Guy Clapperton has written a great article in the Guardian about the convergence of Internet and Television. This has been what I've been believing for some time and when friend Neil King from Global Insight pointed me towards Young and Rubicam analysis of current global situation which can read as a PDF http://pubs.yr.com/aaagh.pdfThe quote I pick up on "Expect the internet to look more and more like TV as this recession progresses."
With manufactrers like one I work for
Root6 Technology and encoding products like
ContentAgent are more and more focusing on the new age of Digital TV. We
announced last September that we would be supporting
Dobly Digital Plus.“The incorporation of Dolby Digital Plus will be a significant addition to our post production deliverables,” said ContentAgent Product Manager
Kevin King. “We are already fulfilling client demand for multi channel audio as part of an automated workflow and it’s clear that further advances such as Dolby Digital Plus will play an increasingly important role in the HD content experience.”
“Dolby Digital Plus is the next-generation audio technology for all high-definition programming and media. It combines the efficiency to meet future broadcast demands with the power and flexibility to realize the full audio potential of the upcoming high-definition experience. Built on Dolby Digital, the multichannel audio standard for DVD and HD broadcasts worldwide, Dolby Digital Plus was designed for the delivery formats of the future, but remains fully compatible with all current A/V receivers. "
Compatibility is a major factor in what i the future otherwise we will end up with the 2 tier society where we have the techno haves and the techno poor. Its a fine line we will tread and with a recession in tow we have to make sure we don't fragment society even more.
I friend commented on twitter about being home with his family and that after lunch they were all talking to each other on facebook all in the same room but only communicating via the web and social applications and not talking face to face. Therefore is he wondered if society had fell so low? Facebook and Twitter are technologies of the here and now are they going to be around in 5 or 10 years who knows but what we do know i that technology has shaped our society from the stream train to the airline. But are we using them as a society to the determent of other more human social interactions and does that make use worse for it?
On a personal note
I closed by Facebook account as it seemed to be asking more and more of me to the determent of my life
Technology has changed our lives and just as television nearly wiped out cinema before its rebirth in the 1980's. Television advertising has been wiped out by the internet, especially as Personal Video Recorders and PC media centres having the ability to strip out adverts from the programmes that they have recorded. Companies like ITV, C4 and Five need fine a new away to advertise in the modern age, how would people react to adverts in the middle of a internet delivered program? We will see the face of television changing before our eyes and in our lifetime as the pipes grow bigger expect more to come down the wire and over the air. Mobile Television is a key to this growth, be it on your phone or other device the television is in your pocket.
futher reports from Y&R can be found at
http://emea.yr.com/ 
