LAS VEGAS -- Five federal policymakers offered their familiar visions of core regulatory issues, including spectrum policy and net neutrality, during CES sessions.

Read More: MCN's Complete Coverage of CES 2018

With FCC chair Ajit Pai absent because of death threats he has recently received, and Democratic commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel opting to skip the program, the sessions were largely status reports on activities at the FCC, NTIA and FTC. The on-stage discussions did not address the commission’s split decision in November on ATSC 3.0 rules.

David Redl, who heads the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, opened the session by reading very quickly through prepared remarks touching on spectrum policy, cybersecurity, international governance and the development of telecom infrastructure, including sharing of bandwidth assigned to federal agencies.

He promised that spectrum policy will be a major focus of NTIA this year, and the agency will work with industry to develop procedures to make better use of the airwaves.

“We must do everything we can this year and beyond to accelerate America’s 5G leadership,” he said. “With 5G set to drive demand for more access to spectrum, we’ve been looking at bands across NTIA’s notorious spectrum chart.” Citing the 37-GHz band, he said NTIA is “optimistic” that “if we can get this right, it will serve as a model on how to handle sharing in other bands.”

Redl also emphasized NTIA’s prioritization of cybersecurity.

After Redl’s speech, Julie Kearney, CTA’s VP-regulatory affairs, sat down for a chat with FCC commissioners Mignon Clyburn, Brendan Carr and Michael O’Rielly.

O’Rielly said he expects a “busy and exciting year” in which the Commission will eliminate rules “that no longer make any sense,” citing Pai’s intent to delete aging regulations.

Carr predicted, “We’ll unleash more innovation and greater investment.” He also said he expects that the policies will lead to broadband expansion.

Clyburn called the Dec. 14 net-neutrality decision and its aftermath a “teachable moment.”

Kearney sought to extract opinion from the commissioners about the need for or likelihood of an update of the Communications Act that steers their decision-making. Analysts acknowledge that Congressional action on such legislation is not currently on the drawing board.

Related: Net-Neutrality Bill Is Longest of Long Shots

O’Rielly said that a new law would mean the FCC wouldn’t have to “parse out meaning” from the 1934 communications legislation and subsequent laws.

Clyburn said she is hopeful that Congress will move in a way to recognize what the FCC, although she added, “We’re not going to get a blueprint of everything that comes before us.”

At an earlier session, Federal Trade Commission chair Maureen Ohlhausen assured the audience that the FTC is ready to play a larger role in enforcing Open Internet regulations that are part of the FCC’s repeal of Title II classification.

“From the advent of the Internet until 2015, the FTC played an active role," she said. “Now that the Open Internet order was put out, eventually the authority is going to come back to the FTC.”

CTA president Gary Shapiro, who interviewed Ohlhausen on stage, said, “No other session in CES history has gotten as much pre-show attention” as the expected Pai participation.

Shapiro characterized CTA’s stance on net neutrality as "very complex in terms of nuance.” He said that he believes Republicans and Democrats agree on “the most fundamental basic principle” that consumers should be able to get whatever they want.

The first uses of 8K displays will get underway in 2018, though the bulk of TV panel manufacturing will be focused on 4K/Ultra HD this year, according to a new forecast from IHS Markit.

The research firm predicts that just 1% of displays in the 60-inch and larger category will support 7680 x 4320 pixel resolution in 2018, and climb to 9% in 2020, and reach 19% by 2024. As a point of comparison, 4K/UHD panels accounted for more than 98% of displays that are 60 inches and larger in 2017, but will dip to 81% by 2024, IHS Markit found in its new Display Long-Term Demand Forecast Tracker.

“As UHD has rapidly replaced full HD in the super large-sized TV display market, panel makers are willing to supply differentiated products with higher resolution and improve profit margin with premium products,” Ricky Park, director at IHS Markit, said in a statement. “Year 2018 will become the first year of the 8K resolution TV display.”

The research notes that Innolux started developing 8K panels in 2017, and produced its first 8K LCD TV display (60Hz, 65-inch) in Q4 2017, which will be supplied to Sharp and to Chinese TV makers in the start. Sharp also mass-produced its first 8K LCD TV display, a 70-inch model, in Q4 2017 to support the Sharp TV brand in China, IHS Markit pointed out, adding that Samsung and Sony also plan to release “flagship” 8K TV models later this year, and will “consume almost all” 120Hz 8K panels from Innolux, AUO and Samsung Display, with sizes ranging from 65 inches to 85 inches.

LG Display also introduced an 88-inch 8K OLED TV display this week at CES in Las Vegas.

The HDMI Forum and the HDMI Licensing Authority are likewise preparing for the 8K era with HDMI 2.1, a new spec for connectors and cables (released on Nov. 28, 2017) that will support resolutions up to 10K, data rates of 48 Gbps, as well as Dynamic HDR and other advanced features.  

RELATED: HDMI 2.1 Targets Resolutions of up to 10K

“This year, you’re actually going to see some commercial products” supporting 8K, Rob Tobias, president of HDMI LA, said at a press event XX at CES that provided an update on HDMI 2.1 efforts. He noted that the move to 8K will be driven in part by video productions being planned for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and the 2022 Winter Games to be hosted in Beijing.

