Me TV: Insider’s view by former AOL chief | CNET News.com Former AOL CEO Barry Schuler writes about TV, technology and what’s holding back interactive TV.
Schuler says the the highway of television technology is littered with many failed companies who overestimate the consumer desire to turn a passive medium into an active one.
“You regularly hear about TiVo customers who say the device has changed their lives. Yet the company continues to struggle with only 3 million subscribers–a veritable rounding error in the world of TV viewership. The failure of TiVo to catch fire speaks volumes about consumer passivity. The appliance might be much better than a VCR, but it remains too complicated for most consumers to install and interact with.”
Although, I’m sure that Schuler is not describing the average reader of thomashawk.com in his quote, he does seem to feel that broader consumer adoption of the technolgy of televsion may finally be around the corner. Schuler says that we are on the verge of a change and that the broadband networked home may be the catalyst.
“We are on the precipice of a nuclear battle for the hearts and minds of the very couch potatoes who, up until now, have not been very interested in anything that complicates their TV “zone out” time. That will change, once Generation X starts paying the broadband bills.”
I just hope that the television set of the future won’t be shouting out “You’ve Got TV” every time you turn it on.
Meanwhile, also over at CNET, John Borland is out with a decent overview on some of the things going on with internet TV, BitTorent, peer to peer and other ways that consumers are taking back television through the internet.