Networking

Skype Downloaded Over 0.5 Billion Times
Skype has announced that its VoIP software has been downloaded over 500 million times since its inception in August 2003.
A pretty staggering number, even when you realise that it includes all of the downloads and possibly all upgrades of the software (* We’re in the process of checking this with Skype HQ).
Working out that this averages just under 11m downloads per month is pretty meaningless, as in the early days there were very few people knowing about Skype, or even how to pronounce it. In the early days some numpties called it Skype-eee – and we bet that the guilty keep that one quiet these days.
Some numbers that are worth looking at – because they’re pretty mind blowing – are that Skype is being downloaded at the rate of six times per second; Skype to Skype minutes in Q4 2006 alone totalled 7.6 billion minutes; and in September 2005, Skype had 54 million registered users. Today it has over 171 million registered users worldwide.
Skype CEO and co-founder Niklas Zennström shares the love and enthused, “The entire Skype team owes its success to the global community of registered users we have today who tell their loved ones how much they enjoy using Skype.”
The original Skype users were mostly people who had used Zennström previously wildly popular product, Kazza, a P2P file-sharing application. Much of the knowledge his team had built up in handling considerable amount of data sharing between machines was invaluable in building the bones of Skype.
Skype is now just part of everyday life. A product that you couldn’t imagine being without. A pretty impressive feat in anyones book.
8 March, 2007
IPTV Growth To Boost Video Market To $277Bn By 2010: iSupply
Research house iSupply are predicting that IPTV will be boosting the reveneue generated by the premium video services market from its current level of less than $200Bn to a whopping $277Bn by 2010.
Their definition of the premium video services market takes in pay-TV, mobile video, DVD, broadband video and theatre/box office receipts, but when advertising revenues are added, the total market reaches a stunning $370Bn.
iSupply see IPTV growing at frankly amazing rates. In 2005 they saw IPTV worth $681m and, with their estimate of a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 103 percent (!), see it reaching a calculator-busting £23.5Bn in 2010.
It appears that they see the public’s willingness to pay for content expanding significantly. Strange, but we and our other tech-aware pals are finding ourselves just not watching that much mainstream content – even if it is available on-demand.
That aside, iSupply see the battle royal between two big, hairy beasts – the current pay-TV world of direct-to-home satellite and digital and analogue cable TV services – and the telcos who will be pushing quad-play.
On the physical format side, iSupply point out that DVD sales are slowing, and will continue to do so, with the decline over the next 3-4 years being as much as 15 percent to 20 percent.
One very interesting point that is raised by them is
With most movie libraries and television series already on DVD, Hollywood studios are generating more than half of their revenues from DVDs—and are running out of new content to sell, making this an issue of paramount importance to them. One cause of the DVD sales deceleration is the fact that consumers have become more price-sensitive, believing that the average DVD cost of $20 is too expensive, especially compared to renting.
It’s not clear where this leaves Blu-Ray and HD-DVD – both on the price of the media (which is expected to be higher than DVD) and on the material that is available. Given Hollywood’s slow ability to make new material, and that most of it will have been sold on DVD already – it’s not clear if the new formats will help them.
Information on Premium Video Services Market report
1 March, 2007
Apple TV Delayed Until March
Apple has announced that their Apple TV product will be ‘a few weeks late.’
Observers aren’t that surprised by this as it was originally intended to be released in February and that’s pretty much run out. The new date is quoted as mid-March.
Apple TV will have a similar interface to their Front Row software and will play downloaded music and videos on a home stereo or television, playing it directly from an Internet connection or networked computer, either by wired or wireless networking, with 802.11n supported.
When it was launched at the start of January, Jobs described it as such, “Apple TV is like a DVD player for the 21st century—you connect it to your entertainment system just like a DVD player, but it plays digital content you get from the Internet rather than DVDs you get from a physical store.”
Apple hope to do the same for TV as they’ve done for digital music, although there’s been quite a lot of backlash against this idea.
The expected cost of Apple TV hasn’t changed £199 or $299.
28 February, 2007
XBox 360 IPTV Coming To London
Microsoft’s Xbox 360 running as an IPTV box will be demonstrated in London for the first time in Europe on 5 March.
It’s had an outing at CES in January this year and was well received.
There’s little doubt that the X360 has the grunt to be able to act as an IPTV STB – if anything it’s total over kill, given the considerable graphics ability it has.
Here’s what Robbie Bach, Sr. VP and Chief Xbox Officer, said about IPTV Edition, the middleware that the network operator will run to power the IPTV-ness of the Xbox 360, “IPTV Edition enables you to do, regardless of whether you’re a cable provider or a telco or any net operator, you can take live media, on-demand media, across an IP network and put it into the home on a high-definition television, and you can do multiple streams of that content without having to have multiple tuners in the set-top box. You really can produce an amazing TV experience.”