Looking beyond resolution, he said Dynamic HDR, which will enable “ideal values” in areas such as depth, brightness, contrast and wider color gamuts on a scene-by-scene or even a frame-by-frame basis (rather than being applied statically to the entire video asset), “pops the image off the screen.”

Tobias also predicted that Dynamic HDR will emerge as “one of the standout technologies that consumers can really grasp and see,” while HDMI 2.1’s use of variable refresh rate and a low-latency model will deliver a better experience for gamers.

He said the new spec’s support for eARC (enhanced Audio Return Channel), which enables up to 32-channel and object-based audio, will also be key as consumers desire both picture and sound to complete the “home theater experience.”

Cris Pasqualino, chairman of the HDMI Forum, said alter that implementing compliance testing for all elements of HDMI 2.1 is a “top priority.”

Those elements will come way of a staged rollout. “It’s a very deep spec,” he said, adding that some initial components tied to compliance testing should be expected by Q2 2018.

Thanks in part to Google’s Android TV, Roku and platforms from Samsung and LG Electronics, the market for smart TV operating systems is already pretty crowded. Vewd apparently thinks there’s room for at least one more.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

Vewd, formerly known as Opera TV, used this week’s CES to introduce a smart TV OS of its own, and will look to carve out differentiation with a system that doesn’t require individual downloads of apps by instead tapping into a platform that loads from the proverbial cloud. Vewd holds that this approach enables it to surface video faster while still providing a conduit to the wide, wide world of OTT services.

RELATED: Opera TV Rebrands as 'Vewd'

Among other claims, Vewd said its OS for smart TVs also provides a guide that unites VOD, live TV and thousands of apps, and will include support for voice-driven navigation. That will be matched up with a data-driven analytics platform.

Vewd did not announce any partners for the new OS at this week’s show, but promised that it will announce some soon from “leading manufacturers,” noting that TV makers/original equipment manufacturers don’t tend to discuss those details until they have a device that’s ready to ship.

However, Vewd also said that the new OS builds on its Core SDK (software development kit), which it claims has in install base of about 30% of the world’s smart TVs. So, in that sense, perhaps it will have a rolling start.

Las Vegas – Thanks to the emergence of OTT and direct-to-consumer options, the viewing audience continues to fragment and put more and more pressure on the traditional TV world.

Though programmers and pay TV distributors must adjust to compensate for that trend, it doesn’t mean that consumers are watching less video, execs said here Wednesday during a CES keynote panel.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

Consumers are viewing that content in different places and on different platforms, and that is opening up the door to smart data that can help detect those patterns, said Kristin Dolan , the former COO of Cablevision Systems (now part of Altice USA) who is now CEO of 605 LLC, an audience and data analysts company.

“It’s more about platform-shifting than cord-cutting,” she said.

“Fragmentation is like gravity,” added Robert Kyncl, chief business officer of YouTube. "It just is…the internet ushered that into our world,” Kyncl added, noting that part of the answer is to super-aggregate content for the masses.

A&E Networks has also been witness to the impact of the internet on viewing habits. The top ten shows being viewed on its apps and owned and operated platforms aren’t the same as the top 10 shows that are being viewed on the programmer’s linear channels,  Nancy Dubuc, CEO of A&E Networks, explained.

That, she said, creates an “enormous opportunity” to serve different viewers with different tastes and different needs.

For advertisers, Comcast is dealing with this trend in part by re-aggregating audiences that can be established and maximize the value of that content and still take advantage of the scale that TV represents, said Marcien Jenckes, president of advertising at Comcast Cable.

“The reality is that people are watching more video than ever before,” Jenckes said. “They are consuming the same content in different ways,” so Comcast must evolve its products to support that.

Macro, a media brand focused on the voice and perspective of persons of color, stays ahead of the fragmentation curve by being platform-agnostic, company CEO and founder Charles King said.

Dubuc said it’s also important not to stand still and let change run you over.

“We’re not in the business of today,” she said. “We’re always trying to guess -- or second guess -- what might be around the corner.”

Panelists also weighed in on how audience fragmentation is affecting the TV ad model.

That could mean everything from changing the ad format, making the ads more relevant and using more data to execute. “It’s a necessary thing that we’re going to have to react to and adjust to,” Dubuc said.

Distributors and programmers are also answering this with new ad-free options, such as recent ones Comcast has developed and launched with FX Networks and AMC Networks.

RELATED: Comcast Launches FX+

“I think you’ll see more experimentation,” Jenckes said.

 Jenckes also stressed the importance of data and how a new “blockchain” partnership could help multiple parties tap into pools of different data that can help to garner key insights that are important when it comes to targeting ads to the right audience.

RELATED: Blockchain Technology Moving Into Cable, Advertising Sectors

Under that blockchain model, data holders control their own data, and keep it safe, but allow others to gain insights from it.

“It’s early days but think it’s needed for the industry to come together to break down silos on that data in a safe way,” he said.

