Randy Newman and Steve Job’s Keynote at MacWorld

If you didn’t see the 90 minute MacWorld keynote here is a quick summary of the product launches yesterday.  Jobs photo courtesy of Apple.  

• Ad:  Hi I’m a Mac and I’m a PC — New Years ad ran which poked fun at Vista…what are you going to do in ’08…  Then Jobs enters stage.
• Time Capsule:  backup hardware device the same size as the Apple TV product.  Two models both include Airport 802.11N in a 500MB and 1TB configuration.  Priced at $299 and $499 works in conjunction with Time Machine (back up system) which is included in OS X Leopard.
• iPhone: 4M sold in the first 200 days (averaged ~20K/day); currently has 19.5% MSS (more than combining the bottom three companies – Palm (9.8%); Motorola (7.4%); Nokia (1.3%).  Enhancement announced:
  1. Maps w/ locations (joint effort by Google and Skyhook Wireless (drove the US & Canada mapping 23M wi-fi hot spots and allows triangulation on the hot spots.  Google triangulates off cell towers and Apple uses both systems in iPhone for identifying location)
  2. Webclips (clipping links to favorite web sites or sub-site
  3. Custom home screen (up to 9)
  4. SMS multiple people at the same time was only one prior
  5. Chapter search for videos and song lyric’s displayed if available
  6. Free software update for all current owners which include the above enhancements
• iTunes: 4Billion songs sold through iTunes; Christmas day sold 20M songs in one day – highest ever; 125M TV shows sold (more than any other service); 7M movies sold (more than anyone, but didn’t meet expectations).  Enhancements announced:
  1. iTunes Movie Rental (music users have not wanted music rental); Studio’s on board at launch (20^th Century Fox, TouchStone, Miramax, MGM, Lions Gate, New Line Cinema, WB, Disney, Sony, Paramount, Universal – essentially all of the studios; More than 1000 films by February
  2. Films available for rental in the 30 days after DVD release
  3. Watch anywhere (PC, iPod or TV)
  4. iPod Touch added 5 new apps including maps, email, SMS, web clips and chapter search
  5. Didn’t state, but looks like progressive download as the movie starts within seconds of the rental purchase
  6. 30 days to watch the movie and 24 hours watch it once started
  7. Can transfer the movie watching to another device in the middle (start on a PC then xfer to iPod for a flight)
  8. DVD quality, but also providing Hi-Def (100 titles today growing fast) with 5.1 Dolby surround sound
  9. Pricing is DVD library release – $2.99; DVD New Release – $3.99; HD library – $3.99 and HD new release – $4.99
  10. Service started today in the U.S. and goes International later this year
• Apple TV: stated that we’ve all missed (Microsoft, Netflix, Nubu and other logos on screen) how to get the movies to the flat panel in the living room.  Apple TV was designed as an accessory for iTunes & computer, but it’s about Movies, Movies, Movies.  Enhancements announce:
  1. Price dropped from $299 to $229
  2. All new user interface
  3. Leverages the new iTune movie rental service
  4. Rent directly from the Apple TV box – no computer needed now
  5. Photo from Flickr can be streamed or from your dot mac accounts
  6. Will auto sync with your computer if you want
  7. Free software upgrade to all existing users and get the functionality
• 20^th Century Fox: Jim Gianopolos (Chairman & CEO) on stage to discuss movie rental deal.  Talked about biz models being super important, gushed about how great it is to work with Jobs and put a major plug in for Blu-ray winning the format war as the crowd applauded.
• MacBook Air: launched a new ultra-thin MacBook to compliment the notebook line up. Standard model priced at $1799.  Model with the 64GB SSD flash over $3K,.  Compared the “Air” to the Sony TZ series which had previously set the benchmark in this category.  The thickest part of the Air is thinner than the thinnest part of the Sony for comparisons.  Features:
  1. .76 to .16 thin (no optical device, can get one external if you need)
  2. 13.3 inch LCD back light display
  3. Full size and backlight keyboard
  4. Multi-touch (similar to the iPhone – swipe, pinch etc.) capability on the trackpad
  5. 80GB HDD and optional 64GB SSD (pricey however)
  6. 2GB memory and 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo (C2D) standard or optional 1.8GHz
  7. 802.11N and Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR
  8. Usage model changing and driving wireless even for software download – now leverage a PC optical drive across the network
  9. Talked about environment: mercury free, arsenic free glass, Bromide Fire Retardant (BFR) and PVC free
  10. 56% less packaging waste
  11. Jobs applauded the joint effort and working with Intel
• Intel: Paul Otellini was invited on stage to evangelize the 30% reduced form factor of the C2D.  Gave Jobs a souvenir of one and gushed about how great it was to work with Apple.  For those of you into little known factual tidbits, it was interesting to note that the video graphic overlay while Paul walked on stage used the old Intel dropped “e” logo.  The graphic/name/title on the projected stage TV was correct.
• Summation: In the first 2 weeks of the New Year Apple launched:
  1. Fastest ever Mac Pro desktop system
  2. Time Capsule
  3. Software updates for iPhone, iPod Touch along with new apps for Touch
  4. iTunes Movie Rental
  5. Apple TV (software upgrade) along with HD video content
  6. MacBook Air – Ultra thin laptop
  7. Last slide stated…And there’s still 50 weeks left….
• Randy Newman: Music artist extraordinaire played a couple songs for the audience.  Newman photo courtesy of YouTube. He starts by telling us about his trip to Europe, where he noticed that “they don’t like us so much.”   And he sang a song he wrote about it…”A Few Words in Defense of Our Country.”

