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Microsoft

Microsoft Invests in Rogers 107

Posted by justin++ from the canada-eh? dept.
GRW wrote in with a link to a story about Microsoft investing in Rogers, Canada's largest cable company. The $600M (I'm assuming that's CDN) is meant to "change the way Canadians watch TV". Microsoft says Rogers will use "Microsoft's television platform". Is that CE, or something more general?
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Microsoft Invests in Rogers More

Microsoft Invests in Rogers

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  • Truth about Rogers/MS (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Sorry about the AC.. but I have my reasons. The truth of this relationship is simple. Roger's is the most mismanaged company ever. They have never had solid years of profitability. Go check out your stock research data.. you will find out.

    Ted Rogers is the biggest fool ever. The company is in debt almost 4 billion dollars CDN. How could somebody screw up a monopoly position so bad? Mostly because Ted got into every business he could because he is a meglomaniac. Cable TV, Cellphones, Television Stations, Magazines.. you name it. Like Rupert Murdock except without the business sense.

    Basically.. they have been loosing up to 100mill quarter. Recently Rogers has been selling assets just to stay above water. Canadians who are listening closely will see. Notice how AT&T is into Cantel now while before it was all Rogers. Rogers has also recently sold massive portions of their backbone network to Metronet.

    The deal with Bill is just a cash infusion for a company that (some anaylsts fear) is loosing at a rate of 75-100mill a quarter.

    I hope Bill knows what he is doing.. and I hope for Roger's investors, he got some control over the company (ie: Ted) for his 600mill.

  • It's Must C:\ TV!

    So, Microsoft in set-top boxes, eh? Will the box have a little "blue LED of death" to indicate when I should reboot it? Rebooting via the remote would be a real plus.

    If it crashes in the middle of a PPV screening, do I get my money back?

  • Isn't that Embedded Windows NTV/CE 2000?
  • My bleary mind dropped a "Mr." into that headline.

    "Where do you want to go today? It's a beautiful day in the neightborhood!"
  • From Microsoft's press release "Rogers Communications and Microsoft to Bring Advanced Television Services to Canada":
    The agreements announced today include the licensing of Microsoft TV and Microsoft TV Server to support at least one million set-top boxes, and the development of Rogers branded e-mail and Canadian-specific content services powered by the Microsoft Network (MSN) network of Internet services and other Microsoft properties. Microsoft also will make a CDN $600 million (approximately $400 million U.S.) investment in Rogers to further demonstrate Microsoft's commitment to Rogers success in developing and rolling out new digital services.

    What a joke on economic reasoning: Microsoft and Roger's strike agreements on the latter party forcing MS technology down the throats of its clients, and than it is said Microsoft also will make a CDN $600 ... investment in Rogers to further demonstrate Microsoft's commitment to Rogers success in developing and rolling out new digital services. They present this as if the agreements are unrelated to the investment and the investment is primarily symbolic ("demonstrate commmitment").

    Microsoft has a long history of working with cable companies to help accelerate the availability of broadband access and features, such as advanced television services, as evidenced by its previous agreements with Comcast, TCI, AT&T, United Pan-Europe Communications, NTL, and TVCabo.

    "Working with"?! They have been buying cable share like mad. I wonder what their ownership percentage of all cable companies globally is by now.

    Rogers Communications and Microsoft to Bring Advanced Television Services to Canada
    http://www.microsof t.com/presspass/features/1999/07-12tvpak.htm [microsoft.com]

  • Microsoft and the executives within have been buying or buying stake in cable companies left and right. ASDL hasn't taken off nearly fast enough so it looks like cable modems are winning the consumer bandwidth war, at least in the short term. I'm out in a small community in Wisconsin and I've got a cable modem, if I held my breath waiting for the phone companies to do ASDL here I'd be dessicating before it happened.

    As a result of this cable companies will be even bigger money than they are now. This is the next frontier Microsoft wants to assimilate.

