Verizon Adds Internet Capabilities to FiOS TV

Verizon has added the ability to access certain Internet applications and websites on its FiOS TV IPTV service. It added what it calls its Widget Bazaar applications marketplace, located within FiOS TV's Interactive Media Guide, with free Facebook, Twitter and ESPN Fantasy Football Widgets.

With the Twitter Widget, FiOS TV subscribers can follow Tweets related specifically to the program, movie or sporting event they are watching. They also can select from a list of top topics to view Tweets associated with today's hottest topics and trends, search for specific Tweets, and create and save a favorite-topics list.

FiOS TV subscribers with Facebook accounts can log in to Facebook through the FiOS TV Widget to update their Facebook status with messages about what they're watching, view their own photos, and view their friends' photos and status updates.

The ESPN Fantasy Football Widget provides on-screen access to personalized ESPN Fantasy Football points and football statistics, including rosters, box scores, scoring leaders and player information. All the information is available, at no additional charge, for FiOS TV customers who are registered ESPN Fantasy Football players.

Verizon will add to the FiOS TV Widget Bazaar additional free and transactional applications developed by the company and others. It will publish its Software Development Kit (SDK) to enable open development. The open development platform will enable developers to publish applications to the more than 7 million interactive set-top devices in FiOS TV homes.

Later this month, customers who subscribe to the Home Media DVR service will be able to search and view on FiOS TV user generated online videos from video-sharing sites blip.tv, Dailymotion, and Veoh. In addition, a new My Videos feature will let these subscribers view via FiOS TV personal videos stored on their PCs.

Verizon has put a page on its website that contains more information about these features.

This is a good start at providing access to Internet applications by Verizon. It is starting to make good use of the IP capabilities of its FiOS TV service. Verizon was able to move in this new direction because it now has taken over the development and maintenance of its middleware software. Other IPTV providers will follow Verizon's example.

ATT Enhances U-verse IPTV Service

ATT has introduced new features to its U-verse IPTV service to make it more competitive with cable and satellite companies:

• The ability to set or delete recording as well as watch recorded programs from any of up to eight TVs in the home.
• An increase of speed from 10 to 12 Mbps for those subscribed to this level of service.
• A video on demand recommendation service based on the viewers ratings of past selections.
• An improved interface for web connected PCs for controlling the recording function on the set-top box.
• Improved navigation in using U-verse from the TV.

ATT is strongly promoting its remote DVR capability in its TV ads. It has found a unique feature that seems to be gaining traction.

Verizon Adds 299K IPTV Subscribers in 1Q09

Verizon added 299,000 IPTV FiOS TV subscribers in 1Q09, leaving it with a total of 2.217 million. It also added 298,000 FiOS FTTH subscribers, giving it a total of 2.779 million at the end of the quarter.

Verizon continues to make strong progress. Its FiOS TV service is clearly an important part of its FiOS offering.

ATT Adds 284K IPTV Subscribers in 1Q09

ATT added 284,000 IPTV subscribers in 1Q09, leaving it with a total of 1.329 million at the end of the quarter. Over the same period it added 359,000 broadband subscribers, giving it a total of 15.436 million.

ATT continues to make good progress in spite of the difficult financial environment. It will easily exceed 2 million IPTV subscribers by the end of 2009 if it maintains this rate. It now sees its IPTV service as a significant driver for its broadband business.

ATIS IPTV Interoperability Forum Issues Phase 1 Specs

The ATIS IPTV Interoperability Forum released five new standards establishing IPTV’s foundational framework.

• IPTV Linear TV Service (ATIS-0800018), which establishes IPTV’s fundamental building blocks for expansion into more advanced services, including pay-per-view and next-generation gaming.
• IPTVConsumer Domain Device Configuration Metadata (ATIS-0800022), which specifies the data structures (metadata) required to provide basic information needed to acquire IPTV content.
• Media Formats and Protocols for IPTV Services (ATIS-0800013), which is a comprehensive listing of the protocols and media formats required for the implementation of IPTV-related services.
• IPTV Terminal Metadata Specification (ATIS-0800029), which defines the data structure that facilitates the exchange of user-related data and the IPTV devices
• Fault Codes for IPTV (ATIS-0800028), which includes a categorized listing of fault codes for IPTV functions and components.

