The death of the central network, birth of the distributed network
: Another stick of dynamite exploding TV and the old, centralized networks: Lost Remote reports that TiVo is abandoning working with cable operators (well, they did the abandoning first) to work, instead, with the PC (read: internet). There’s the future of media distribution: what you want, where you want, when you want it. Turn off the old media hose and, instead, dive into the big media pool and swim wherever you want.
Keep scrolling down on Lost Remote’s Consumer Electronic Show posts and you find more evidence of this: Microsoft will work with MTV to distribute content to new devices. More cable networks sign with Akimbo to distribute on-demand content via the internet; a few years ago, they wouldn’t have dreamed of doing that for fear of pissing off the cable MSOs (which customarily limit the amount of programming a network can put on the internet). But they’re not scared of the big, bad wolf pipe now. As AP head Tom Curley has said (Jay Rosen reprises the thought here): The container no longer matters.