  • Actually thats incorrect. Presently we watch TV drinking either Molson's or Labatt's beer while eating slabs of back bacon and wearing toques. After the investment we'll all be issued Microsoft logoed beer hats. Personally I feel that as long as the flow rate of the beer through the apparatus is fast enough I don't mind at all.

  • Yes, that's pocket change for Microsoft. I feel sorry for those living North of our border. The company that milked us good now invades our Northern neighbor and gives them a proprietary standard they can't refuse. All your news, information, and the world around you will sure to be innovative by today's standards. Everyone will soon have the One True Service from One Microsoft Way.
  • Being a Canuck Shaw customer, I guess I'm safe from the Microsoft threat. :-)

    But ignoring the emotionally-loaded phrases like "Microsoft technology" and "investment", what cool things could you do with a TV that has a 4 Mbps internet connection? It's a pretty awesome setup, surely some good could come of it? Here is some stuff off the top of my head; use your to add more:

    1. streaming video from any IP -- 2^32 channels, or 2^128 for IPv6
      We would want MPEG or something open, MS will use some proprietary crap like RA or their own
      [okay, okay, RA is adopting some open stuff, but you get the idea]

    2. instantaneous monitoring of consumer channel surfing preferences
      we would want this [really] as long as it's securely anonymous, MS will want to know who everyone is and how much money they make, plus their postal address so they can send targeted marketing junk mail based on viewing habits

    3. cool, up-to-date TV guide thing as is already available via digital cable and satellite
      it better have *at least* this, or it's all a complete waste of time

    4. digital VCR technology
      able to pause live TV for up to 2 Gigs of disk space.. :-)

    5. CONTENT, CONTENT, CONTENT!!
      I want to watch episode 32 of Babylon 5.. NOW.

    6. last but not least, I want to watch the currently ongoing Quake3 tournament at BeatDown

    Well, I can dream, can't I? Is it so far-fetched? Really?

  • ...what it probably means is that Rogers ends up eventually shifting from @Home to RoadRunner (which MS has invested in).

    It definitely means the new cable boxes will be WinCE "terminals". Does that mean they'll also do WebTV (another MS "product")? Does that mean that everyone will get a "free" HotMail account with their new Wince (more like, shudder) cable boxes?

    does that mean they'll get "free" MSN access?

    The flip side of the wince cable boxes is that Microsoft is essentially buying market for wince, since it is not doing so well against the Palm Pilots... when MS thinks they have enough wince cable tv boxes in place, they'll start rolling out new "integration" with wince handhelds to do some sort of an end run around PalmPilots: get your E-mail from your TV into your portable Wince. The marketing will also say that "you can't do this with Palm Pilots!", along with some suitable actors with "testimonials" and subtle putdowns (to capture on the Got to Keep with the Jones factor) of PalmPilots and other non-Wince platforms.

    ...and Microsoft is buying eyeballs for its on-line products: WebTV, MSN, Hotmail, etc. Which makes sense. Microsoft is investing in YOU...you should be thankful!

    Does anyone know how significantly different @Home's requirements for the cable tv plant are compared to RoadRunner?
  • ...or it'll be like in "Fahrenheit 451". Your TV will have a camera on it, and one of the big things to do will be to get to "be in the play".

    What do you think, Julia?

    Right!

    Next subject...
  • ... buy them.
  • Microsoft is always afraid. Read any book about the MS business philosophy, and you'll see that it's embedded deep in their collective psyche.

    This is why they respond as they do to competition - not out of strength, but out of fear.

    D

    ----
  • Do what I do. Don't watch T.V. Really, it's boring. True crap. I can't stand most of it nowadays. The only channels I can dare watch are the Nature channel and sometimes The Movie Network.

