This story is an interesting development in the ongoing format war. The price is steep, up to US$1752 (compared with US$199 for an upcoming HD DVD player).
How much would a 50 Gbyte hard drive cost? Are these storage media substitutable? Assuming that digital rights management (DRM) issues can be resolved, do you think that this feature will make a difference in this war? Has the market moved away from the need for high capacity, portable storage like this?
On this topic, China has announced a third format, as reported by Ars Technica. Do you think this will have an impact on the ongoing format war?
12 September 2007
10 September 2007
Structural Separation
There has been a bit of a debate going on that argues, in essence, since network neutrality seems infeasible, let's separate transport from services. BT in the UK has taken this approach, which has apparently been hailed by EU Commissioner Viviane Reding. I have a few questions about this idea:
- We have tried structural separation in the past in the US ... some of us remember Computer I and Computer II. Is this proposal different? Why? How?
- While structural separation, in theory, does remove incentives on the part of network operators to discriminate, to what extent would infrastructure investments be inefficient? That is, can transport providers make more efficient investments if they know (and can confidently predict) upcoming services and their deployment? Part of this is a problem of opportunism and asset specificity that Williamson predicted would result in increased transaction costs (and hierarchy).
- Assuming that the above questions are resolved, how would this be implemented? Do you think it could happen voluntarily (as it did in the UK)?
07 September 2007
Internet regulation news
The US Department of Justice filed this in response to the FCC's Notice of Inquiry on broadband competition. The filing has been picked up by the media (see this in Forbes and this on the BBC website). Forbes summarizes the filing as follows:
I tend to agree with the idea that users ought to be able to pay for various levels of service as a matter of principle. On the other hand, I am concerned with the incentive that carriers have to "starve" a best effort tier to drive users to higher service levels. How would you go about managing this incentive in a way that is enforceable, economically efficient and technologically feasible?
Update (2007-09-10): I found this article from CNET interesting and helpful. Did you?
Update (2007-18-09): This article takes a look at the international aspects of this debate. Also, this article raises the possibility of further Congressional action in the US
The Justice Department on Thursday said Internet service providers should be allowed to charge a fee for priority Web traffic.
The agency told the Federal Communications Commission, which is reviewing high-speed Internet practices, that it is opposed to "Net neutrality," the principle that all Internet sites should be equally accessible to any Web user.
**snip**
The Justice Department said imposing a Net neutrality regulation could hamper development of the Internet and prevent service providers from upgrading or expanding their networks. It could also shift the "entire burden of implementing costly network expansions and improvements onto consumers," the agency said in its filing.
Such a result could diminish or delay network expansion and improvement, it added.
The agency said providing different levels of service is common, efficient and could satisfy consumers. As an example, it cited that the U.S. Postal Service charges customers different guarantees and speeds for package delivery, ranging from bulk mail to overnight delivery.
I tend to agree with the idea that users ought to be able to pay for various levels of service as a matter of principle. On the other hand, I am concerned with the incentive that carriers have to "starve" a best effort tier to drive users to higher service levels. How would you go about managing this incentive in a way that is enforceable, economically efficient and technologically feasible?
Update (2007-09-10): I found this article from CNET interesting and helpful. Did you?
Update (2007-18-09): This article takes a look at the international aspects of this debate. Also, this article raises the possibility of further Congressional action in the US
Standards and the future of CDs
For the recent anniversary of the compact disk, I was asked about the past and the future of this large scale data storage medium (this article in the Pitt News is a product of these queries).
In response to a question, I wrote:
We have also seen bridge technologies. Prior to CDs, cassette-based audiotapes dominated the music industry. Many cars had cassette players, so when CDs came to dominate, it was possible to purchase an (analog) cassette interface that connected to a portable CD player. In this transition, it is possible to purchase low power FM transmitters that use an "empty" slot in the FM band. The downside of this approach is that this "empty" slot varies by location, so it requires a bit of adjustment on the part of the user to match the tuner to the player. It is definitely not as good as the prior transition technology, in my opinion.
How much is the transition to MP3 players from CDs hampered by the lack of a standard digital interface? The de facto standard is Apple's iPod interface, though I don't know if other digital media players support that standard. Some audio devices now have an analog interface, which can be connected to the analog (headphone) output of the digital media player. Is that adequate?
In response to a question, I wrote:
I think the CD still has some value, though downloading has diminished the technology's future prospects. There are still a large fraction of consumers who purchase CD's , and they do so for several reasons. First, there are many music systems that accommodate CDs (home stereos, car stereos, etc.), so they remain more versatile until these are retired by consumers. A factor in this is the lack of a standard digital interface for MP3 players. Not everyone owns iPods! Second, CDs can be (legally) shared and resold. it is legal to create MP3 (or other compressed audio formats), so a CD gives owners the option of using multiple formats. Finally, CDs tend to be a more durable format. That is, it is not vulnerable to disk crashes or xray erasures the way hard disks or flash memory are.
We have also seen bridge technologies. Prior to CDs, cassette-based audiotapes dominated the music industry. Many cars had cassette players, so when CDs came to dominate, it was possible to purchase an (analog) cassette interface that connected to a portable CD player. In this transition, it is possible to purchase low power FM transmitters that use an "empty" slot in the FM band. The downside of this approach is that this "empty" slot varies by location, so it requires a bit of adjustment on the part of the user to match the tuner to the player. It is definitely not as good as the prior transition technology, in my opinion.
How much is the transition to MP3 players from CDs hampered by the lack of a standard digital interface? The de facto standard is Apple's iPod interface, though I don't know if other digital media players support that standard. Some audio devices now have an analog interface, which can be connected to the analog (headphone) output of the digital media player. Is that adequate?
More on standards committees
This item in the NY Times caught my eye today (it was a followup to this earlier one). It reminded me of the early days of digital communications, when AT&T came into the ITU with the T1 transmission system to have it standardized. It too failed ... and it led to a world of two standards -- the North American digital hierarchy and the ITU digital hierarchy.
It points to the reality that standards committees are made up of people, usually who work in organizations that compete in the marketplace. So, standards committee deliberations are extensions of marketplace competition. These discussions and decisions are also deeply influenced by all of our human traits and foibles that aren't always logical or rational.
So, much as Microsoft clearly wanted its Office Open XML standardized, do you think that they have the market clout to have its proprietary "standard" prevail? Are we going to have a world of two "standards"? If we do, is anyone going to care about the non-Microsoft one? Can Microsoft go another rout, such as the formation of an Open Office XML consortium to guide this standard, effectively bypassing ISO?
It points to the reality that standards committees are made up of people, usually who work in organizations that compete in the marketplace. So, standards committee deliberations are extensions of marketplace competition. These discussions and decisions are also deeply influenced by all of our human traits and foibles that aren't always logical or rational.
So, much as Microsoft clearly wanted its Office Open XML standardized, do you think that they have the market clout to have its proprietary "standard" prevail? Are we going to have a world of two "standards"? If we do, is anyone going to care about the non-Microsoft one? Can Microsoft go another rout, such as the formation of an Open Office XML consortium to guide this standard, effectively bypassing ISO?
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