Hard News: Chasing the Trans-Pacific Express
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Same old drum, but lack of an unencumbered EPG (EIT) has really stuffed the NZ market.
Here in Aus I can buy an HD set top box with PVR/recording abilities for $70 (needs an external drive or flash disk) .
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Basically a clone of what was foisted on the Aussies with AUS-USA-FTA.
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Wow, I normally agree with most of what you write, but irritating and confusing? Yikes! I love my TiVo, and find it highly enjoyable to use. The kids can use it to put Hi5 on after kindy, it cant be too confusing if my 5 year old can use it! (the TiVo kids zone function is great!)
cheers,
Joseph -
We were patiently waiting for the release of TiVo in NZ, but when it became known that it was only going to be available through Telecom (and it wasn't at all clear whether any other ISPs would be supported), we promptly went out and bought a freeview PVR. We felt let down.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Wow, I normally agree with most of what you write, but irritating and confusing? Yikes! I love my TiVo, and find it highly enjoyable to use. The kids can use it to put Hi5 on after kindy, it cant be too confusing if my 5 year old can use it! (the TiVo kids zone function is great!)
Fair enough. But compared to MySky, it's a mess. Things like recorded programmes being under "Now Playing" were too cute. The number of clicks to record a programme was too many. I really just started to hate having it as my default Freeview decoder.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
We were patiently waiting for the release of TiVo in NZ, but when it became known that it was only going to be available through Telecom (and it wasn’t at all clear whether any other ISPs would be supported), we promptly went out and bought a freeview PVR. We felt let down.
Serious marketing fail, that one. The only thing you needed a Telecom broadband connection for was the on-demand content, which was mostly rubbish anyway, but it was enough to confuse the customer.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Same old drum, but lack of an unencumbered EPG (EIT) has really stuffed the NZ market.
Here in Aus I can buy an HD set top box with PVR/recording abilities for $70 (needs an external drive or flash disk) .
The fact that Freeview in NZ is MPEG 4 didn't help either -- MPEG 2 kit is commodity-priced and MPEG 4 still isn't that cheap.
The lack of a full EPG for Maori Television and Prime hurt TiVo too.
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MPEG4 is pretty much standard now (I'm guessing the chipsets are all just MPEG2/4 compatible).
Exhibit #1 $70 HD MPEG4 set top box with USB record (and media player!)
Exhibit #2 $300 twin tuner 1TB HD PVR
Exhibit #3 $59 HD MPEG4 set top box with USB record
Exhibit #4 $249 Dual Tuner 500Gb HD PVR
I have contacted a couple of vendors to see if these things will work in NZ (want to buy one for my mum) but so far no luck. It isn't the MPEG4 specs, but the channel layout and spacing. This is a trivial thing to support, but with the lack of an EPG, and no freeview branding, I guess there is no real market for them to bother adding that functionality.
Pity eh?
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recordari, in reply to
Serious marketing fail, that one.
Umm, yes, I didn't even know TiVo was available. Might have something to do with having MySky and being with Vodafone, but still, usually global brands launching locally make some sort of splash. Of course I might be living under a rock.
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The lack of a full EPG for Maori Television and Prime hurt TiVo too.
And, surely, all Freeview content being made available on Sky including additional free to air channels such as Heartland (which isn't even available on FV!). Of course a large percentage of people were going to opt for MySky, even if you don't own the box (despite paying for it).
My worry is that Freeview is going to die a slow death and we'll have just one major broadcast content provider (at least until TV-over-IP becomes competitive anyway).
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Sacha, in reply to
My worry is that Freeview is going to die a slow death and we'll have just one major broadcast content provider
As long as it's a privately-owned monopoly, you understand
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Nope - mpeg 2 is standard, mpeg 4 is still something you buy special (rather than cheapest) silicon for - the NZ market is still too small and too much stuff in freeview is just different from everywhere else.
Picking MP4 was cutting edge but you have to live with those decisions and we've seen the results.
