Mulled Marc

AT&T has announced that they are creating a broadband service offering 20 cable networks to any broadband user (in the US, with Windows, using Internet Explorer). The service will run $20 a month and AT&T plans to add more channels over time. The service will be the same video service as cable with all of the commercials and AT&T has no plans for banner ads or special frames – the video can be made full screen.

While the first iteration of this doesn’t sound like it will have a great cost / value ratio, if they can pull it off it could be interesting for the whole net neutrality debate. I’ve gotta think cable companies won’t be too happy if people were to cancel video service from their cable company keeping only the broadband connection, then sign up for a video package from AT&T. To have any real impact AT&T needs to offer some kind of ala-carte programming at a reasonable price, a built in method to time-shift wouldn’t hurt either.

While it’s a small step, this is a necessary step to two previous theories of mine:

1. At some point in the near future everyone will have an IP address assigned to their ass. No home phone vs cell phone, no cable package, just an IP address that follows you wherever you go and allows you to view your video content, make and receive phone calls, etc. In the longer term, we’ll all be assigned IP addresses at birth by our robot masters to make our categorization and eventual enslavement more effecient.
2. The concept of cable television and television networks is doomed. This concept will be gone once television producers figure out that they can skip the networks and distrubute themselves using iTunes, online streaming, direct-to-DVD, etc. Perhaps you will still subscribe to a television “network” in the future, but it’s more like a playlist or one of Amazon.com’s “Listmania!” lists. I’m hoping that the producers of Stargate SG-1 fire the first salvo in this battle now that Sci-Fi Channel has canceled their show.

via TVSquad
Engadget
Yahoo! News

A Federal Court judge has ruled that an online website may be sued under the Americans with Disabilities Act if their website is not accessible by the blind. The ruling stems from a suit against Target by the National Federation of the Blind (NFB). The class action lawsuit charged that Target’s online site was missing features that would allow a blind person to use the site and that a purchase could not be made online without the help of a sighted person. The NFB has stated that they previously contacted Target to resolve the issues with their website, but that negotiations broke down, leading to the suit.