He went on to explain it’s not just about selling the IPTV software to the head-end, “this product sells SQL Server, it sells Commerce Server, it sells the rest of our backbone into these operators, and really helps broaden our business.” Hmmm, Nice.
It’s also been on what they call “scale commercial deployments” with the BT Group in the UK, Deutsche Telekom in Germany, T-Online in France and Swisscom in Switzerland. AT&T is working with Microsoft in the US.
There’s a history here
When the original Xbox was launched, Microsoft spent an awful amount of effort in denying that it was a going to be used to bring them closer to the TV in the lounge.
Despite this, they did quietly release some add-on software package that allowed you to pull picture and music from a PC. We bought it to give it a go, and found it to be disastrous. Hugely bloated software that needed to loaded on the PC that was to share and disastrous software that loaded on the Xbox. It was rare that it worked at all.
We assume that the X360 is considerably better than this.
The US version of XBox Live already gives subscribers the ability to download films and TV programmes to their X360s.
22 February, 2007
Vodafone And Orange 3G RAN Share: Examined
As has been mentioned on Digital-Lifestyles, Orange and Vodafone have entered into an agreement to share their 3G Radio Access Network (or RAN). We thought you’d appreciate some more depth … and who better to give it than Steve Kennedy, our telco guru.
Currently Vodafone have a bigger network than Orange, so Orange would gain more than Vodafone from the deal, but in future it means that new cell sites will be used by both operators.
The agreement could have covered 2G (GSM) too, but as Vodafone use 900MHz systems and Orange use different systems operating in the 1800MHz band, it just not possible. That said, it’s likely future technology would allow both sets of frequencies to operate within the same radio equipment.
There will still be interesting problems to sort out for 3G sharing, as Vodafone exclusively use equipment from Ericsson, while Orange use equipment from Nortel, Siemens, Nokia and Alcatel.
Once the network is in place, each network will be responsible for enabling their own network services and ensuring quality of service, etc. As competition for customers increases this is a sensible way for operators to reduce cost, share the infrastructure and compete on service. It’s a shame the fixed networks don’t take this view, as has been pointed out before, the LLU operators could join forces and build a joint LLU network and then compete on service. This might give them a larger network, which would be of a size and scale to compete with BT’s upcoming 21CN.
Why the rush to build?
With a 3G license comes obligations and one of these was to reach 80% of the population by the 1st Dec, 2007. Though the GSM network coverage hit that a while ago, 3G expansion has been slower with few customers really wanting 3G services so the operators have built 3G networks in densely populated areas where they can make revenue from those customers. That means big cities have been covered, but elsewhere 3G coverage is patchy to say the least.
Hutchinson 3G (or 3 the new entrant into the mobile world) has been rapidly building its customer base and building a network to match. In June 2004, Ofcom tried rules that 3 had SMP (significant market power) in the 3G world, which meant it would be regulated by Ofcom much in the same way BT is for fixed networks. The other 3G operators happily supported Ofcom in this view. 3 didn’t want the increased regulatory burden and disagreed with Ofcom’s ruling, so appealed to the Competition Appeal Tribunal. They won their appeal in November 2005. This was the first time any network has successfully appealed against a SMP designation.
3 wasn’t happy about having SMP forced upon it and therefore made noises to Ofcom about coverage obligations, which the other networks weren’t meeting. They’ve got 10 months to hit that 80% figure.
Though city centres might have a demand for 3G (for data services, no one cares about 3G voice – a voice call sounds the same whether it’s 3G or GSM), as you leave dense urban areas the appeal of 3G is less. Well maybe not less, but there are less people to use it and less of a reason for the networks to install 3G infrastructure and sites.
The cost of a 3G cell is probably not much different in terms of equipment from that of a 2G cell, one major difference is the amount of bandwidth needed for the cell, as data volumes are significantly higher (maybe 40Kb/s using GPRS data compared to maybe 2Mb/s for 3G, multiply that by 10 users and it’s 400Kb/s compared to 200Mb/s).
UK backhaul (i.e. the pipes used to connect cells) are expensive. The more rural the cell site is. the less chance there is that anyone (except maybe BT) has got any kind of high bandwidth connectivity. Therefore, the costs of the backhaul may well exceed that of the cell site itself.
Sharing makes economic sense
Orange and Vodafone have to hit that 80% figure or Ofcom can impose fines which could be significant. Therefore the build out of a shared new network makes economic sense. It’s half of what they’d each have to pay.
