Interview: Dr. John Abel, President of DataCast, on Data Broadcasting and the Digital Consumer Era (Part 2)

by Dale Cripps
Tuesday, January 19, 1999

Part 2
HDTV News: Were moving fast into the consumer era with digital. If I play this taped conversation with you back to the average public, would they understand what you are driving at?

I think that's a problem. I saw a program the other night on PBS. I thought it was pretty low information, but how much can they (the public) absorb? I think this is going to take a lot of education on the part of the consumer to get them to accept this, or get them to understand it.

Here's another angle. I think the Consumer Electronics industry feels they missed out on the last big thing—the internet. That was captured by the computer industry. That's why you have companies like Thompson and Sony agreeing to distribute WebTV. They felt like they were missing out I don't think WebTV has been wildly successful. The Consumer Electronics guys are (instead) looking at data broadcasting. Whether data broadcasting is to a TV set or a PC it will receive satellite signals, cable, broadband, telco lines, and terrestrial TV signals into a receiver device that is out-board from the computer. It may likely connect to a computer or a TV set that stores data, displays web sites, collects content on various things, as an agent with software.

The web looks like channels. I really think there is a disintegration of vertical channels. Chrysler wants me to go to their web site. It's like a channel. It's the Chrysler channel. But when I get there I'm not interested in all of their cars. I'm interested in one, perhaps two models. Then what I want to do is compare them with other brands. What you want for that is the agent to go pull such content to you. You want an agent to get it from data broadcasting, off the web, or whatever. You want to grab it and get it presented to you in a way that is more comprehensible, and with less clutter of the web.

The consumer will get more sophisticated about their information needs. Right now people are overwhelmed with the number of channels they have. There is something on MSNBC that I would like to see. There is something on CNN I'd like to see. There's something on NBC I'd like to see. How do I get it all brought to me in an easy way? Some of it is web based. Some of it is broadcasting. Some of it is cable. How can I get that brought to me in a convenient way? This might be a data information receiver of some sort.

HDTV News: This calls to mind branding. By simply pointing to brand and model you wind up with whatever is digitally stored about it and that of its competitors. The new Apple 8.5 system has a search scheme where you search your own hard drive, then it will take you out and search the Internet.

That is our heading. The consumer is getting overwhelmed with too much information. They want something that serves an editorial function, or an agent. The broadcaster has this editorial role. Local broadcasters in the data broadcasting arena can deliver a lot more content.

I was amazed during the release of the Starr Report. You know how many people were trying to get to that web site? We took that Starr Report off the web and data broadcast it in our demo. It took 13 seconds at 560 Kb/s to transmit the entire Starr Report to a PC. We also picked up President Bill Clinton's two responses. One took 2 seconds to transmit. The other took 1 second. The broadcasters on the air here in Washington were saying, "The Starr Report, the Starr Report, the Starr Report,” but they could never broadcast the damn thing. Broadcasting is the perfect application, and it (Starr) was the number 1 seller. Broadcasters could have broadcast it. It was free. It wasn't owned by anyone! The publishing industry made a huge sum out of it because they didn't have to pay any author for it.

HDTV News: Right there in Washington is the largest pool of non-copyrighted material in the world.

Absolutely. I called ten top law firms in the ten largest cities in the United States and asked, "What federal agencies would you like covered?" One of the agencies was the FCC. "We'd like to have the FCC meetings streamed to our PC" It's available on the web now, but they would like not to send a person to Washington to cover it... "We’ll hire another law firm here so we don't have to go down there and do it." They don't just want the live meeting (that's an important one), but they want all of the documents under discussion at that particular place. I asked them, "Would you pay a thousand dollars a month for it?" They kind of laughed. They said "You know how much it costs for a Lexus-Nexus search? Two hundred fifty dollars an hour."

That's an enterprise application. I don't think the public is going to want to watch the FCC meetings. There is a tremendous amount of content from Washington D.C., however, that has value when delivered to all state capitols. It would have value with law firms, trade associations, major corporations —anyone regulated by the federal government.

HDTV News: Any large association, be it religious, or trade, or advisory, is always putting out a large quantity of data. I would gather that there is no shortage of this kind of material. Is it a matter of recognizing the limits of each audience?

You could run down the list. What you said is right. You also have the catalog industry. Catalogs spend, I was told, between $20 and $50 per household for the Christmas season to send a catalog. Data broadcasting can broadcast multi-media catalogs. They're going to cost more to produce the first time out, but the delivery cost is going to be much lower. They're far more appealing than those tons of paper in your mailbox.

Software distribution! Software distribution in this country is not very good. The software developers always have a problem getting distribution. They have trouble getting shelf-space. They have to produce a lot of product and put it in inventory. You can't test drive it very easily when you go into shop for software. You're basically reading the back of a box and hoping it'll work. You can't test drive it.

So, data broadcasting distributes software. It can distribute fixes and updates for that software. It can let you test-drive the software. You have an idea whether you want to buy it or not. Then it can be unlocked, or you can go online to get it, or you can go into the store and get it. I think software is a huge market. The whole area of publishing, whether books, or eventually what happens with books. Remember, the Starr Report was 435 pages. It took 13 seconds at 500 Kb/s to broadcast it. Not bad.

What are you hearing about HDTV and DTV?

HDTV News: I think that the industry as a whole has made the decision that it's going to go forward without stopping. I think that there is still concern about whether the earlier adopter is the only adopter. If that's the case, we have a new problem to address. I think the fact 41 or 42 stations went on the air is a very important test. From what I get in my Email from the web pages I would say the consumer marketplace is going to respond. I don't take it is a given yet. I think we have to be very diligent and not let anything slip through our fingers. It's very clear that if it doesn't continue to expand, it will collapse unceremoniously. Former Apple Washington rep, Jim Burgersaid to me that many executives from broadcast told him HDTV will collapse of it's own weight. "Don't worry Jim," they said, "we'll pick up the pieces and see what we can make out of it."

HDTV News: I'm sure there are as many different attitudes and opinions about H/DTV among broadcasters as there are among the public. I get a lot of them streaming in from to my web page survey. As people start to see these devices an Epiphany of sort occurs. They drop their defenses and say "ah well forget what I said yesterday. It's really great." So I think it's going to go just fine.

I think so too. I'm heartened by the fact that there are many more broadcasters interested in doing it than have to.

Continued in Part 3