Seeking Nerdvana

Seeking Nerdvana has found a new home at ITWire - one of Australia's leading technology news and opinion sites.

Seeking Nerdvana's new address is www.itwire.com/seekingnerdvana

Apart from the URL change, it's business as usual - I'll still be writing about my pursuit of technology nerdvana and reviewing the latest gear.

This is my last post to this site. Thanks for your support over the last few months - please drop by the new site and say hello.

There's an entertainment revolution coming and the television networks are trying to create the illusion they're leading the way.

Summer's here and the time is right for the television networks to screen even worse junk than usual. Rather than butchering first run shows by showing them out of order, moving them to a different time slot every fortnight, starting them late and running ads over the top of them - over summer they do it to repeats and third rate shows that couldn't cut it during the ratings period.

Richard Lord, chief operating officer of Australian digital services company Hyro, makes some interesting comments on his blog as to whether the television networks are taking a risk by letting viewers slip away over summer - allowing their eyeballs wander over to places like YouTube and MySpace.

Keep in mind that one of the things Hyro does is help television networks win back these viewers. It recently won the tender to rebuild the Ten Network's website and develop a range of new services in wireless and programming - competing against the Seven/Yahoo! and Nine/MSN alliances.

Lord realises that viewers want greater control over the viewing experience, but his job is to help the networks to hand over that control (or the illusion of it) when and how it suits the networks, not the viewers.

"The great and exciting thing is that all of this is happening at a time when the technology, the channels and the understanding of the business have evolved sufficiently to help to realise the potential of digital channels. We have reached an exciting time in the evolution of entertainment and the industry it supports and are witnessing the consequences of the work we have done as we set about changing the world," he says enthusiastically on his blog.

Real innovation is not going to come from the existing players - they're being dragged kicking and screaming into this new age which actually empowers the viewer. They fear change. They loath personal video recorders. Networks and advertisers don't want empowered viewers, they want battery hens who will sit down, shut up and watch whatever they're given - including the ads. Especially the ads. The television networks have convinced the government to do its best to protect them from competition, and they try to destroy anything that threatens this cosy existence. Communications Minister Helen Coonan had the nerve to call herself a "friend of the consumer" recently on Lateline. Lucky I don't keep guns in the house or I'd need a new telly.

Throwing viewers tidbits such as SMS voting and the occasional download won't placate them forever, but it will work for a long time because, on the whole, people are stupid. Just look at the garbage they're prepared to watch.

When the entertainment revolution comes, it won't be televised. It will sweep away the old-skool players. The network programmers who treat viewers like idiots will be the first against the wall. Richard Lord should take care not to be standing next to them when it happens.

Just when you thought PVRs could save us from incessant television ads, Microsoft has patented a Tivo-like system for commercial breaks.

It inserts fresh advertisements into old recordings on personal video recorders, to ensure you see today's ads even if you're watching a recording from last week. It remains to be seen whether you'll be prevented from skipping or fast forwarding them - but chances are you'll be forced to watch every ad, or else go old-skool and duck off to the toilet like we used to do during the ads. Although the appeal for TV networks and advertisers is obvious, I don't see why any consumer in their right mind would buy such a device. Then again, looking at the DRM-infested junk that so many people buy these days, Microsoft could have a winner on its hands.

Music lovers are sick of being treated like criminals and told how they can use the music they've paid for. Finally the message seems to be getting through, with major recording label EMI the latest to start selling MP3s without Digital Rights Management.

It's only a toe in the water to gauge interest at this point, with Britain's EMI Music offering tracks from singer Norah Jones and rock band Relient K - via Yahoo!'s online music service. It's certainly not the first time straight MP3 have been sold online, but it's one of the first times a major label has put aside its piracy paranoia and given the punters what they want. Well at least I think it's what they want. To be honest I think your average, non-tech savvy consumer doesn't appreciate what this all means. They've been training to jump through the DRM hoops and don't realise things could be different. Hopefully EMI's experiment doesn't die just because people don't know what's good for them. The fact that Microsoft has abandoned its own PlaysForSure DRM format on its new Zune players - screwing over loyal customers - is going to burn a lot of people and should help to raise awareness of the issue.

Some people might say this is a threat to the copyright owners, but many observers see it as a major threat to Apple. Music sold with non-iTunes DRM, such as PlaysForSure or the new Zune format, can't be copied to an iPod unless you go to the trouble of stripping the DRM - which is generally illegal. An unprotected MP3 can be imported into iTunes and copied to an iPod, meaning Apple has some real competition in the music download market. I think most iPod owners would be into the whole Apple experience and would probably prefer to stick with iTunes, but competition usually drives innovation and it will be interesting to see how Apple responds.

Australia's Ten Network is set to broadcast sport in glorious high definition next year, finally give us a taste of what couch potatoes can expect from the digital revolution.

Next year Ten will broadcast its Saturday night AFL match in HD, as well as all games from the Rugby World Cup in France, reports The Australian.

High defintion sport could take digital TV to the masses.

Read the full post at http://www.hydrapinion.com/index.php/play/2006/12/08/sport_goes_high_definition

* NOTE: This post is on Hydrapinion, an opinion-based, multi-headed blog - or hydrablog - I've started with four other freelance technology journalists. My topic is Play and my day is Friday so from now on I'm going to point to Hydrapinion every Friday, but Friday is also the day I'll post TechVidReviews here at Seeking Nerdvana and reprints of my magazine products reviews that don't appear online elsewhere.

Two interesting recent news items show a glimmer of hope for Australia's fledging electronic content delivery eco-system.

The first is ReelTime offers Download-To-Own movies to XBox 360 - a follow up to ReelTime's recent move to offer download-to-own movies available the same day as they hit the retail shelves. Adding XBox 360 compatibility may not sound like much, but it shows that ReelTime is obviously putting some serious though into its strategy as well as how end users actually want to user their content. Such an approach is very encouraging.

The second is Internode upgrades network for IPTV push - another step forward for one of the country's most progressive ISPs which has just picked up PC Authority magazine's ISP of the Year as part of its Reliability and Service Awards. I think we're in much safer hands if the future of IPTV lies with a company like Internode rather than Telstra, although Internode admits its plans are still somewhat at the mercy of Telstra. You also have to respect a managing director like Simon Hackett of Internode, who returns your emails at 1 in the morning when you're working on a story. Now that's a service you'll never get from Telstra.

Asher Moses at Fairfax reports the Australian federal government has finally made some concessions on its draconian proposed copyright laws.

The amendments also removed on-the-spot fines for some copyright offences and ensure it's legal to do things like transfer music to an MP3 player.

Asher Moses writes; "The Government has listened to the Senate Committee and stakeholders and has improved the effectiveness of the reforms," Mr Ruddock said in a statement.

"The amended reforms make it clear consumers can transfer the music they own onto devices such as iPods and enable the next wave of technology by allowing people to record a TV or radio program on mobile devices to watch it at a more convenient time."

The amendments also removed on-the-spot fines for some copyright offences, to ensure they didn't "unintentionally capture harmless activities of ordinary Australians".

I've been one of many people shouting from the rooftops about how ridiculous the new proposals were. I guess if enough people make enough noise for long enough, even the luddites in Canberra listen.