 A couple of parting thoughts about Randy Newman.  The song choice was odd.  If Apple signed off on the first song he sang they have some guts.  A little piano ditty that compares the U.S. to Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia and Europe during the time of the Inquisition.  Now that’s an interesting mix of art meeting commerce.  Highly political and bashed a number of things which will only add to the blog fodder I’m sure.

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HD DVD Takes a Nose Dive

By now you’ve read about Warner Bros. Entertainment announcement to drop HD DVD and focus on Blu-ray, a Sony Corp. backed technology vs. rival Toshiba.  Warner was the last major studio to put out movies in both formats and after May they will exclusively release on Blu-ray. 

The announcement by Warner rattled the industry nerves to the point that the N.A. HD DVD Promotional Group (which included Intel and Microsoft) canceled a major media event.  Who would blame them?   It’s not the kind of exciting news for what’s to come in 2008! 

I predicted Sony would not allow the “Betamax” struggle to repeat and that Blu-ray would prevail (HERE).  No need to bore you with the technology advantages of each format.  Ironically HD DVD has better interactivity today than Blu-ray, but that will evolve with BD Live.  I also observed evidence of a move of desperation during the holiday season when Toshiba HD DVD players flooded the market at $179.99.  Then Sony countered and jumped on the price discounting wagon with their BDP-S300 (entry level player) at Costco for $278.99 after a $100 rebate.  A $100 premium and never mind it didn’t support 7.1 audio. 

So what will Microsoft do now?  Speaking to Reuters, Albert Penello, group marketing manager for Xbox hardware, said in response to a question about Microsoft possibly supporting a Blu-ray accessory if HD DVD failed that they would consider it.  According to Engadget during holiday ’07 consumers purchased 92K HD DVD players for the xBox 360.   I believe Microsoft really wants the market to shift to digital download (aligns with xBox 360 content download service and their xBox 360 IPTV directions) and the format war was likely viewed as a gift which stalled adoption, create consumer confusion while digital download services improve. 

What is really important to most consumers is that the Warner announcement translates to the release of more movies which we want to watch (rent/buy) in stunning hi-def.  Now that the format battle is over I can plan on the Blu-ray release of Lord of the Rings (LOTR).  New Line (parent Time-Warner) will make this happen in ’08. 

And if all this wasn’t enough good news for the week, Sony demoed at CES the “next generation” of portable cinema viewing.  Samples of Blu-ray movies were successfully copied from a PlayStation 3 Blu-ray drive to a PlayStation Portable’s memory stick, as part of Sony’s new web-oriented service/approach to interactivity and play anywhere portability known as BD Live.  Other abilities include ring tone downloading and other media content to a BD Live media player.  One issue is that current Blu-ray players in the market (including the PS3) do not support BD-Live, but Sony confirmed the PS3 firmware update will be rolling out as early as this month to incorporate BD-Live playback into the system.

Now if Universal and Paramount can see that it makes sense (or is that $cents) to move to Blu-ray we’d be all set for a great hi-def year!

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Unlimited Download TV Service

Let’s see, I slept for 7 hours; it’s a new day and an announcement of yet another start up in the internet video space.  This seems like a daily ritual. 

The newest is Sync TV, a spin off from consumer electronics company Pioneer, which launched a beta download service.

The audio and video quality of the TV shows is comparable or superior to the same show on DVD.  SyncTV will provide HD programming across some of the different channels and will also have programming available in discreet 5.1 Dolby Digital Plus, giving you the “home theater” experience.  They allow you a great deal of flexibility in how you play back the TV shows you download. You can play back shows on up to five ‘home’ devices which mean PCs/Macs now and other home entertainment devices in the future (read portable players). 