In this climate of everyone’s customers wanting everything for nothing, being able to reduce your build costs may well be the straw that doesn’t break the camel’s back.
9 February, 2007
Orange And Vodafone Propose Sharing 3G Aerials In UK
There’s a lot of radical thinking going on in the mobile business these days and here’s the latest. Vodafone and Orange have signed a non-binding agreement to let each other to use the others 3G infrastructure.
It’s all about their RANs – Radio Access Networks, which connect customers mobiles to the operators networks.
Until now they’ve gone around installing their own, but are now realising that this is a mighty expensive business, seeing as the cost is several £100k per base station. In rural areas these may only service a handful of people, thus rending their investment uneconomic.
The core of the proposal is to
- Continue managing their own traffic independently
- Retain full responsibility for the quality of service they offer their respective customers
- Remain competitors in the UK mobile wholesale and retail markets
The summary – share infrastructure, but compete on service.
What’s forcing this?
When the mobile companies bid for the 3G licenses, not only did they pay over a huge amount of money, but they also took on obligations to provider 3G services to a certain percentage of the UK population.
As not many people have signed up for 3G, the mobile companies haven’t wanted to spend the money on servicing a population that isn’t giving them money with subscriptions and they’ve let their obligations slip. Until now Ofcom hasn’t been pursing them on this.
Three, the largest 3G provider in the UK, has recently been saddled with three little letters by Ofcom – SMP – Significant Market Power. They’re not too happy with the restrictions that this imposes on them, so have been pointing out to Ofcom that the other 3G license holders aren’t fulfilling their coverage obligations.
To ensure that they don’t get saddled with substantial fines by Ofcom, the other 3G holders will need to expand their infrastructure. By sharing costs on this, they save money.
More details of this will be provided by Steve Kennedy, an expert in this area, in an article ~~later today~~ tomorrow.
8 February, 2007
Amazon Unbox On TiVo Bound For US
Amazon are expanding their Amazon Unbox service to the TiVo platform. It’s being described as a “soon-to-be-launched service.”
Unbox offers TV programmes and films for rental or purchase, delivered down a broadband connection.
Amazon are taking a route much the same that Sky is in the UK. They initially offered the Sky Anytime service on PC first, and are now in process of moving it to their Sky+ box. TiVo are claiming 1.5m broadband-ready TiVo boxes in the US, significantly less than the number of Sky+ boxes in the UK.
The straight Amazon Unbox service (omitting the Tivo part) was launched in September 2006, delivering content to PCs and, by way of difference from Sky, portable device (as long as they were Windows Media Video-compatible).
The line-up of content providers includes the usual suspects – CBS, Fox Entertainment Group, Lionsgate, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios Home Entertainment and Warner Bros. Entertainment.

How do you get it?
Sign up for the service sounds pretty easy. TiVo subscribers simply log on to Amazon.com and follow a few simple steps to establish a link between their broadband connected TiVo Series2 or Series3 box and their Amazon account. The list of available content will then make its way down the broadband pipe, to be displayed on the usual TiVo “Now Playing” list.
Prices for television episodes are $1.99, with most films costing between $9.99 and $14.99 for purchase. Film rental starts at $1.99.
Respect for the customer
In a move that shows that TiVo/Amazon look at things from the consumer perspective, all purchased videos are automatically stored in each customer’s “Your Media Library” at Amazon.com for future access and download. This is absolutely the right way to do this, rather than forcing the consumer to buy it all again in their hardware gets into difficulty.
Impact
We suspect that Amazon won’t be stopping at delivering Unbox to TiVo and are likely to offer it on other PVR platforms after a period of exclusivity.
Given the straight Amazon Unbox service is wrapped in Microsoft’s DRM, we assume some kind of content protection will be applied to the Amazon Unbox on TiVo content. What is unclear is if this will also be by Microsoft – highly unlikely given TiVo runs on a Linux platform.
Potentially having to apply a second form of DRM to all of the content will be a major overhead for Amazon.
TiVo on Amazon Unbox
Amazon on Amazon Unbox
8 February, 2007
Tiscali Tips In With A Triple-Play Deal
Tiscali has unveiled plans to launch a television service for its broadband subscribers, offering more than 30 digital channels and on-demand programming.
The new Tiscali TV service will be available from next month to customers subscribing to the company’s 2Mbps ‘dual play’ broadband package.
Launching on 1 March 2007, the fifteen quid deal dishes out 2Mbit/s broadband access, serving up over 30 digital TV channels, ‘catch-up’ TV for some BBC programmes, plus access to a further 100 hours of on-demand programming.
The £20 triple-play deal bungs in line rental and free weekend telephone calls, with movies on-demand starting from £2 (€3) upwards, as well as upgrade options including Sky Sports via ‘Sky by Wire.’
