October 12th, 2006
Network-based PVR To Boost DVR Market
By Chief Gizmateer
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
Electronic News reports that ABI Research, a market research firm, issued a report stating that network-based personal video recording (nPVR) will “radically change” everything from advertising to content distribution on video networks fueling the DVR market which is estimated to grow from 20 million current subscribers last year to over 250 million in 2011.
“nPVR offers substantial benefits to service providers in terms of cost,” principal analyst Michael Arden said in a statement. “But nPVR has to prove that its technology is as good as client-side DVR boxes, and it raises serious issues with some content providers, issues that they are willing to take to court.”
ABI believes the question in coming years is how much of the function of recording storage will shift to an operator’s network. The nPVR allows any digital set-top box (STB) to act as a DVR through software upgrades without needing a hard drive for storage since content is stored on a server in the network.
Source: DVR Playground
Jim Frost says:
It was originally the cable companies’ intent to use technologies like this, rather than set-top PVRs. The technology has existed for years, but it was undeployable because the content providers refused to license their content for the cable companies’ use. Thus the technology largely died on the vine.
This is not an issue with set-top PVRs because of fair-use laws. It’s ok for the consumer to record for their own use, but it’s illegal for someone to record to resell — even though the net effect is the same.
The article mentions “once the … content providers sign on” in passing; in truth this is the primary obstacle and has been for years. Don’t bet on it happening any time soon.
October 13th, 2006 at 6:12 am
ruslj says:
It sounds convenient from an equipement perspective but having it be network-based makes privacy a thing of the past (as if it already isn’t)
October 15th, 2006 at 10:49 am