YouTube, meanwhile, has been innovating with six-second bumper ads, and TrueView, an ad format where the OTT provider doesn’t charge advertisers if an ad is not viewed in its entirety.

 “This year we’ll innovate on that [TrueView] even more,” Kyncl said. “We're trying to innovate in ways so that advertisers can get their messages across to all of these large audiences...but doing it in a way that is not viewed as friction." 

Las Vegas -- As OTT video becomes more prolific and as consumers continue to alter their viewing habits, serving the “superfan” with curated content has become increasingly paramount, Discovery Communications CEO David Zaslav said here Wednesday at a CES keynote discussion.

For Discovery, that strategy will largely continue to focus on non-fiction fare, which emphasizes “enthusiasts and superfan networks,” Zaslav said.

That focus has also been a big driver behind Discovery’s proposed play for Scripps Networks Interactive, which offers a complement of networks and content in non-fiction areas such as food, home and gardening, travel and cooking.

“People not only…fall in love with the show, but they fall in love with the curation,” Zaslav said, noting that the plan is not just to provide deep baskets of long-form content that suits their interests, but also in smaller bites that can be distributed across all platforms.

“We think we can take advantage of that ecosystem by following the superfans and the enthusiasts for cars or science, or food or cooking all around the world and sort of super-feed them,” he added.

Zaslav also stressed the importance of not just owning the content, but also owning the global distribution rights. Discovery owns all of the content on its platforms all across the globe, with the exception of its Eurosport offerings.

“We’re IP [intellectual property] long,” he said. “But we’re also betting that owning the windows for that content globally will give us really unique status.”

Zaslav also talked up the implications of smart digital assistants and voice navigation, noting that those will provide another way for Discovery and others to provide complementary content in niches and genres that they are about, such as a recipe or instructions on how to build a bench.

Voice navigation “will be big in the way people consume content in the years ahead,” he predicted.

Zaslav and fellow panelist, LionTree LLC CEO Aryeh Bourkoff, were also asked to size up the M&A landscape in the TV and media industry.

Bourkoff acknowledged that it’s a “great time to be a creator,” but stressed that the business model for traditional industries don’t always align with changing consumer behavior. “And that is creating a lot of friction,” he said.

Bourkoff said companies with scale can preserve existing models for longer than smaller companies, which will be the ones that will need to seek out a dance partner.

Hulu said it ended 2017 with more than 17 million total subscribers, a number that factors in customers who take its subscription VOD service as well as its newer live TV offering.

That total is up by 5 million subs, or 40%, from the 12 million SVOD-only subs that Hulu reported having in 2016. Hulu announced its latest numbers in tandem with this week’s CES in Las Vegas.

RELATED: Hulu Nears 12M U.S. Subscribers

Hulu also announced that its total audience has surged past 54 million unique viewers, and that its VOD library ended 2017 with more than 75,000 episodes of TV across 1,700 titles.

The OTT video service also announced that ad revenues eclipsed $1 billion for the first time in 2017.

Among other stats, Hulu said the median age of its viewers is 31, with a median annual income of $92,000.

The top three dramas on Hulu in 2017, based on hours watched, were Law & Order: SVU, This is Us, and The Handmaid's Tale, and the top three comedies were South Park, Family Guy and Bob’s Burgers.

Hulu launched its live TV service, which remains in beta form, last May.

Hulu latest results come on the heels of 10 Emmy Awards, and two Golden Globes.

“2017 was a momentous year for Hulu,” Hulu CEO Randy Freer, said in a statement. “We took several major steps to become a 21st century direct-to-consumer media company, evolving into both an aggressive SVOD business and a formidable new live TV provider. The year ahead is going to be even bigger, as the company invests more in content – live, library and original – as well as technology and data to make Hulu the leading pay TV choice for consumers.”

Las Vegas -- Execs from the National Association of Broadcasters, Advanced Television Systems Committee and Consumer Technology Association raised a toast here at CES Tuesday to mark the release of a suite of standards for ATSC 3.0, a next-gen broadcast platform that will support multiscreen video, Ultra HD resolution, interactivity, immersive sound and other advanced features.

RELATED: CES 2018: ATSC 3.0 Standard to Be Delivered

The release, which will pave the way for an internet-based standard for broadcast TV, marked an “an intensive five-year effort,” ATSC president Mark Richer said. “We look ahead to the future with great optimism.”

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

The release of ATSC 3.0 “isn’t the beginning of the end, just the end of the beginning,” he said in a homage to Winston Churchill.

“With ATSC 3.0, we have the opportunity to take broadcasting to the next generation,” Gordon Smith, president of the NAB, added, calling the new standards the “next chapter of broadcast television.”

“In an age of cord-cutting…a wonderful future of the American viewer is a combination of over-the-top and over-the-air,” Smith added.

RELATED: NAB: ATSC 3.0 Will Reinvent Free TV 

 “We’re celebrating a milestone today,” Gary Shapiro, CTA’s CEO said, calling it a “huge effort” for the parties involved to reach consensus on the new standards.

