Mike, "OVS" is an FCC-invented acronym that is supposed to mean "Open Video Systems", or "Open Video Services". It originated from a mid-1980s white paper written by Robert Pepper (chief of the FCC common carrier bureau) called "Through the Looking Glass". I still have a copy of that somewhere in my files.
OVS evolved from the FCC's lengthy inquiries in the early 1990's involving what they called "video dialtone". The idea of video dialtone / OVS was an attempt by the FCC to encourage more competition in the delivery of video services to the mass market.
First, some background.... A traditional cable TV company obtains a cable franchise from a municipal authority and builds a broadband local network (cable system). Then they decide what programming or content to offer to customers over their network, to attract as many customers as possible. That has been the success model for cable MSOs (multiple system operators).
If I recall correctly, The OVS idea was that more many companies could be involved in the delivery of programming to the customer. For example, the company that builds and owns the local broadband network might sell out rights to deliver channel capacity on their entire network to many other companies. This would be almost like the the broadband network owner was a common carrier like exists in the traditional telephone side of our industry, selling capacity to anyone who pays the price. As the owner of the OVS network, they would fall into an entire different regulatory capacity than a traditional cable company, i.e, a company that controls the entire menu of channels that are delivered to customers. I think the idea of OVS was to give some other door for telephone companies to go through in order to compete with cable companies. Ever since the internet explosion in the last few years, most big phone companies have become more interested in the data business than the video business, so OVS never reached any high interest level in the telecom industry. I don't have any idea if the economics of an OVS model are any good. If the economics of OVS were good, then market economics says that lots of cable companies should be embracing the idea of OVS instead of remaining as traditional cable companies that control the programming menu. I can't name any major cable company that has expressed any interest in OVS, so that may explain why so few people have ever heard of OVS. It was a nice sounding idea, but if it doesn't make money,....you know what happens. |
