Dave, perhaps if we combine residential optical storage by Ioptics with satellite home delivery from Fantastic, we'll have ample local data to allow for capabilities to develop a residential caching systems that would free up the cloud for more "real time" use?
See article below concerning Fantastic Corporation's play here. I like what one of the principals has stated about entertainment channels having their own IP addresses.
"At Fantastic, we don't believe in PC/TV or
TV/PC" convergence, said Ohnemus. "What
we believe is the world will be entertained by
broadband with different IP addresses."
Regards, Frank
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Broadband by Satellite: Fantastic, or Just a Fantasy?
By Bernhard Warner
The Fantastic Corporation, a little-known
Swiss technology outfit, announced a
partnership Thursday with satellite
manufacturer Loral Space & Communications
to introduce an ambitious effort to provide
wireless broadband Internet and multimedia
access to corporations and, eventually, to
homes. Utilizing a global armada of Loral
satellites rather than a spaghetti network of
cable wires, The Fantastic Corporation is
billing its system as the dawn of Internet
access at speeds that are 4,000 to 5,000
times faster than anything At Home, Time
Warner or Microsoft's WebTV currently offer.
According to Peter Ohnemus, Fantastic's
president and chief operating officer, the
first clients will be Reuters and Dow Jones.
Reuters, which also has signed on as a news
provider for the broadband service, will use
Fantastic to develop a broadband news feed
due out next year that will be capable of
disseminating more than 1,000 news stories
a day, each replete with video, Ohnemus
said.
Other clients have yet to be signed up, he
said, adding only that they are in discussions
with a top automotive company and a top
four pharmaceutical firm.
The selling point, according to Fantastic, is
that its technology is hardware- and
network-agnostic – therefore consumers and
businesses can access the broadband feed
with their current computers or cable
set-top boxes once they've installed a
satellite dish. The company will charge
subscribers under $10 per month for each
channel feed. (The licensing fee to equip
major corporations with the broadband
access could be higher.) Eventually, it
intends to offer channels for news,
entertainment and music, each equipped
with a transaction component to buy, say,
the Titanic soundtrack after listening to the
tunes. For businesses, the feed could be
customized to include departmental
schedules and tasks as well as relevant
industrywide news broadcasts.
Backed by a blue-chip roster of companies
including Reuters, Intel and Deutsche
Telekom (the largest potential cable provider
in the world with access to 27 million
European homes), Fantastic ultimately wants
to equip every computer, cable set-top box
and even household appliances like
refrigerators with an Internet Protocol
address. Once that's taken care of, a
customer can order a satellite dish to begin
retrieving the broadband feed, which will be
dense enough to receive text, audio and
video feeds at real-time speeds.
"At Fantastic, we don't believe in PC/TV or
TV/PC" convergence, said Ohnemus. "What
we believe is the world will be entertained by
broadband with different IP addresses."
The company will focus at first on the U.S.
market, then target companies and
consumers across the globe. It will be at
least a year before Fantastic offers the
service to the home user since there are no
common standards at the moment for
set-top boxes. Initially, the company will
target government agencies and
corporations, specifically those in the
financial, automotive,
medical/pharmaceutical and insurance fields,
said Ohnemus.
As with any unproven program, Fantastic is
facing considerably daunting challenges. For
one, the company acknowledges it's made
"no in-roads" to speak of with U.S. cable providers to equip their
customers with satellite-ready set-top boxes. Secondly, the company
needs to secure more funding for a global marketing push. The
marketing dollars, Fantastic states, likely will come from its tentative
plans to go public in both the U.S. and Europe. The company also has
to amass content providers, plus satellite dish and set-top box
manufacturers to attract consumers. And, at costs of up to $10 per
channel designation, a consumer could rack up a significantly higher
bill than what the cable operators charge at around $40 to $50 per
month.
Terms of the multimillion-dollar deal with Loral business unit Loral
Orion, Rockville, Md., were not disclosed. |