Looking to give MSOs more flexibility on how they buy and deploy access network capacity, Cisco Systems this week launched Infinite Broadband Unlocked (IBU), a licensing program for the cBR-8, a flagship converged cable access platform (CCAP) that supports cable services and the new DOCSIS 3.1 platform.

Cisco said the program aims to improve the economics of delivering multi-gigabit services using emerging distributed access architectures that employ Remote PHY and push key electronics toward the edge of the network.

RELATED: Cable-Tec Expo: Ramping Up for Remote PHY  

Rather than using traditional licensing models for CCAP devices that require MSOs to buy large numbers of new bandwidth licenses for every service group where they want to offer the expanded service, the IBU model has only one license type based on bandwidth consumption, Cisco said.

That gives cable operators the ability to provision all of the capacity of their CCAP platforms without restrictions or upfront licensing expense, the company claimed, noting that the IBU licensing plan is available for current and new Cisco cBR-8 customers worldwide.  

Further, Cisco believes that the approach will promote the provision of multi-gigabit service tiers across MSO footprints without the risk of stranding capital while also simplifying service group splits by eliminating the need to purchase additional license types.

“IBU helps cable operators be more competitive and gain subscriber market share,” Sean Welch, vice president and general manager, Cable Access, Service Provider Business, Cisco, said in a statement. “We have listened carefully to our customers, and with this new offer we have specifically focused on making DOCSIS licensing simple and aligned with their business objectives.”

Starry, the wireless broadband startup, and chipmaker Marvell have teamed on a tech partnership that aims to accelerate the deployment of 5G-based fixed wireless services.

Under the plan, Starry will combine its pre-standard 5G system focused on millimeter wave spectrum and smart antenna tech with Marvell’s 802.11ax chips.

The collaboration, they said, will focus in two areas – a “blueprint”/reference design for Starry’s millimeter wave, point-to-multipoint fixed broadband transceivers (the last mile in Starry’s infrastructure) that integrate Marvell’s 802.11ax chipsets; and a cloud-based internet and WiFi network monitoring platform that will tie into every node of the network and check performance of base stations and receivers as well as in-home WiFi hubs.

Starry and Marvell expect both to become available in mid-2018. Elements of that handiwork will be on display at Marvell’s suite at this week’s CES in Las Vegas.

They hold that the partnership will broaden the technology ecosystem with near-term implications while pivoting away from pre-standard 5G tech that is being developed in “silos.”

It also helps Starry tighten its ties to WiFi, as the companies note that the bulk of the world’s mobile cellular internet traffic is served via WiFi from fixed networks.

The partnership takes hold the week after Starry launched a symmetrical 200 Mbps service in Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C., (initially in beta form), that follow a commercial deployment already underway in Boston. Starry is selling the data cap-free service for $50-per month.

RELATED: Starry Launches 200-Meg Wireless Broadband Service in L.A., Washington, D.C.

They claim that the arrangement will lower the cost of entry into the market.

“When we started Starry, our goal from the beginning was to drive down the cost of deploying broadband, from the cost of equipment to speed of deployment. And we have been successful at achieving both,” Chet Kanojia, Starry’s CEO and co-founder said in a statement. “The barrier to entry in the market today – whether domestic or global – is cost. That’s why you see so few people willing to challenge incumbent monopolies. We saw 5G as an opportunity for a new ecosystem of access technologies and products to emerge – but felt that it could only happen if the barrier to entry was low.”

In an interview last week, Kanojia said that Starry and its high speed/no data cap approach has been particularly appealing to cord-cutters and cord-nevers.

Median consumption of the service is 450 GB per month in the early going, with to top 20% of Starry subscribers consuming between 600 GB to 1.6 terabytes of data per month.

More insight into Starry’s market learnings in the early going will be featured in the Platforms section of the January 15 issues of Multichannel News and Broadcasting & Cable.

Las Vegas – TV maker TCL is using this week’s CES to unveil a new family of “Alto”-branded audio products, led off by a smart soundbar that will be tightly integrated with Roku’s operating system and new Roku Connect initiative.

That product, called the TCL Roku Smart Soundbar, is expected to launch in late 2018. Pricing wasn’t announced, but TCL’s soundbar is the first announced device to emerge from Roku’s Whole Home Entertainment Licensing program.

RELATED: CES 2018: Roku’s Platform Reaches Beyond the TV

TCL’s new soundbar will work with any TV with the proper input, but is optimized for Roku. The Roku Connect capability, for example, will enable the soundbar to connect to other AV devices in that ecosystem and weave in support for voice control through the coming A.I.-powered Roku Entertainment Assistant.

Among examples, the new soundbar will be capable of turning on a TCL Roku TV when asked to launch video content or stream audio even when the TV is turned off, the companies said.

TCL is a “natural fit to be the first partner to plan to build a smart soundbar under our new licensing program,” Roku CEO Anthony Wood said, in a statement.

The TCL soundbar will be compatible with other TVs or smart speakers that enter Roku’s licensing ecosystem.

Roku has not announced other OEM partners that will build products based on its new licensing initiative, but other TV makers that work with Roku include RCA, Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), Hisense, and Funai Electric.