    As for Internet, yup you're kind of in a bind there. Lesson learned: Resnet cannot be beat :)

    On a tangent, did anyone watch "The 700 Club" as a kid while you were searching for cartoons? I did, and for the longest time I found it the most boring show. I couldn't understand what it was supposed to be. I saw it again today (they were vilifying Internet p0rn too), and realized what it is. *SIGH* That could explain a lot... :)

    Anyways, back to slav^H^H^H^Hwork!
  • That's fantastic, I always wondered what a 32 inch blue screen of death would look like!!

    Thank god for dss and direct tv!!
  • Those of you who were around here for that will deeply remember that (and the ensuing outcry). Those of you who don't, the gist of it was that Rogers had come out with some new cable TV channels and that you would be automatically subscribed if you did not explicitly say you didn't want them. (And, yes, they did add to your cable bill.)

    So, I can see it now... Windows 2000 upgrades up the wazoo, and the "No, I do not want to upgrade" checkbox is hidden deep within www.microsoft.rogers.com. Another reason I'm glad I'm stuck in the flat bits with Shaw. (and my 60kb/sec upstream)

    Speaking of which, digital cable is available here, but I don't have it (I don't have cable TV, period... just cable Internet). One of my friends does, though, and I have to go over and check it out sometime...
  • What Microsoft fails to understand is that Canada will tax them to death, and that will be the end of them. Go Canada!
  • The new Sleeman's steam is really good. Try it.

  • Microsoft Television Platform (Score:3)

    by zCyl ( 14362 ) on Tuesday July 13, 1999 @02:29AM (#1805983)
    I have a deep technological respect for the Microsoft Television Platform. Why, if it weren't for all those old windows cd's holding up my television set, the darn thing would wobble all the time.
  • anyone else read the back issues of that "after y2k" comic posted yesterday?

    "i should have bought canada when i had the chance"..

    i guess Bill Gates must read /. pretty closely
  • Looks like Micros~1 knows that it is in serious trouble and would like to find a way out of the OS business by buying into cable. How much have they spent on this spree over the last four or five months? I reckon it must be something close to 4-5 billion dollars on a captive market for their latest abomination, wince, er, um WinCE.

    Looks like they see the writing on the wall...

    Chris

  • Gosh, I suppose that this means that Microsoft are going to try and get involved in some sort of web-based television. It's a great idea; can't possibly fail.
  • I can't wait to see the Microsoft propganda to start flooding our already crappy cable services. I wonder how this will effect my @Home service?
    I wonder.. I wonder how much a DSS is worth now...


    [ssa]
  • Now you Yankee /.ers will be at war with us for sure!
    And I thought the Rogers Cable monopoly was evil before....
    Currently we have Rogers@Home and of course their cable tv service. There are no immediate plans for ADSL service in my area (Guelph), and a DSS is beyond the price range of a household of poor students :-(
  • > Most WebTV's use a telco (phone line) return...

    They'll probably make use of the @home infrastructure that's now available to most Rogers customers (well, except the folks in remote communities... Billy will need a "Death Star" of some sort to make that work.)
  • Am I the only one here who feels that Canada is becoming the Oceania of 1984? We have a monopoly for cable TV and broadband internet access (which you cannot get without having cable TV) joining forces with Microsoft's monopoly. Soon we shall have those little set top boxes provided from microsoft recording everything that we watch and do, remember Gates and Co. plan to have these replace the PC. Soon we shall have the M$ thoughtpolice breaking into our homes in the middle of the night and re-educating us on the glorys of microsoft.
    "Thoughtcrime does not entail death, thoughtcrime is death."
  • I can just see it now. Montag comes home to find his wife had just installed the newest software for the TV room, windows:leathal enforcer. The versions that allows leathal deterant against any anti-microsoft activity.
    "Dear, why the heck did you do that?"
    "The TV family told me to do it."

    Monopoly joined with monopoly, until there is only ONE big company. Hey, what do you know, we're communists.
  • Don't forget Keith's - now THAT is a beer ;)

  • Wow.. (Score:1)

    by RPoet ( 20693 )
    "By using Microsoft's television platform, Rogers will be able to deliver new services that fully utilize the broadband infrastructure, thereby enabling a great information, entertainment and communications experience for their customers."

