Carly Says "Go Digital or Go Home"

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://news.com.com/2100-7784_3-5195012.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=news' target='_blank'>http://news.com.com/2100-7784_3-5195012.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=news</a><br /><br /></div>"Broadcasters must embrace digital technology before they're left behind, Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina said Monday at the National Association of Broadcasters conference here. "There is no question what is shaping the capabilities of this age of broadcasting; it is digital technology," Fiorina said during a keynote event at NAB, which also honored talk show host Oprah Winfrey for her achievements in the broadcasting industry. <br /><br />"We have entered an era in which every process and all content is going from analog, static and physical to digital, mobile and virtual," Fiorina added, referring to shifts in the creation, production and distribution of broadcast programming. While this transformation will take place over the next decade, broadcasters need to develop new business models that consider commercial-skipping devices like TiVo and digital archives of programming, Fiorina said."<br /><br />I've got to hand it to HP, they're really gunning after the digital media market in a big way, and it's interesting to see a CEO of a computer company keynote at NAB - I don't think that's something you would have seen a few years ago.

[Filip Norrgard]

Well, it is nice to see that she's right. With digital TV (DVB) and radio (DAB) all more or less in use in Europe, I can see her point. Static, analog TV and radio are gone when switching to digital is done. However, with cheap digi-tuners comes cheap hardware which doesn't turn up the best result -- and quality:

We had an incident where a Finnish commercial channel, MTV3 (http://www.mtv3.fi), had broadcast too much data to the national DVB broadcaster/relayer, Digita (http://www.digita.fi) which only managed to filter out some of the extra bits. The result from too much data: some hundreds of digi-TV boxes locked themselves up and became completely fried! In other words, very nice looking paperweights on television sets. :P
The Finnish Communication Regulatory Agency is now investigating who's to "blame" and should pay for the damage... :twisted:

What have we learned? We'll with digital comes more other potential problems... :roll:

[that_kid]

I think it's good to see companies step up and embraced technology but I hope it isn't a doublevedge sword. We may gain more media but loose the ability to view in the way we want to. Digital is great but it's not cure all fix all.