TCL also announced a new line of Roku TVs that will be outfitted with Dolby Vision HDR, Roku Connect and the Roku Entertainment Assistant, including 2018 6-Series models, which will also support 4K video resolution, and screen sizes of 55 inches and 65 inches.

Consumer spending on music and video streaming services, which includes the likes of Netflix, Hulu, Sling TV, Spotify and Pandora, will reach $19.5 billion in revenue in 2018, a 35% jump over 2017, according to a new study from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA).

From a broader point of view, the U.S. consumer tech industry is set to drive a record $351 billion in retail revenues in 2018, up 3.9% from 2017, the CTA found in its annual U.S. Consumer Technology Sales and Forecasts report.  

RELATED: CES 2018: AR a

Excluding the addition of streaming services, total industry revenue will increase by 2.2% in 2018, CTA said, announcing the study to coincide with this week’s CES in Las Vegas.

The org also expects U.S. sales of connected devices to reach 715 million units this year, a 6.6% year-on-year increase.  Here’s how the CTA sees some subcategories in the “emerging technologies” arena breaking down:

Smart Speakers: Sales of voice-controlled smart speakers, including products such as Amazon Echo and Google Home, skyrocketed 279% in 2017, with unit sales expected to hit 43.6 million units and drive $3.8 billion in revenue in 2018.

Smart Home: CTA expects sales in this category, which includes products such as smart thermostats, smart smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, connected cameras, smart locks and doorbells, smart home systems, and smart switches, to reach 40.8 million units in 2018, a 41% increase over 2017, and ring in $4.5 billion in revenues.

Drones: Total drone sales are expected to reach record highs of 3.7 million units in 2018 (up 20%) and earn $1.2 billion in revenue (up 17%). Drones below 250 grams are expected to reach just over 2.2 million units this year, while drones above 250 grams will reach 1.5 million units shipped, CTA said.

In the “maturing technologies” arena, CTA said 4K TVs will make up half of all total digital displays sold in 2018, with unit sales expected to hit 22 million (up 27%) and drive $15.9 billion in revenue (up 14%).  

For the broader TV category, total unit sales of digital displays are projected to reach 44.2 million units, up 2%, and lock in $22.1 billion in revenues, up 2%.

Sales of standalone tablets, meanwhile, are on the decline, due in part to the rise of laptops that double as tablets. Tablet sales are expected to drop 12%, to 45.6 million units, in 2018, with revenues dipping 13%, to $12.5 billion, according to CTA’s forecast.

Las Vegas -- Westinghouse Electronics is broadening its smart TV horizons with a new family of 4K-capable TVs that are powered by Android TV.

The 43-inch model will carry an MSRP of $325, while the higher-end 65-inch version will fetch $799, according to an official here at CES, where Westinghouse was showing off a model at Sunday evening’s CES Unveiled event.

The new Android TVs will support apps from Google play, as well as voice search/navigation and integration for Google Cast and Google Assistant. Westinghouse’s Android TV models will also build in 3 GB of memory, WiFi, three HDMI ports, component/composite connections, and an optical out connection.

The deal expands the number of TV makers that have adopted Android TV. Other examples include Sony and Sharp.

Westinghouse (along with Seiki and Element Electronics) used last year’s CES to announce it would launch a line of “Fire TV Edition” 4K models that use Amazon’s platform.

Westinghouse also makes a more basic smart TV with a small set of apps that uses its “Muse” platform.

An official said it the company is also open to the possibility of developing TVs that run the Roku operating system, but Westinghouse has not announced any plans to do so.

These are the best of times for entertainment content owners and distributors—but they are also very challenging times. There is more content—often great content—than ever before and also vastly more competition due to the rise of streaming services, as well as on-demand options.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

This presents a challenge for content owners and distributors: how to stand out from the crowd and help viewers find what they want.

Awash in all that content—not just professionally produced long-form content, but also highly viral digital-first content—viewers have a hard time wading through it all. In fact, it would take a single viewer more than 5 million years to watch the amount of video that crosses global IP networks each month, according to a recent Cisco Systems report.

That’s why it’s imperative for content owners and distributors to make it easy for viewers to search and discover their content. But to do that, they really need to know precisely what’s in their content. And to do that they need better content metadata.

Content metadata is the descriptive, image-rich programming information, such as title, actors, description, release date, running time, and genre. High-quality metadata is quite valuable because it can improve content discovery for consumers and make it easier for people to connect to the entertainment they find most informative and enjoyable at any given moment.

Discoverability is key

The rapidly evolving media landscape compels content owners and distributors to understand and define their content metadata at a much deeper and granular level than before. That’s because viewers demand quicker and easier ways to engage with content wherever and whenever they want. For distributors, this requires a new approach to creating content metadata and delivering personalized experiences for each and every viewer.

This is where machine learning comes in. Not only does machine learning help companies keep up with the tsunami of content, it can better enrich metadata and enable distributors to get the right entertainment in front of the right viewers at the right time.

Machine learning takes metadata beyond cast, title and descriptions, and enables content to be enhanced with many new data descriptors such as keywords, dynamic popularity ratings, and moods, to name a few.