    So, Microsoft is once again leading a paradigm shift in technology? *lol* Funny the article hardly says anything about what will actually change, except for Microsofts yearly income.
  • I explicitly got a Non-Rogers solution [www.look.ca] when I wanted Cable. Nobody can say that Rogers is a warm and fuzzy company, as they have a lot in common with fellow monopolist Microsoft. Remember negative-option billing? For Americans, this was a greedy monopolistic money grab that provoked a national uproar against the cable moguls.

    I am really not excited about the fact that ADSL is not available in my area, too. Still using 56k for now.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday July 13, 1999 @02:33AM (#1805996)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • we're your northern *neighbour*
  • I'm out in a small community in Wisconsin and I've got a cable modem, if I held my breath waiting for the phone companies to do ASDL here I'd be dessicating before it happened.

    Out in BFE, that's pretty much what it's like, I gather. But everywhere else, the situation is reversed. Most major cities don't have cable modems in any useful form, but DSL is all over the place.

    I'd have loved to get cable if it were available, but since the projected availability date is still three to six years off, DSL is the right-here-right-now immediate solution.

    The general trend I'm seeing is that in the burbs and in no-mans-land, cable has the better availability, and everywhere else DSL seems to be taking over. But then again, I live in California, so maybe I have it all backwards...
  • Uh...I really doubt that MS is "in serious trouble" nor do they "see the writing on the wall" This makes perfect sense for them, they want to have a hand in ANYTHING that relates to the internet. They already missed the boat big-time with the browser stuff, and it's taken them years to catch up. They don't want to be caught with their pants down again.

    Like it or not, MS has a *huge* installed base and more resources than I would like to think about. That equates to POWER, and lots of it. They have lost some momentum over the past year, but they are going to be around for a long time and I doubt they are "afraid" of anything right now. Well..except maybe the DOJ.

  • I'm now very glad that my parents got a mini dish. My Canada does not include MSRogers.
  • They have already bought huge plots of land in Vancouver, and I think Canada will welcome their half trillion USD company without any silly old restrictions on business practices.
  • My dear AC, you are wrong.

    @Home uses Solaris hardware. I knew from Netcraft that their web server (the local one for here, www.slnt1.on.wave.home.com - their portal) ran Solaris, and I had somebody queso the mail server, Solaris again.
    @Home's main network architect said just today that they use all Suns.

    BTW, Bell is the one who is going to be implementing PPP over Ethernet very soon. (see http://www.redback.com/) Just so you know, Linux doesn't support PPPoE yet, and the ONLY clients for it at the moment are for Win9X. Of course, it is an RFC, so I'm sure somebody will add it to Linux within a few months, but....
  • No more choosing between Rogers or Microsoft as to the most hated corporation in Canada!

    Those of you not living up in the Great White North here, Rogers is infamous for poor customer service, misleading ads and questionable business practices. I think our good ol' attorney general or CRTC are looking into them yet again... heh!

    Sound like some other company you know?
  • I'd rather not start getting junk mail that matches what I was watching three weeks beforehand.

    "Dear os and so,

    We noticed that you have an interest in watching sport fishing. Our company sells a complete line of free-range worms ..."

    I can see a lot of viewer information being sold if it's possible.

    It'll be expensive, intrusive, and unstable. But maybe I'm just off my coffee.

