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Technology Stocks : WavePhore (WAVO)- VBI fed WaveTop for WebTV -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skip who wrote (1114)	4/3/1998 12:24:00 PM
From: David Gardiner	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 2843

Boston Globe WaveTop story The Boston Globe, April 2, 1998 Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company The Boston Globe April 2, 1998, Thursday, City Edition SECTION: ECONOMY; Pg. C1 LENGTH: 694 words HEADLINE: 'Net is lurking in your TV; UPGRADE / Hiawatha Bray BYLINE: By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff BODY: There's no escape from the Internet, not even on public television. Lurking within those nature documentaries is a torrent of news and information from the World Wide Web, courtesy of Phoenix-based WavePhore Inc. and its new WaveTop broadcast Internet service. WaveTop has camped out in the empty spaces between television images. A fresh image is drawn on the screen 30 times every second. Between each redrawing, there's a wee bit of dead air called the vertical blanking interval, or VBI. Since these snippets of time aren't used for anything else, broadcasters can fill them up with all manner of digital data. At WaveTop, they had the bright idea of transmitting Web pages inside the VBI. The company cut a deal with the Public Broadcasting Service to smuggle its VBI data into millions of homes, innocently disguised as episodes of "Barney." Like TV, the service will be advertiser-supported, with little banners appearing on your computer screen. The WaveTop software (for Windows 95 only) will be available for free next week at wavetop.net. It'll also be built into Microsoft Corp.'s forthcoming Windows 98. Earlier this week, I gave WaveTop a try. First I had to turn my PC into a TV set. That's easily done. WaveTop lent me one of those tuner cards that plugs into a computer's motherboard. My colleague Doug Bailey has been using one on his Apple Macintosh machine for years. I now see why. I can scan the Web in one window while watching C-Span in another. TV tuner cards can be had for less than $ 100, and I think I'll buy one. So much for the easy part. The WaveTop software has some cockamamie feature that scans every channel on the dial in search of a VBI signal. Why bother? Channel 2, WGBH-TV, is the only game in town. I learned a clunky way to bypass the scan and punch in the channel I wanted. The WaveTop folks say they'll add an easier way to set the channel. Anyway, I get dialed in, and what happens? At first, nothing. The WaveTop system is finicky about signal quality. And as fate would have it, reception on WGBH was lousy. The station's people blamed MediaOne, the cable company that serves my Quincy abode. A cable company engineer said everything was groovy on his end and suggested a house call from a technician, but who's got the time? On my regular TV, the WGBH signal was full of soft, wavy lines - annoying but tolerable. However, that was quite enough distortion to bollix up WaveTop's data transmissions. But then, miraculously, the darn thing worked. A WaveTop engineer told me their system uses an error-correction program that can decipher even very corrupt signals. That's exactly what happened. The WaveTop browser on my computer screen began filling up with the latest baseball scores, news of Bella Abzug's death, even sharp color photos from the pages of USA Today. Eureka! So what have we learned? WaveTop works - but only if you're in range of WGBH or about 260 other PBS stations scattered across the United States. And you'd better have a good, clear signal if you expect it to work well. On the other hand, you don't need cable. WaveTop works even with your old rabbit-ears antenna, if the signal's strong enough. Another drawback: If you miss a WaveTop VBI broadcast, you're out of luck. WaveTop pumps out its data at regular times. Be there or be square. This is very different from the Internet, where you can get the data you want when you want it. Besides, WaveTop is a one-way system. To send data from your computer, you'll need a separate Internet account. So WaveTop is no replacement for the Internet, but perhaps a valuable supplement. The broadcasts include the latest news from USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and CBS Sportsline. Imagine getting all that for free, without having to log on. WaveTop may be the most sensible contribution yet to the moribund market for "push" technologies, which automatically pump Internet data into people's computers. Push was on everyone's lips last year, till somebody noticed it wasn't worth the trouble. By making push almost as easy as watching "Seinfeld," WaveTop may be the company that finally gets it right.