The beauty of machine learning-powered metadata is that it can help surface the most relevant content in real time at just the right moment. In the old paradigm, viewers would rely solely on the most basic metadata, such as title and cast, to discover content. But with enriched metadata they can now search content by tone or trends or location—or numerous other categorizations that simply were not possible before.

Programming works better in real time

Better metadata can also help both online and traditional content distributors create more accurate and useful scheduling models. In the conventional TV programming model, networks need to know what they’re going to put on the screen weeks in advance. But that’s a limitation in today’s environment, where a programmer has no idea what may be popular two weeks from now.

Take a situation where a major YouTube star like Lilly Singh releases a new video that instantly goes viral. Most distributors can’t get that content up on their platform fast enough, so they miss out on millions of views. But machine learning can dynamically recognize that the video is trending in real-time and identify this to be served up to the distributor’s subscribers and help ensure that a service doesn’t miss out on that huge hit.

Traditional media work flows will also benefit from machine learning via the algorithmic matching of metadata to ever increasing content line-ups, enabling the content to get into distributor systems exponentially faster than what is possible via traditional methods.

Unlocking value for content creators

Content creators also face a set of new challenges, especially in a world where content is experiencing explosive growth. Now that consumers have more choices for content, one big question remains for content creators: How does their content get discovered and enjoyed? 

That content could be their current “traditional” long form content, their back catalog of content, or the new digital-first content they are creating. The challenge is that existing metadata typically only includes title, cast, and synopsis, and oftentimes the quality and accuracy of the content is lacking. The problem is even worse for back catalog content.

The value of machine learning is that it can analyze large amounts of unstructured information and determine the relevant data to map to large amounts of content, thus making that content more discoverable and viewable.

Here’s an example. A typical piece of content from a major studio typically has a limited set of metadata. But what if you could analyze information from all over the Internet to add relevant data to that content? Things like theme, tone, mood, story, trending data, cross category links, entity relationships, etc.

This is no small task. Out of the huge volume of data on the Internet, how do you determine what is relevant to the content at hand?  What’s more, data formats and structures are constantly changing such that you cannot simply write “rules” to identify what is relevant data to your content. 

That’s why machine learning is so vital. It can analyze all this unstructured data to make sense of it and then enrich metadata for the content.  As an analogy, imagine email spam. The nature of spam is continually changing, so the backend system needs to continually learn—and do so at massive scale—so that it can effectively filter out those junk emails.

Not people vs. machine, but people enhanced by machine

Machine learning certainly represents the future of metadata. But that doesn’t mean the need for human editors is going away. As content genres get more specific—such as “dysfunctional-family animated comedies” or “timeless Italian soap operas”—the need for human experts to curate this content also increases.

Think about how companies like Lyft, TaskRabbit and Postmates are able to leverage technology to bring together the workforce it needs at the location and exact time it needs, mapping workers to relevant tasks. The same principle holds true for editors of metadata. If you want your catalog of Spanish horror content to thrive, you’d prefer true aficionados of the genre editing that content, because they can do a much better job than anyone—or anything—else.

Machine learning can help find these experts at a massive scale and can also help edit their work. It has the ability to compare inputs from these editors and determine the consistency and accuracy of the data, resulting in the highest quality and most relevant metadata.  At the same time, expert human editors can fine tune the initial data from machine learning techniques to bring unparalleled quality to the content metadata. You see this dynamic today where companies like Facebook and Google are combining people with machine learning to ensure appropriate content for their respective customers.

As the volume and breadth of content continues to explode, machine learning-powered metadata will enable speed at scale. It can be used to create better, more personalized entertainment experiences for viewers, while driving critical new revenue opportunities for content creators and distributors.

--Roz Ho is senior vice president and general manager, consumer and metadata, TiVo

Sales of headsets and eyewear outfitted for augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) are poised for a record year, according to a new forecast from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA).

The CTA said it expects sales of AR and VR headsets and eyewear to reach a record 4.9 million units in the U.S. in 2018, a more than 25% increase from 2017. Those sales will produce about $1.2 billion in revenues, a 10% increase from 2016, CTA added.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

The organization noted that it expects sales of consumer-focused AR eyewear to “accelerate considerably” within the next five years.

RELATED: Magic Leap Intros ‘Creator’s Edition’ AR Platform

The CTA announced its VR/AR projections ahead of a U.S. Consumer Technology Sales and Forecasts report that will be released at CES, which is set to run Jan. 9-12 in Las Vegas.

RELATED: PlayStation VR’s Installed Base Crosses 2 Million Units

The CTA will also expand the space dedicated to AR and VR at next week’s show, noting that its Augmented Reality Marketplace will grow to a record 10,900 net square feet, making it 10% larger than that at the 2017 gadgetfest. Meanwhile, the show’s Gaming & Virtual Reality Marketplace, will expand to 34,100 net square feet, an 18% year-on-year increase.

The association also noted that its AR/VR Working Group, operating under its Technology & Standards Program, will “soon” wrap up work on technical definitions covering a “broad spectrum” for those industries, including MR, XR, outside-in tracking and Six Degrees of Freedom (6DoF).