  • $600M CDN is ~ $50.00 US. Microsoft was probably just paying their cable bill. Nothing to worry about everyone, move along...
  • Can we now expect all Canadians to be the victims of subliminal messages causing the entire nation to become a bunch of M$ droids buying all the products they sell?
  • Microsoft and Rogers Cable in bed together now? It doesn't surprise me in the least.
    They both make a fortune by overcharging their customers for their mediocre products and services. Rogers doesn't hesitate to charge me $40 a month for my cable service which only includes a few special channels - cartoon channels for the kids, History channel, Much Music etc. Many of these channels were offered free of charge for several months with the understanding that you would have to pay for them after a certain period. When January 1st of that year came Rogers slyly added the extra charge for the channel on everyones bill. It was a huge fiasco for Rogers - they apologized -I think - and automatically removed the channels unless they were ordered like they should have in the first place.
    And if I want a cable modem they want me to pay them another $40. Almost $100 a month out of my pocket an into their bank account? They can kiss my ass. Rogers has swallowed up most of the competition. If there was an alternative in my area I would us it.
    Recently, Rogers also came into my apartment building and installed new cable wiring. Now instead of our cable coming from the walls it no runs in from the hallway which itself branches from a central cable that runs up the garbage chute rooms. Don't know if this is significant but the timing is interesting. They spent months installing the cable and there was a lot of nonsense about all the great new services we would eventually enjoy to make up for of all the inconvenience they caused us.
  • Seeing as the CRTC just decided NOT to regulate the Internet (or "New Media", if you prefer), I wouldn't take too much comfort in that. You might not get MSTV, but you'll sure as hell get MSWebTV, MSHotmail, MSN, MSPayPerView, MSVideoPhone and MSAnyBroadbadAppYouCanThinkOf.

    I can't believe the CRTC allowed this to happen. :(
  • Try Look (www.look.ca). They are much cheaper than cable. They broadcast digitally from land based towers as opposed to satellites.

    Just a couple more months and you'll be able to say fuc^h^h^hgoodbye to TedTV. On the bright(?) side, this means that we're gonna get MSNBC on the lineup...
    - - -

  • Set-top boxes and interactive capabilities are all well and good, but what content are we going to be accessing using these *oh-so-wonderful* new technologies? Microsoft learned back with the MSN fiasco (Microsoft Network - it was supposed to rival the Internet... uh, it didn't) that they can't do content worth a damn...

    Rogers doesn't (afaik) create any content, they're just a carrier. I doubt the CRTC will relax it's Canadian Content legislation, even for Billy; so does this mean a big shiny new "Microsoft TV Productions" office tower for Toronto?

  • I don't think it got as far as a law suit. What happened is Rogers added a bunch of channels, jacked the price and didn't give existing customers much of a say in the matter. The result was getting a lot of the subscribers mad, people dropping subscriptions, and the threat of government involvement.

    Rogers back peddled quickly and everyone was more or less happy in the end. A little while later the BC government (and maybe the Federal government as well) brought in a law preventing them from attempting it a second time.
  • I'm just wondering how MS is going to crash my tv?
    How can it be a true MS product if it doesn't crash.
  • This makes me happy I'm in Cogeco's domain instead of Rogers'. I tolerate (barely) having M$ products on my PC, but I wouldn't be able to stand having it on my TV.

    This is how I currently recover after a power outage: turn on my TV, and ask it to auto-program the channels. I can't imagine what would happen to an M$ box after a power outage...

    (Shaw's gota "digital cable", I wonder how that works...)

  • "... change the way Canadians watch TV"

    It will. I'm gonna get a dish...

  • Rogers doesn't (afaik) create any content

    Actually Rogers owns several cable channels and at least one broadcast station.

  • To be accompanied by Microsoft News (during which all other shows are tuned out), the Microsoft "Freedom to Inundate" Hour, and, as a special bonus, Microsoft Test Pattern(TM) late at night.
  • Don't forget Alexander Keiths.

    But hey, there is always Labatt Max Ice for those "I think I want to drink 'till I puke" times :)
  • That's just wrong man wrong. Have you looked at the percentage of earnings when it's split up by nation? %-wise Canadians are less MS-Droidish than the States. What really urks me is that figgin' Rogers WAVE modem (cable) will be my connection to the net. "Hope they don't make winBLOAT a requirement for cable internet....". The US has had some ISP doing this. This would be bad uhkay. Like I would not be able to connect uhkey.
  • I saw something about this on CBC last night. Apparently this deal is to create an interactive environment. They're renting a 'Set-top box' (see The Road Ahead - Gates) to enable interactive gameshows etc etc. If this actually works, I'll be REAL happy to not have to wait for the ultraslow Prevue channel. The box is supposed to rent for $10 a month, and comes with a remote instead of a keyboard/mouse.
  • Our TVGuide channel often used to emit:
    "Please insert laser disc and press the spacebar."
    © 1998 Amiga Computers Ltd.

    or something similar. heh..
  • Moses Znaimer.



