Boston Globe


February 4, 2002

The television industry is running scared

By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff, 2/4/2002

Like some universal solvent, digital technology seems to dissolve
practically everything it touches.

The music recording moguls learned it the hard way, as consumers swapped
favorite tunes on Napster and burned pirate CD recordings. Now it's the
TV industry's
turn, as the digitizers apply their corrosive talents to copying videos.

You can smell the aroma of panic wafting from the federal courtroom in
Los Angeles where some major TV producers filed suit against
SonicblueInc. The California
company makes Replay TV, a digital video recorder with features that may
delight consumers but terrify broadcasters. For instance, the latest
version of
Replay TV can let the viewer skip over TV commercials without a glance.
Moreover, the device allows users to send copies of favorite shows over
the Internet.

Scary stuff for any company looking to protect its intellectual property.
But even if you think the broadcasters have a point, it's hard to see how
their
lawsuit will put a stop to this sort of thing. Especially when you
consider that millions of personal computers are capable of similar
feats.

In essence, Replay TV is a modified personal computer that uses a
custom-designed processor to digitize and compress video data and sling
it onto a hard
drive. Several years ago, when the first such machines were being
designed, standard PC processors lacked the muscle to do this work
reasonably well. Besides,
who'd want to clutter up a PC hard drive with a bunch of old TV shows?

But that was before Pentium 4s and Athlon XPs, monster chips with clock
speeds above one gigahertz. The hard drives got bigger as well; you can
buy 100
gigabytes for around $300. Then there are the CD burners that are now
standard equipment on home PCs. A high-speed burner can copy 800
megabytes of data
in just a few minutes.

In short, any late-model PC can double as a Replay TV. All that's needed
is a way to pump the TV signal into the computer and the software to
digitize and
compress it. You can now add both these accessories to a computer for
less than $100.

TV tuner cards for computers have been available for at least a decade
and generally sell for about $50. The cards connect to a home TV cable or
broadcast
antenna, and let the user watch TV in an on-screen window, while running
other computer tasks in the background.

The last piece of the mosaic fell into place last year, when
Houston-based SnapStream Media unveiled its Personal Video Station
software for recording TV
shows on the PC. SnapStream PVS lets the user punch in time and channel
information, then order the computer to copy the show. It's even simpler
if the
computer is connected to the Internet. The user goes to a Web site that
displays local TV listings. Click on the videotape icon next to each
show, and
the PVS software is set to record the program in Microsoft Corp.'s
Windows Media format.

Like the traditional VCR, SnapStream PVS can be confusing to set up and
use. But it works. Video quality varies by how much you compress the
signal. A half
hour of VHS-quality video takes up about 270 megabytes. If your hard
drive can stand it, you can make higher-quality copies.

The SnapStream software costs a mere $50 and can be downloaded from the
company's Web site, www.snapstream.com. Since most PCs don't have TV
tuner cards,
SnapStream also peddles a hardware and software bundle in retail stores
for $90.

Adding TiVo-like capabilities to a PC allows for a variety of
paradigm-busting applications. Say you've got multiple computers in your
home, all networked
together. The SnapStream software contains a built-in network server, so
you can watch a recorded program on any PC in the house. Suppose you own
a palm-top
computer that runs Microsoft's Pocket PC operating system. You can
download a SnapStream video and watch it during the morning commute.

There's just one thing missing - a way to connect the computer to your
living room. SnapStream plans to offer just such a device, equipped with
WiFi-based
wireless networking. In effect, the PC will broadcast programs to the TV.

There's nothing to stop you sharing SnapStream videos over the Internet.
Nothing but bandwidth, that is. Most high-speed home Internet services
allow rapid
downloads, but relatively slow uploads. It'd take all day to send an
episode of ''Babylon 5'' at today's speeds. So there's little chance that
TV shows
will be Napsterized - for now.

But you can certainly burn favorite shows onto CDs and swap them around.
Besides, the broadband lines serving universities and businesses are high
speed
in both directions, and video swappers seem to be using them. Already you
can find a great deal of pirated video material online.

If SnapStream gets installed on millions of PCs, there'll be plenty more.
And the TV moguls will find themselves knee deep in the digital acid
bath.

Hiawatha Bray can be reached by e-mail at
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This story ran on page D2 of the Boston Globe on 2/4/2002.


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