Last year, that working group stamped the following definitions:

-Augmented Reality (AR) overlays digitally-created content into the user's real-world environment

-Mixed Reality (MR) is an experience that seamlessly blends the user's real-world environment and digitally-created content, where both environments can coexist and interact with each other

-Virtual Reality (VR) creates a digital environment that replaces the user's real-world environment

RELATED: Apple Snares Mixed Reality Headset Company 

In an effort to help its cable operators make the leap to IPTV, TiVo has introduced a next-gen, app-based platform that will enable TiVo to deliver its interface and overall user experience on a variety of retail streaming devices as well a client that will run on an MSO-managed device that runs Android TV.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

The new, underlying cloud-powered platform, to be demoed at next week’s CES in Las Vegas, is designed to allow TiVo’s cable operator partners to begin their pivot away from QAM-based digital video distribution systems and spark the transition to an IP-based video architecture, with options for VOD, DVR services as well as linear TV.

That migration can be deployed in several different forms, including hybrid QAM/IP approaches as well as IP-only scenarios for all video customers or those tailored to specific market segments, such as broadband-only customers or for services that are delivered on college campuses within the MSO’s traditional service footprint.

TiVo’s next-gen work centers on the backend control plane of the video service and factors in the company’s new UI, search across linear, OTT, VOD and DVR-recorded content, along with upgraded components such as voice search and navigation and a personalized recommendation engine.

For MVPD partners, TiVo will also integrate encoders and other video infrastructure components from third-party suppliers, explained Jim Denney, TiVo’s vice president of product and strategy.

An example of some of that early work is already taking place in Spain with Vodafone, which has combined TiVo’s new platform with network DVR technology from Ericsson, and was the first service provider to deploy TiVo’s new user experience.

RELATED: Ericsson Folds on Fabrix Systems For $95M

In addition to that backend work, TiVo work in the next-gen arena will also focus on streaming clients that will operate as apps on unmanaged retail devices such as the Apple TV box and Amazon Fire TV players. TiVo is also extending its next-gen platform to web browsers and apps for smartphones and tablets.  

TiVo, Denney said, is also developing a client to run on MSO-managed Android TV devices that will auto-boot to the cable operator’s experience when the box is turned on and extend more control to the operator, for those that want that option. This option will also enable cable operators to deliver their pay TV service on a platform that also supports the multitude of OTT apps that are offered on the Google Play store.

In both of those app-based scenarios, TiVo’s new fourth-gen UX (formerly code-named “Hydra”) essentially will be bridged to those retail and MSO-managed devices and support the same “design sensibility” that is delivered by TiVo on its more traditional Linux-based boxes, Denney said, noting that the approach allows TiVo to scale across different clients using a similar baseline code.

This isn’t the first time TiVo has tried to extend a bridge to third-party retail platforms. In 2015, TiVo introduced an app (in beta form) for the Fire TV that enabled users to watch shows and movies recorded to the DVR on the Amazon-made OTT device. AsZatzNotFunny reported Wednesday (January 3), TiVo retired that original Fire TV client app a few weeks ago, presumably to make way for the new app strategy being announced today.

RELATED: TiVo Flips on Fire TV App

TiVo’s fresh apps-based video approach for cable partners may ring familiar, as it shares some important similarities with new products for tier 2/3 MSOs that have been recently introduced by MobiTV and Evolution Digital.

RELATED: MobiTV, NCTC Forge Next-Gen Video Deal

TiVo has yet to announce if any of its current crop of MSO partners have committed to the next-gen platform. In the U.S., possible candidates include existing MVPD partners such as RCN Corp., Mediacom Communications, Armstrong, GCI, Grande Communications, Midco, and Atlantic Broadband, among others. Suddenlink is also a TiVo partner, though Altice USA, which acquired Suddenlink in December 2015, appears to be going in a different direction with its recently launched “Altice One” all-services platform.

RELATED: Altice USA Unveils ‘Altice One’

Cable operators' reduced participation at 2018 CES next week (Jan. 9-12) reflects the changing roles of cable TV in the evolving video distribution business.

The occasionally-collaborative but often combative relationship between cable operators and hardware makers (remember the CableCard negotiations?) faces new challenges in the emerging competitive streaming media ecosystems.

And streaming technology -- including upcoming 5G wireless broadband delivery -- will be pervasive at CES (the event once known as the International Consumer Electronics Show).

(In the spirit of full disclosure: I am a contractor to CTA, managing a couple of on-site CES activities this year.)

Beyond the glut of devices will be extensive chatter (including comments by FCC chair Ajit Pai) about the NextGen ATSC 3.0 TV standard plus other policy discussions about spectrum contention.

Both CableLabs and CTAM, which ran sizable CES show floor tours until a couple years ago, are sending executives there to create podcasts and streaming video coverage to update their members about the sizzle at the technology extravaganza in the Las Vegas desert. But no longer do the groups organize roving bands of cable marketers and technicians to roam the CES exhibit halls.