    Who else?

    br?
    He owns Bravo, CityTV, Much Music, MusiquePlus, MuchMorMusic, Space, and tons more stations. Znaimer is one of the main dictators of Canadian pop culture. I'm sure ChumCITY would jump at the idea of being part of this.
  • As a fellow canadian i can say there is only one hope for ya .. do DSL MAN!!!! First .. unlike rogers .. they are not limiting the bandwidth ... second ... they are owned my Nor-Tel .. not much better then microsoft ... but better none the less.
  • Hey, if MS gets CE into their cable boxes they just might have to hang upsidedown in in order to watch their TV.

  • MS TV (Score:1)

    by styopa ( 58097 )
    I can see it now.
    You flip to a channel, it isn't there and the cable box crashes. No more of that static, we have the BSOD.
    Some other company that MS is pissed at trys to advertise and Dr. Watson for TV pops up and says this commercial has caused an error and is shutting down, ok cancel help. (of course they will forget to place a keyboard and mouse on the TV which leads to my next one).
    Keyboard and pointer device not found, please insert MS TV cdrom into cable box and click ok.
    You video card has not be found, defaulting to VGA 16 colors.
  • > Canada will tax them to death

    Nah! Canada only taxes ordinary people to death. Corporations and the Very Rich are another matter altogether.

    I imagine Ottawa would bend over backwards for Mr. Bill and his minions should MS choose to move north to BC. Imagine what they'd do for him if he moved to Quebec. Back Orifice comes to mind.

    -MWR-
  • Im an engineer for a cable co. and I have been playing with CE and Sun java digital set top boxs for a few years now. If M$ owns your cable co and they start handing out new boxs -good luck. The M$ logo will be in your face all day, stats are collected of what you are watching(depends on cable plant) and basically they have control of anything the box does. But the new Scientific Atlanta 3000HCT is leet0 ;)
  • Thats Java not Jave...
    Coffee hasen't kicked in yet
  • That wasn't an interactive thing...Some Cable Systems send computer output directly to modulators, to send over TV...If you have a local radar channel (for weather stuff) some of those are done with that.
  • Yea, maybe they'll call it WebTV?
  • If there's @home service (cable modem) that can be used internally in the box to "fetch" more web info, something that MS will need for the return path...
  • "Content" will likely be the same enhancements that are offered with WebTV(don't laugh). Also, the MSTV sofware will likely allow web browsing via a return path (telco or cable modem, depends on the box).

    check http://developer.webtv.net for info on how they do this...
  • Yea, so's the Explorer2000 from SA, and the DCT5000+ from GI and the Pioneer whateveritscalled...
  • Right. here's what we have now....

    1. Streaming IP? Done. The whole ATVEF spec. has IPoverVBI (which is for analog) and better, you can mutiplex data into the MPEG-2 stream coming out of an upgonverter, then pull the data into code by reading the PID (for digital).

    2. Usage monitoring? Done (suprise!) There's a number of companies that can do this (I know, I wrote the code for my company). With SOME analog and digital, you can have the box read and store channel number, time on channel, then the controller (that's the computer that runs the cable set-tops) "asks" the boxes for the data.

    3. TV Guide? Done. There's several versions of this coming. Prevue has an interactive version, and the advanced analog & digitals (should) have built in versions.

