"With its deep patent and intellectual property portfolio, can't AXC make a contribution to Internet broadcasting?"
Sure can. That's why some of us are anxious for AXC to hurry up to the web so it can start to learn as it goes along and start figuring out exactly just how to use its tech to make money on the dang internet in the 21st century. LOL. Man, sometimes I wonder if I've hitched my wagon to a turtle heading into the year of the rabbit.
Seriously, that's why Ampex video and audio technology which spans the pure analog to digital eras, is extremely valuable. See, in order to deliver video and audio over the internet (and extranets/intranets), one needs compression. Even though bandwidth is expected to grow 10x annually each of the next 10 years, compression will still be required because of the way that people will use that bandwidth as embodied in the saying that one can never have enough bandwidth. For example, any day now, we should be getting a report from Steve Leahy regarding the first ticket given to him by the Bandwidth Police who are trying to regulate the usage of cable modems. Way too many people downloading the multimedia interviews from the Playboy site and crashing parts of the shared network.<g>
The folks in showbiz can tell you better than I that in assembling and reassembling footage or audio tracks to tell a story, they want to work with pure video or audio signals because compression basically involves discarding redundant information in a data file -- and in the digital era, all video and audio signals are converted to data files. Compression has the practical effect of amplifying and degrading any artifact or defect in the original signal. Varying degrees of cheesy video and tinnny audio are currently available on the web. Because even today an Ampex Professional Video signal is at par or superior to a Sony or Panasonic non-HDTV pro video signal -- quite an achievement really considering the contraction of resources that AXC has suffered over the years -- Ampex has the potential to offer the least cheesy video and the least cheesy audio over the internet. Purest video signal = least cheesy compressed video output. Which should be good enough for starters if Ampex ever gets around to switching on its web host, a natural way for Ampex to showcase its storage products and its video/audio technology.
Now, if only Ampex can figure out how to catch up with the growing crowd rushing to stream quarterly conference calls to investors. That is the kind of service, part of a collection of services, that would seem to me to be an effective way to gather eyeballs, showcase technology and increase the profile of the stock all at the same time. Also, there's an interesting post on Yahoo regarding the kind of secured backup service that Ampex and Micronet may be trying to develop and provide over the net that I think would sell well. I'm fairly confident that even Bramson understands that he has to structure his internet services in such a way that the basic service is free (to collect eyeballs - free basic email, free basic backup, free chat, free basic everything really) with graduated prices for additional features for the consumer and corporate market.
Hal put it best, either Bramson executes well or he continues to execute us.
Regards,
Gus
More on lossless and lossy compression....
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