The Duck is nervous now...........................................
ijumpstart.com
DUCK LEVERAGES MICROSOFT CONNECTIONS AND TRUEMOTION TO SHOW BROADCASTERS WHAT THE PC CAN DO FOR DIGITAL TV
<Picture><Picture><Picture>
Duck Corp. CEO Stan Marder is reaching out to broadcasters and trying to get them to use his company's video-encoding technology for digital television (DTV) by offering millions of eyeballs in return.
Duck's TrueMotion 2.0 algorithm will be included in Memphis, and the codec is a component of Microsoft Corp.'s [MSFT] DirectX developer platform. Content encoded in TrueMotion will be able to be viewed on any PC with the future operating system.
Marder was unable to say how much it would cost broadcasters to encode their programming in TrueMotion, but he and Duck stand to gain big if his proselytizing proves effective.
Multimedia Week Editor Judith Abrams caught up with Marder after meetings with broadcasters in Europe and Japan to find out his plans for moving TrueMotion beyond the interactive games industry and into DTV.
Multimedia Week: How are you working with Microsoft to sell the broadcast community on TrueMotion 2.0 and your vision of digital television?
Marder: TrueMotion 2.0 allows you to go to much higher resolution at extremely low data rates and gives you levels of functionality that people like broadcasters, film studios and high-end multimedia developers have always been asking for. Broadcasters, cable operators, satellite delivery companies, anyone that wants to deliver high quality video to the PCs can be assured if they encode in TrueMotion they'll be able to play it back. We've been on the road with Microsoft, Intel and Compaq since NAB and went to Montreux and presented this to the European broadcast community. Then we went to Japan and presented it the community there. We showed video at 720 by 1280 at 24 frames per second progressive running in software only with a 266 MHz Pentium. It was a shocker because nobody thought we could do this yet. We also showed 640 by 480 in 60 progressive playing in software. It's very important for sports events where you have fast motion. Te other thing we showed is video with IE 4.0 and Netscape Communicator and the ability to show 30 frames per second inside an HTML page. That's where the interactivity begins.
MMW: How can you convince broadcasters to sign on to your vision of digital TV?
Marder: My challenge over the next 12 months is to license our technology to all the broadcasters and work very closely with them so we can enable them to build the kind of compelling interactive applications that will drive this whole thing. At the end of the day, consumers don't buy technology, they buy content and applications. The real message is you, Mr. Broadcaster, have been given a gift, let's call it 20 megabits, that you can use whichever way you want. The opportunity is to figure out how to fill that spectrum with compelling content that brings new things to the user and brings new revenue streams to the broadcasters. I think of standard television using 5 megabits per second, and I still have 15 megabits left over. Our argument is to say, what about real high definition television? How about Web access where you go to a Web site that wasn't designed for the 28.8 user but was designed for [access] at 2 megabits per second. You can use video and high production values we all know how to make. How about doing real electronic commerce -a real walk through the mall. The most compelling application I see is a push technology that incorporates real video. Imagine a world of PointCast where you can hear a person talk and see what's going on behind the still image. If you can provide a way to engage in the video I think you've added the next dimension.
MMW: If your digital TV concept doesn't fly with broadcasters, who will you talk to?
Marder: We're doing a lot of business now. is in over 500 titles now. Every title that comes out of Sega, many titles that come out of Sony for the PlayStation, and what we call the A titles on the PC are all based on TrueMotion. Certainly as the machines [PCs] get faster you're going to see more video-only titles. Wait until you see the new version of Zork that's about to be released.
MMW: What about DVD. When will it be a factor?
Marder: There is no DVD. God knows what's going on. I think everyone is still saying DVD is coming in six months. DVD is going to be important. The other thing we did show at PC Expo was a scene from The Player that was playing directly off a DVD-ROM drive without MPEG. One of the balloons we're trying to burst is to counter on the authoring side. Everyone's saying we need DVD authoring tools. That's nonsense. You've got all the authoring tools. Whatever you use to make your CD-ROM you can use to make your DVD-ROM. The problem keeps coming back to MPEG. MPEG is what needs the authoring. (Duck, 212/941-2000.) |