Television itself -- long a centerpiece of CES -- has become a relatively minor product, although the show's "C Space" content/advertising program reflects the importance of programming to the show's producer, CTA (Consumer Technology Association), which two years ago changed its own middle name from Electronics to Technology. TV sets themselves will continue to be flat and big with higher-and-higher resolution, although the number of set-makers continues to decline.

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Comcast has a sizeable presence in CES's "Smart Home" exhibit area, but gone are the days when the cable behemoth's top executives joyously consummated hardware deals in Vegas. Just 12 years ago, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts and then chief strategist Mark Coblitz beamed happily in Panasonic's CES booth after unveiling a plan to buy 500,000 set-top boxes. (Ultimately only a fraction of that "order" was ever delivered, and most of those sat on warehouse shelves, but it certainly was a solid negotiating tactic.)

As for next week's event, CableLabs CEO Phil McKinney, who will attend the show, expects three major topics to dominate CES: "Artificial Intelligence Everywhere," immersive storytelling (via virtual reality and augmented reality) and connected cars.

"AI and machine learning will be introduced to shift how we consume content," McKinney told me. "Imagine something like a ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ film that changes the narrative based on your viewing experience," he said - echoing decades-old promises of viewer-controlled interactive TV. He also cited AI-enabled security tools.

"You won’t be able to hide from AI at CES this year," he added "Everyone will be saying they have 'AI' or 'machine learning,' but few will be using the true technology. Those will be the ones to watch," McKinney said, although he did not identify which exhibitors may have the real thing.

As for smart and autonomous vehicles, "We’ve seen them at CES for many years now," McKinney said, pointing to his own video assessment of connected cars at CES 2010, when he worked at Hewlett-Packard.

Xogo and DeviceBits -- two of the start-ups involved in CableLabs UpRamp accelerator program -- will participate in the on-site podcast that McKinney will create from CES.

Read More: Complete coverage of #CES2018

The CTAM delegation to CES will primarily consist of Angie Britt, senior VP of advanced products, who will create a real-time CTAM Live! From CES program. Britt and CTAM senior technical consultant (and Multichannel News contributor) Leslie Ellis will select pertinent exhibits and business executives for real-time “snapshot” interviews and tech demos. They'll produce a 10- to 15-minute video interview program from Las Vegas and live tweet/live-post highlights to CTAM’s Facebook page and other social media outlets during the first two days of the show. Significantly, they plan to move beyond the traditional video and Internet territories at the sprawling convention, including the program-centric C Space at the Aria Hotel venue, a couple of miles from the main CES exhibit halls.

ATSC 3.0, Net Neutrality and Regulations From the D.C. Delegation
When Pai joins CTA president Gary Shapiro for a 30-minute on-stage discussion on Tuesday (Jan. 9) at 11:30 a.m., will the discussion focus on the emerging ATSC 3.0 TV standard (of high importance to TV equipment makers) or net neutrality? Pai will likely evangelize on both topics -- plus some other issues, including a possible continuation of his recent rants again social media.

This will not be a platform for new revelations on any topics, but CES gives Pai a bully (and friendly) pulpit from which to explain his stances. The plans by TV makers for NextGen (3.0) television may be of greater interest to some in the audience, although the impact of Pai's "Restoring Internet Freedom" policy also will weigh heavily on many minds. Separately, the Federal Trade Commission's acting chair, Maureen K. Ohlhausen, will take the same stage to explain the agency's role in enforcing the new non-net neutrality policy.

Later on Tuesday more federal policymakers will delve into spectrum, infrastructure, 5G, privacy and the Internet of Things at a roundtable discussion that includes FCC commissioners Brendan Carr, Mignon Clyburn and Michael O'Rielly, the FTC's Terrell McSweeny, and David J. Redl, Assistant Secretary of Commerce and head of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration.

Technologies that are high on the cable industry's agenda will be visible throughout CES. For example, you'll hear a lot about voice controls -- in the first year when Amazon and Google have large booths, largely to show off their smart-home technologies such as Alexa/Echo and Google Home artificial intelligent devices. Meanwhile, Universal Electronics, which has shipped nearly 40 million voice control remote controls this year, largely to U.S. multichannel video program distributors, will unveil its new smart home device, "the Torre Hub." It is a bundled, "low-cost package, aimed at reducing fire and flood insurance claims."

CES, which is likely to match last year's attendance of about 184,000 people, also reflects the technology industry's diversion into everything from health/wellness/fitness products to smart cities. All of those categories offer opportunities for cable communications providers to develop services.

And of course, there are countless chances to be distracted by new uses for old ideas and defunct names. For example, look for the "OjO Commuter Scooter" (pictured) at the Ford booth. Ojo was also the name of a videophone for a face-to-face, web-based video calling system, unveiled in 2004, the last gasp from the legendary Hal Krisbergh's WorldGate Communications. WorldGate had started as an interactive TV provider, but eventually moved on to its Ojo device, which was heavily promoted to the cable industry before WorldGate filed for bankruptcy in 2012.

The Ford-licensed OjO Commuter Scooter, built by Oxnard Electric, is a 65-pound bike-scooter hybrid that the company said complies with the rules and guidelines of the electric bicycle market.

Don't get your OjO mixed up with your Ojo.