologists inside Compaq Computer (later bought by Hewlett-Packard) coined the phrase as a strategy to sell more ...... Read More
Comments (2)Adaptive Streaming: Cloud, Gateway or Both?
Here’s a good one from reader Jan: “Where does adaptive streaming happen - in the cloud or in the gateway?” Adaptive streaming is the process of slicing a digital video file into different sizes: maybe one that’s two seconds in length, another that’s four seconds and so on. The technique necessarily works hand in hand with “transcoding” and “ ...... Read More
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