That’s the good news.  The bad news is yet another DRM (Digital Rights Management) technology for the consumer to try and get their head around.  Sync TV is using an open-standard DRM called Marlin.  Yet another group of top electronics manufacturers joining forces to develop a standard for content management and protection.  Marlin is also referred to as “OMArlin” because it supposedly bridges between the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) DRM v.2.0 and the Marlin DRM standards.  Does anyone care, outside the companies involved?  Not really.  Consumers might agree that content protection is a good idea but, they just want to play their stuff on all their devices. And they want everything to be cheaper, too. 

It’s another set of companies trying to protect what they see as their intellectual property and make money. You could make the claim as the same motive as Microsoft, Apple, RealNetworks and others in the DRM struggle.  The marketing spin tries to convince us that DRM is intended to make it easy for us to buy content and share it, without being encumbered by content protection schemes.   But, adding Marlin to this mix will be yet another failed attempt to create a DRM “standard”.   

What I do find interesting with Sync TV and all the regulatory noise about bundled programming, is the fact that users can subscribe a-la-carte for a variety of programs they want to watch. Each channel costs about $2 each per month, and currently there are four subscription channels available. Showtime is the foundation partner with promise of more.  

The Sync TV launch underscores the two worlds that now exist–the heavily regulated telecoms and broadcasting sectors and the almost entirely unregulated internet channel.  

Where do you think most of the innovation is?

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Follow the Profit – The Movie

In May I attended a work function dinner up at Timberline Lodge. Upon arrival in the lodge parking lot it was clear that a film crew was in the middle of prepping and filming a movie. Not thinking much about it I walked around a bit and chatted with a couple ‘grips’ asking questions about what video editing software was being used, what camera’s, was it in hi-def, and then chatted with a couple girls that were stand in’s for the big “star”. I remember the weather being cold and they were standing with latte in hand shivering. At any rate, I’m just now getting around to looking up the details on the film.

Tom Noonan has just joined the cast of Follow the Profit. According to Variety, Robert Chimento, Diane Venora, David Conrad, Annie Burgstede, R.D. Call and Jonathan Frakes will also be starring in the independent drama.

The film revolves around an ex-Delta Force soldier who goes on a mission to save a group of abused youngsters. The impressionable kids are stuck in the clutches of an evil religious organization. Sounds like a yawn’er…,but I’ll go see it because I was there during some ‘B’ roll at the lodge.

The Drew Ann Rosenberg film starts shooting in Portland, Oregon this week.

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A Spiraling Vortex of Movie Download Ruin

New copyright exemptions went into effect at the end of November, and it’s still illegal to copy a DVD to your iPod for personal use. The proposed exemptions to allow copying commercial DVDs to portable media players were rejected. The new copyright exemptions are in effect for three years and additional information is available at the U.S Copyright Web site.

Consumers can NOT copy DVDs for personal use, but film professors can use software to copy movie clips from the discs for educational use. Huh? And there is an exemption where the blind can now use applications to hack and read copy protected books. This is bizarre. It’s okay to space and time shift your video, yet it’s illegal for protected (e.g. DVD) content under the DMCA rules to be copied to your iPod?!

But, Wal-Mart steps up to save the day and is now offering the general public a chance to buy a DVD…say Lord of the Rings and pay $2-$4 extra for a downloadable copy that can be played on a laptop, portable video device, or both. According to CNN, 40 percent of all DVDs sold in the U.S. are sold at Wal-Mart.

When customers buy “Lord of the Rings”, they can choose to pay $1.97 more to play it on portable devices, $2.97 more to play it on PCs or laptops, or $3.97 more to play it on either portable devices or PCs/laptops. But not in iPods. According to the WalMarts Web site;

The Portable format is optimized for on-the-go viewing using ‘PlayForSure’ portable video players. If played on a PC, the image quality will not be as good as the higher resolution Standard format. These videos are not compatible with Apple iPods. Portable format videos are encoded at a 320 x 240 resolution with an average bit rate of 500 kbps.

Any movie that is downloaded from Wal-Mart will be stored in a user’s Wal-Mart Video Download Manager as well as their Windows Media Library. Users can only have the movie on one computer at a time, but they can re-register the license on any number of computers, meaning it is possible to play it on the computer with the license and then move it to another computer only if you move the license.

I’ve always learned to frame debates or arguments in terms of the average person, not the looney edge-case fringe, but I would argue this is kind of confusing!

This is a spiraling vortex of ruin and doesn’t support the consumer content value chain…We buy a title, not a particular file for a title (so, we buy video once, for all devices!).

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