Commenting on their new offering, Mary Turner, chief executive Tiscali UK said, “The success of Freeview has shown that customers want more than five channels but don’t necessarily want to pay a high monthly subscription.”
“Our TV service gives customers broadband plus the channel choice they want and free on-demand programming, all for the price you would pay for a standard broadband connection,” she added.
Tiscali will also be launching a new HD-enabled set-top box in July, capable of recording high-definition content onto its built in 160Gb hard drive.
With Tiscali delivering all content via the telephone line, we’re not entirely sure how long HD downloads will take, but we suspect that your ice cream will be well and truly melted by the time your 3hr thriller crawls down the line.
Meanwhile, Tiscali continues to increase its coverage in the major metropolitan areas, and expects to have a footprint of around 10 million homes by the end of 2007.
Tiscali
6 February, 2007
MP3Tunes Oboe: Now Unlimited Free Storage
Oboe, the MP3Tunes.com online music service is increasing its previous 1Gb of free music storage to unlimited storage to some of its registered users.
The bold move was signalled when we received an email notification today that our account had been given the magic blessing.
MP3Tunes takes a different approach to iTunes and other on-computer music management software. Rather than have all of your music stored on the machine you are listening to it on, the music is stored on the Internet.
To listen to the music you can either use their application; or plugins for Browsers (Firefox or ie); or media players (iTunes and Winamp). Access to the music is also free.
This brings the advantage that your music can be played by any Internet-attached computer or device that you might have to hand, including TiVo, Nokia 770 and Series 60 phones.
Uploading music is done using their Oboe Sync 2.0 software which runs on Microsoft Windows 2000/XP, Mac OSX and Linux.
They’re not sniffy about the music file formats either, with a comprehensive selection supported (MP3, MP4, M4A, M4P, AAC, WMA, OGG, AIF, AIFF, MIDI). Pointedly it is also stated that “Digitally Restricted Files may not play.”
The unlimited service, previously called Premium, used to cost $40/year. As with their previous offering, there may limits on the size of each file that you upload, but at time of going to press, this remains unclear.
A bit of history for you …
Mp3Tunes was started by Michael Robertson, the founder of MP3.com, the trail blazing music service that started in 1998 and eventually had to close after a concerted legal attack by the music business.
In 2000 mp3.com started my.mp3.com, a service very similar to the Oboe service offered now offered by MP3Tunes. We hope that their new service doesn’t suffer the same end.
Impact
We think this move to an unlimited service could just start to put a dent in the dominance of iTunes, particularly in Europe, where legal pressure is building on them.
Being able to access music collections from work as well as home, without having to physically carry them, is a big boost.
As far as sustaining the service, because clearly there’s a fair cost in offering something like this, we assume the income will arise from the sale of additional music to the people who embrace the service.p
1 February, 2007
BT Stays Top Of The UK Broadband League
New figures from research firm Epitiro puts BT as the leading consumer broadband provider for the 4th quarter of 2006 (October-January).
Their research found BT to be providing the best overall service, closely followed by Pipex, Orange and Demon, with Virgin in 5th place. Despite their low placing, Virgin recorded the lowest number of connection failures, suggesting that their customers achieved the highest degree of uptime.
BT notched up the fastest HTTP download speed and fastest FTP downloads from users’ personal webspace, with Pipex recording the fastest FTP upload speed.
Epitiro’s testing procedure monitors “customer experience” for internet access services, analysing over 622,000 real-time data samples from eleven locations around the UK – meaning that each broadband service was tested around 60,000 times.
Like ferrets in a drainpipe factory, Epitiro’s boffins keenly rummaged through these figures to get a breakdown of the speed and reliability of Internet connections, connection times, download and upload speeds, and the performance of both ping and DNS lookups.
The report also shows browsing speeds increasing steadily throughout last year, with the fourth quarter recording an average consumer ADSL connection speed at 5728.3 kilobytes per second.
“ISPs are increasing their speeds, which is good news for bandwidth-hungry users,” commented Epitiro’s Gavin Johns.
“Speeds have increased from 3817.82 kilobytes per second in the third quarter due to new ADSL Max entrants into the ten largest broadband providers. However it’s unlikely that many ADSL Max services will perform at their full capacity of 8Mbps. The speed of broadband service reduces the further the customer’s connection is from their local telephone exchange,” he added.
Overall rankings Q4 2006 (Q3 2006 in brackets)
1 BT (BT)
2 Pipex (Pipex)
3 Demon (Orange)
4 PlusNet (Demon)
5 Virgin (Virgin)
Epitiro
29 January, 2007