Tivo and Netflix offer Internet TV

Is Tivo Poised To Take Control Of Home Movie Viewing over IP?
Tivo has concluded their long sought deal with Netflix to stream over 12,000 movie titles to your home, this via standard Tivo DVR's. In addition to the Roku player and LG Blu-ray player, both currently available, Tivo plans to support Xbox 360 by late fall of this year. Also, according to Steve Swasey, Netflix's VP of Corporate Communications. The company hopes to stream its content directly to television sets by the end of 2009. Is Tivo positioning themselves as the bridge between lean forward and lean back entertainment in the living rooms of the U.S.? With over 100,000 titles in the Netflix library, the Tivo/Netflix deal has a way to go before this loss leader strategy for Netflix starts to impinge on their existing business model, would they want to abandon mailing discs in the future in favor of VOD?

TiVo Enables Instant Streaming of Netflix Movies, TV Episodes
TiVo announced on Thursday a partnership with online DVD rental service Netflix  that will provide TiVo owners the ability to stream thousands of movies and TV episodes from Netflix directly to their televisions. The feature will be available at no additional charge to Netflix subscribers who also own a TiVo Series3, TiVo HD or TiVo HD XL. A subscriber's Netflix Queue will be automatically displayed on television via the TiVo interface, and using a TiVo remote users will be able to browse their instant Queue, read synopses and rate movies.

FCC member optimistic airwaves proposal will pass

A top federal regulator said on Wednesday he is optimistic communications officials will approve a plan, backed by Microsoft Corp and Google Inc, to open soon-to-be vacant television airwaves.The Federal Communications Commission has scheduled a November 4 vote on the proposal to allow unlicensed use of some airwaves called "white spaces." These pockets of the spectrum will become available when U.S. broadcasters are required to move completely to digital television next year."I'm very optimistic. I think this could be a 5-to-0 vote," FCC member Robert McDowell told Reuters. Three of the five FCC commissioners are needed to clear the plan.


60Frames Entertainment lays off six
Digital studio 60Frames Entertainment laid off six employees Thursday, the latest in a rash of online-minded startups shedding jobs amid the economic crunch.

The cuts, which leave eight remaining staffers, come as 60Frames rein in the high volume of productions in progress. Launched by UTA and ad-agency Spot Runner last year, 60Frames intended to produce as many as 50 short-form series, and has released over 30 series thus far. The company has over a dozen series still in production.A spokeswoman for 60Frames declined comment.The layoffs will not affect 60Frames' recently announced pact with NBC Universal Digital Studio to supply a slate of original series that would get greenlighted once a sponsor is attached.

Obama Ad Draws 33.5 Million Viewers
More than 33.5 million viewers turned in to see Sen. Barack Obama’s paid political advertisement last night, which ran on seven networks in prime time, including NBC, Fox, CBS, MSNBC, BET, TVOne and Univision. The total beats the last political advertising prime-time buy from Ross Perot, who bought airtime on NBC, CBS and ABC the night before Election Day in 1996. Those ads drew 22.6 million viewers.

Obama Drives ‘Daily Show’ to Record Ratings
Sen. Barack Obama’s appearance on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” last night was the program’s most-watched episode ever. The episode attracted 3.6 million total viewers and a 2.6 household rating, besting its previous record—when Michelle Obama was a guest on Oct. 8—by 22%. The half-hour also garnered 2.2 million viewers and a 2.0 rating among people ages 18-49. “The Colbert Report” broke its previous record too, bringing in 2.4 million total viewers and a 1.8 household rating for the Oct. 29 episode.

Qwest FTTN: Available To 5 Million By 2010 - Should be available to 1.8 million users by year's
Qwest recently told us they were ahead of schedule on their $300 million ADSL2+ deployment plan, with their new 12Mbps/896kbps and 20Mbps/896kbps tiers available to 1.5 million customers. That number should reach 1.8 million by the end of this year, and may reach 5 million by the end of 2009, Qwest CEO Ed Mueller told investors this week.

Beeb’s Next-Gen iPlayer Tests New Features
The upgraded iPlayer will allow users to synchronize content across devices via Microsoft’s Live Mesh environment — functionality its Adobe AIR download management can’t support — and will add social networking features such as reviews and recommendations that essentially crowdsource some of the marketing for the already popular player. The social networking features will be limited to simple content-sharing options at first, as the national broadcaster has to tread a careful line between engaging a tech-savvy audience with one less familiar with digital media, Rose said. “The goal is not to build another Facebook.”

The Entire Video of John Doerr Giving 10 Tips for Start-ups
Here’sa video of star VC John Doerr reciting his 10 tips for start-ups to follow in the economic downturn. Doerr gave out the advice at VentureBeat’s “How to manage your start-up in the downturn”

Current Enlists Digg, Twitter for Election Night
Cable network Current has partnered with Digg and Twitter to power its Election Night coverage, the programmer announced today. Starting at 7 p.m. EDT on Nov. 4, Current will cover the election results on-air and online with live streaming headlines from Digg.com, a social news site that lets users vote on the most popular stories. The Digg headlines will live alongside so-called “tweets” from Twitter users. The goal is to capture the mood of the electorate by providing commentary from citizens across the country, rather than pundits. “By partnering with Digg and Twitter, Current is enabling our young adult viewers to directly influence what they see online and on TV, especially on Election Night on Current TV,” Current CEO Joel Hyatt said in a statement.

Earnings: CBS Swings To Loss On 12.5 Billion Write-Down; Q3 Revs Rise 3 Percent
True to its warnings about lower earnings earlier this month, CBS (NYSE: CBS) Q3 net earnings from continuing operations came in with a loss of $12.46 billion, or a loss of $18.58 per diluted share, versus earnings of $340.2 million, or $.48
per diluted share, for the same prior-year period. The earnings report also highlighted a $56.4 million write-down on items associated with "other-than-temporary declines in the market value" CBS' investments.

Comcast: AT&T Is Our Biggest Threat - Though VoIP adoption still giving Comcast the edge
Yesterday's Comcast earning numbers showed that despite a tightening economy and increased competition from telcoTV, Comcast is weathering the storm -- thanks in particular to the company's rapid VoIP growth. Despite the faster speeds offered via FiOS, Comcast COO Stephen Burke this week stated that AT&T was the bigger threat.

"We are actually seeing more competition from AT&T than Verizon right now, and that was the exact opposite a year ago," Burke said on today s earnings conference call. "We monitor it very, very carefully. AT&T has so much broader a footprint that we actually think they are having a greater effect on our business than Verizon.