These documents are available from the ATIS Document Store.

This is a good effort but it still seems like too little too late.

Time Warner Backing Off Usage Caps

Light Reading has published an article that states that Time Warner has shelved plans to extend its trial of usage caps currently underway in Beaumont, Texas to Rochester, N.Y.; Greensboro, N.C.; and San Antonio and Austin, Texas. Take a look a my previous posting to get information on the Beaumont trial.

Apparently, Time Warner is bowing to public and political pressure. It continues to believe in usage caps and believes that it needs to better educate its users.

Personally, I think usage caps and usage charging will not be accepted and is a tool that Time Warner is using to quash competition from over the top Internet TV services.

Time Warner Modifying Usage Caps

Light Reading published an article describing how Time Warner is modifying its usage caps and another article listing the usage caps both Time Warner and ATT are offering in Beaumont, Texas. Time Warner is offering a higher tier that offers a higher usage cap.

These caps range from 5 GB per month to 150 GB per month.

It is always interesting to calculate how much HD TV viewing that these caps will permit. A cap of 10 GB permits less than 3 hours of HD viewing in the month. A cap of 100 GB permits less that 1 hour of HD viewing per day and a cap of 150 GB permits less that 1.5 hours per day.

Clearly these caps will discourage the use of the broadband service to deliver video to the TV. This is certainly a way that the telcos and the cable companies can keep their customers on their own TV services and away from over the top Internet TV services.

ATT 3 Screen Masters Golf Tournament Coverage

ATT is providing coverage of the 2009 Masters Golf Tournament over its U-verse IPTV service, to the PC, and to mobile phones. Live content to all three screens includes:

• Par 3 Contest, which featured a live feed from the contest on Wednesday, April 8.
• Masters Extra, which gives AT&T viewers one hour of coverage before cable and network broadcast coverage begins.
• Amen Corner Live, which features live coverage of the 11th, 12th and 13th holes.
  15th/16th Live, which features live coverage of the 15th and 16th holes.

On demand coverage includes:

• Masters Moments, featuring a series of 24 vignettes from past Tournaments available to U-Verse and PC viewers.
• Multiple Player Interviews, offered daily via U-verse TV VOD, the PC, and mobile video.
• Masters TV, including daily previews and recaps available via to the PC and mobile video.

This is a nice set of 3 screen programming. It does show the complexity of making this kind of offering. Consequently, compelling 3 screen programming will continue to be limited to these special events quite a while.

Nielson Publishes 3 Screen Usage Statistics

The Nielson Company has issued its 4Q08 three screen video usage survey for the U.S. This survey shows TV viewing, time shifted TV viewing, Internet usage, Internet video viewing, and mobile TV viewing.

Regular TV viewing dominates in terms of the number of viewers as well as the amount of time spent viewing. The demographic breakdown shows that the age groups above 55 are the most avid viewers of regular TV. The age groups between 18 and 34 watches the most Internet videos. The age groups between 25 and 44 make the most use of mobile video.

This report shows that the new technologies are most used by younger people, but that traditional TV is still very strong. It will be interesting to see how these trends hold as this population ages. I think that these younger groups will continue to use these new technologies, but that there viewing habits will be similar to those of their parents today.

Cox Traffic Management Strategy

I have made a post on my Telco 2020 blog on Cox Cable's strategy for managing traffic on its broadband network. Its approach makes a lot more sense than the monthly usage caps that other operators are adopting.

FTC Report on Self Regulation of Interactive Advertising

I have posted an article on my Telco 2020 blog on a new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) report on the effectiveness of self regulation for interactive advertising. The report outlines significant issues with self regulation. I think that we will need regulation in this area before long.

ATT to Slow U-verse Deployment

The latest DSL Prime email from Dave Burstein stated that ATT will reduce the number of new homes added to the U-verse foot print from 8 to 9 million in 2008 to 4 million per year through 2011.