I spent years designing DVRs (protocol engineering, not UI) and everything I've seen in NZ so far just grates - the UIs suck - especially MySky - where's the skip forward 30 seconds? the "what did he say?" button (back 5 secs), - why to I have to to go up to get larger channel numbers some times and down others? I have a big screen TV, why does the UI have the graphics finesse of Windows 1?
more importantly why can't I make my own PVR for Sky? I know it's not hard, the streams are bog standard - sell us a stream decoder , let us deal with the UI
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And considering a DVB-T tuner now costs well under $100, Freeview need not cost a king's ransom. That is, if Freeview survives the tsunami of anti-intellectuallism.
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nzlemming, in reply to
Basically a clone of what was foisted on the Aussies with AUS-USA-FTA
Worse. Basically, everything they couldn't get in ACTA and then some. It would be a disaster for New Zealand and I'm having trouble seeing a way to divert our blinkered bureaucrats and politicians away from it - the idea of a "free trade agreement" is too firmly embedded in the collective psyche, even though that's actually the last thing the TPPA is.
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Ethan Tucker, in reply to
As long as it's a privately-owned monopoly, you understand.
You have to wonder how any attempt to dilute the rigor-mortis-like market grip of an unnamed privately owned monopoly would ever succeed, given the expensive lawyers and purely hypothetical political campaign donation power of that broadcaster.
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3410,
So, the reason PVRs cost $600 instead of $200 is... what, simply the MPEG4 issue, or are there other factors?
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The basic Sky ANZ package is $50.00 (plus $2.00 something or other for their magazine.) None of my whanau do sports channels of any kind-
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And last I heard, the sports channels are compulsory irrespective of package. No picking and choosing it seems.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
And, surely, all Freeview content being made available on Sky including additional free to air channels such as Heartland (which isn't even available on FV!). Of course a large percentage of people were going to opt for MySky, even if you don't own the box (despite paying for it).My worry is that Freeview is going to die a slow death and we'll have just one major broadcast content provider (at least until TV-over-IP becomes competitive anyway).
Sky couldn't have planned it better eh?
What the hell were TVNZ up to when they made that suicidal decision. It's almost like someone decided to kill off public broadcasting, Kordia ain't getting much help either but being a very smart organisation they will branch out and survive I think even though Mssr Joyce and Key have done their damnedest to destroy them. -
Steve Barnes, in reply to
And last I heard, the sports channels are compulsory irrespective of package. No picking and choosing it seems.
I have no sports on mine, much to the dismay of some of our more fanatical visitors. Don't get the magazine either, you can opt out.
As for TIVO, too old tech and far too late to market, once again WTF were TVNZ thinking? -
Islander, in reply to
Wrong DeepRed - the Sports Channel is not compulsory. They'd really love you to take up that option, and the Movie channel, and MySky (they keep hassling my mother about this -but not me. For the simple reason my 'phone is connected to an answering machine, and I ignore their emails.)
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Yes, I still cannot see that there has been any sort of case made for what quantifiable benefits NZ would have to gain from either signing an agreement similar or wider than the Australian- US FTA. Now that might not be a problem if it was that we would not be expected to sign up to quite significant changes in favour of the USA, but we are. So we should at least get something for that.
When Australia went through this process there were several in-depth reports commissioned to examine the benefits of such an agreement and IIRC the report (s?) that favoured the Agreement largely relied upon rather large assumptions based on the value of "invisibles". Where the latter are benefits due to relaxed investment / other rules that increase the amount of inward US investment/trade. My view then as now is that these benefits are very hard to measure and whether or not the assumed benefits are actually linked to the changes to be agreed is almost impossible to know
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Paul Campbell, in reply to
And considering a DVB-T tuner now costs well under $100, Freeview need not cost a king's ransom.
(a good PVR should have 3+ tuners - but they really cost a lot less than $100 when embedded - more like $10, and are a tiny part of the whole system)
Well part of it is a combination of our small market (one that's fragmented into satellite and terrestrial segments, one mpeg2, the other mpeg4) and an unusual standard (mpeg4) - it means that off the shelf solutions aren't available - someone has to design one specially for us - and, even then, for a quality product most of the work is software. As more places pick up mpeg4 that issue will go away.
There's also a butt load of stupid patents in this area and everyone wants their cut
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Sacha, in reply to
My view then as now is that these benefits are very hard to measure
An Australian report last year measured them and came with a figure of minus $700m in just one area, didn't it?
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