Talking Guide Extends TV Accessibility in US

from the desk of John Carlucci, President and CTO Americas
As part of the CableLabs Summer Conference, I had the opportunity to participate in a panel on TV Accessibility. A highlight was a live demonstration of the Comcast Xfinity Talking Guide.  The attached video shows a demonstration and Tom Wlodkowski, Comcast VP Accessibility talking about the guide.

The FCC rule requiring a talking guide was enacted late in 2013 based on section 205 of the CVAA passed in 2010 .  The rules cover video navigation device functionality in the following areas: Channel/Program Selection; Display Channel/Program Information; Configuration – Setup; Configuration – CC Control; Configuration – CC Options; Configuration – Video Description Control; Display Configuration Info; Playback Functions; and Input Selection. A summary of the specifics can be found here.

STBs: “Reports of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated”

Are set-top boxes (STBs) becoming a thing of the past? According to Light Reading's Mari Silbey, they aren't going anywhere. While the news of Cisco selling its beloved set-top unit to Technicolor is stirring up rumors about the death of the set-top business as a whole, we know that by giving operators a presence in the home, STBs offer several advantages.

Consumers may not need a STB for video streaming anymore, but having a special cable box in the home gives cable operators the opportunity to provide a hub for IoT devices and home security applications. With a surge of interest in IoT and what it means for the smart home, cable boxes could be the long-term solution everyone is looking for.

As technology continues to advance, consumers need something in the home that is capable of keeping up with the times. Operators, and consumers, can fortify existing cable boxes with inexpensive dongles that provide new functionality and enable new services. This method will not only save money, but it will ensure that consumers are getting the latest and greatest technology.

Silbey says it best: "Speed, latency and offline storage: these are all reasons why there's still a business in set-tops, even if it's one that demands greater vendor scale and delivers lower per-box margins."

To read her article in full, click here.

We're headed to the mountains!

Alticast is headed to Keystone, CO next week for the CableLabs Summer Conference on August 3-5. We will have a booth set up demonstrating our AltiPlex Cloud Service Platform featuring Cloud UI (ask us about our Cloud DVR as well), IoT Solutions on RDK, and AltiProtect on multiscreen devices. We will also have on display our award-winning HDMI Media Express. Please stop by our booth to check it out.

Our President and CTO, John Carlucci, will be participating in a panel discussion on Monday, August 3 at 2:45p.m. on Media Accessibility. John will be speaking on new technology improvements that have been, and are being made to help make the media viewing experience more accessible and interactive. These new designs are targeted not only to those suffering from hearing and visual impairments, but also to people suffering from cognitive and aging issues. Tom Wlodkowski,Vice President, Accessibility for Comcast Cable; and Diane Burstein, Vice President & Deputy General Counsel of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association will also be on the panel.  If you are there, please check it out. It's going to be an interesting discussion!

Alticast Sponsors the RDK Training Summit at CableLabs

Alticast partnered with CableLabs and RDK this past week by sponsoring the RDK Training Summit at the CableLabs headquarters in Louisville, CO. This three-day event offered training sessions introducing the RDK architecture, Yocto build system and to provide a deeper insight into the individual RDK components. The event was a mix of lectures, demonstrations and interactive exercises to familiarize the attendees with building, developing, debugging and testing of RDK solutions.

Alticast sponsored by the opening night evening cocktail session. Our RDK Product Manager, Mark Johnson, demo'd our technology using the RDK platform at our table set up during the cocktail hour. He also presented, along with Bum-joon Kim, Integrating RDK with Back-end Subsystems & Application Framework, during the Wednesday afternoon session.

Alticast's Bum-joon Kim and Mark Johnson present "Integrating RDK with Back-End Subsystems & Application Framework."

Our next event will take the team to the CableLabs Summer Conference in Keystone, CO on August 2-4. We will be demonstrating our Cloud Services platform, RDK-IoT, and DRM, Android Application Framework. If you are attending and would like to meet with our team, please email us at jotoole@alticast.com to reserve a time.

Improving content security for 4K and UHD - Industry execs weigh in

In a recent e-brief written by FierceCable, Alticast's SVP of Technology and chief architect, Bill Helms, weighs in on the topic of UHD content security for 4K and UHD. Find out why AES-128 is the industry's baseline for securing this content and why is isn't foolproof. Also, be sure to read how one of our customer's, CJ Heliovision, used our AltiProtect™ UHD to ensure secure delivery of their UHD programming.

To download the e-brief, click here.