This looks like a result of the current financial fiasco. ATT's U-verse has been quite successful, I wonder why the company is backing off now. Maybe because it is starting to understand the limits of its VDSL approach compared to Verizon's fiber-based approach.

Digital TV Delayed in the U.S.

The U.S. has delayed the analog sunset from February 16 to June 12. I have also written about this on my Telco 2020 blog.

This will not have much effect on the IPTV or even the Pay TV market in the U.S. Any increase in subscribers due to the analog sunset will be more than matched by losses due to the current recession.

Charter Introduces 60 Mbps Cable Modem Service

Charter has introduce a 60 Mbps downstream DOCSIS3.0 cable modem service in St. Louis, Missouri. This service will be priced at $129 per month for its video customers.

This is a premium offering that goes well beyond what ATT can offer with U-verse. Not too many people can afford such a pricey package, so it is not a direct attack on U-verse. Charter will have to bring the price of the service down before it will make a real dent in ATT's success.

ATT Adds 264K IPTV Subscribers in 4Q08

ATT added 264,000 U-verse IPTV subscribers in 4Q08 ending the year with 1.045 million subscribers. The company achieved its goal of 1 million IPTV subscribers by the end of 2008. Its U-verse service now reaches 17 million homes.

ATT completed its rollout of its whole home DVR and two stream HD support by the end of 2008.

ATT made good progress and has established U-verse as a significant competitor in the U.S. pay TV market. It has stated that it will continue its investment in this service while it cuts CapeEx in other areas.

Verizon Adds 303K IPTV Subscribers in 4Q08

Verizon added 303,000 IPTV subscribers in 4Q08 leaving it with a total 1.918 million at the end of the year. This compared to the 282,000 FiOS Internet subscribers it added in the quarter, ending the year with 2.481 FiOS Internet subscribers. Its FiOS ARPU was more than $133 per month in the quarter.

Verizon had a good year, adding nearly 1 million IPTV subscribers in 2008. This shows the strength of its FTTH strategy.

FCC Questions Comcast VoIP

I have made a post on my Telecom 2020 blog that discusses a letter sent from the FCC to Comcast questioning its VoIP strategy. The FCC is questioning why Comcast's cable telephony service should be treated as an Internet VoIP service and be exempt from normal voice service fees. The FCC is concerned because Comcast's cable telephony service is not subject to Comcast's video traffic management system used on its cable modem service.

It will be interesting to see what happens with over the top Internet TV services, which will be subject to similar restrictions. If you read the FCC letter, you will see that watching a TV program at full resolution is likely to cause Comcast's traffic management to make the program unviewable after 15 minutes.

SES Americom to Kill Wholesale IPTV

Telephony published an article that said that SES Americom will discontinue its IP-Prime satellite based IPTV content distribution service in July 2009. In the past year, IP-Prime signed agreements with 70 small telecom operators, 37 of which have reached commercial deployment. The company estimates the number of subscribers remained at less than 10,000 at the end of November.

The small independent U.S. Telcos are a tough market. There are about 1,000 of them with an average of only a couple of thousand customers each. There are actually quite a number with less than 1,000 customers. It is hard to build up a large subscriber base focusing at the low end of this market.

ATT User Experience

Alan Weinkrantz has written a blog posting describing how he got ATT to drop his cost for a triple bundle from $164 per month to $94 per month by threatening to move to a competitor.

This shows how competitive it is becoming where Telco IPTV services are available in the U.S. I am sure that the cable companies are making similar offers to minimize churn.

ATT Reaches 1M IPTV Subscribers

ATT announced that it will reach 1 million U-verse IPTV subscribers in a few days. It expects that the service will pass 17 million homes by the end of 2008. It is also achieving 10 percent penetration within 12 months of entering a new market.

ATT also said that its U-verse service install times have decreased by 17 percent since 4Q07. More than 90 percent of its U-verse subscribers also subscribe to a broadband data service. 54 percent of its U-verse subscribers did not previously subscribe to DSL services.

ATT has put U-verse on the map as a major competitor in the U.S. pay TV market. The U.S. cable companies clearly have to include ATT as well as Verizon in their competitive calculations.