    4. I'm not going to comment, check out replayTV

    5. With the digital compression & motion prediction etc...there'll be several hundred channels available (don't like the angle on the sports show your watching? change channel, get angle from different camera, that sort of thing)

    6. Watch? How about PLAY? Put a cable modem into a set-top, and with the right code in the set-top, you could play...
  • That's the prevuew channel..which until recently...hang on to your floppies for this one...RAN ON AN AMIGA!!! yea folks,ye old scrolling graphics was too hard for any other OS to handle.
  • The Microsoft deal is probably to put the WebTV interface into the set-tops. Microsoft has recently started porting the WebTV software to other boxes (Gen Inst, Sci Atl, etc..) so it looks like this will be some kind of "proof of concept". I noticed that they didn't mention whether it was digital set-tops or analog...the difference being that the digitals are much better with the interactive content than the analogs. I'm just wondering how they're going to do the return-path (that's when you buy something on your TV, how does the box "talk" to the rest of the world). Most WebTV's use a telco (phone line) return... Anyone know what kind of box is in place there? Some interesting links to check out.. http://www.microsoft.com/dtv/ Microsoft's official interactive TV stuff http://www.atvef.com/ The specs for sending web pages over TV The e-mail is drawcab!
  • It may be my faulty memory betraying me, but isn't "roger" commonwealth (or at least U.K.) slang for, um, sexual intercourse? If so, can't think of a more fitting name--"Microsoft Rogers" as a verb phrase.
  • This seems to be a much wider plan to totally shut java out of the set-top OS market, Microsoft have already this year I think bought large stakes in three of the largest UK cable providers. Sun better start buying Cable stock soon or it may find Microsoft has a stake in every cable provider.

  • I've had the Shaw service for 18 months and so far it has been mostly excellent. There was a couple of weeks of DNS irregularity and two or three days of network downtime altogether.

    I *frequently* see 600KB/s (bytes!) when downloading from big sites such as Intel or ESPN or AltaVista.

    The Shaw network uses the Terayon technology which is based on spread spectrum concepts. This means that all the available upstream channels broadcast simultaneously on the same frequencies and the head node sorts it all out.

    The algorithm for allocating the available spread spectrum downstream channels can be a bit of problem when playing Quake in the evening. There are something like 128 64K-bit channels each of which can be assigned to a different user on 10mS slices (I forget the exact numbers and I haven't even checked the arithmetic). But it works out to a situation where a very large number of low-bandwidth streams become a bit choppy (you don't get slices quite as often as you might like).

    I've also heard a rumour that you hack the box somewhat with SNMP protocol but I don't know the details of how this is done.

    I'm not sure that Shaw is any better than Rogers and I was ready to find lots of faults with this offering and there simply haven't been any worth mentioning for as long as I've subscribed.

    Futhermore, the representatives have insisted that they are not in the process of implementing upstream bandwidth caps. It might that the Terayon technology is less sensitive to the abuses which I know are going on (e.g. sharing copies of the Phantom Menace).

    We are fortunate to also have ADSL here but the economics are such that only businesses make much use of it.

    We really have nothing much to complain about--yet.
  • I can just see it now...
    * A BSOD every other day, requiring me to reboot
    my TV
    * Having to add 256 MB ram and a 6G HD to my TV
    in order to watch CBC Newsworld.If it had been
    MSNBC (not available in Canada), it would only
    have been 128 Mb ram and 4G hd.
    * My cable bill now expressed in USD
    (GST included, Washington State tax included)
    * Being forced to take @Home internet service,
    just to download Microsoft fixpacks for my
    cable TV service

    But, I can look on the bright side...
    * Now, my TV will be able to call the Home
    Shopping network automatically (through the
    Gates PC phone), and order all that MS software
    that I don't want or need.
    * I'll be greeted by BillG at every commercial
    break
    * When not in use, the TV screensaver will remind
    me to register *all* my Microsoft products
    (and take a quick survey of the rest of my
    household for future upgrades and marketting
    opportunities).

    I think not.

    If it comes down to Microsoft on my Cable, I'll
    switch to sattelite.


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