Servers to time-shift TV for U.S. troops in Japan
U.S. personnel stationed at Yokota Air Base in Japan are getting a time-shifting server system that will broadcast U.S. television programs at the right time of day--meaning that prime-time shows will be on at the appropriate hour, despite the time difference.
The hardware and software acts as a computerized container, holding a show for nine hours before it's rebroadcast. One is required for each of the 33 channels available on the base.
"The time-shift servers work much like a very large TiVo," Keith Southard, chief executive of San Jose, Calif.-based Allied Telesis Capital, wrote in an e-mail to Stars and Stripes. "They take content in, store it on large hard drives, and then replay the content at the designated time--nine hours later in a continuous stream."
I wonder if there is a way to use a combination of TiVo and Slingbox to get the same effect--though clearly, you couldn't do it on the same scale as you would need to in order to support a large amount of people.
Dave Rosenberg dishes up "Software, Interrupted" with nearly 15 years of technology and marketing experience that spans from Bell Labs to multiple start-up IPOs to open-source enterprise software companies. He is co-founder of MuleSource and currently serves as the general manager of Hardy Way. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can contact Dave via e-mail at softwareinterrupted@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @daveofdoom. 
- by DigitalFrog December 5, 2008 8:02 AM PST
- Why wait 9 hours? Why not just record them and make them available on demand Tivo/PVR style? There has to be people there who also work shifts that would interfere with the new 'prime-time'
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- by sanenazok December 5, 2008 12:01 PM PST
- Because it's being broadcast to TVs using standard transmission. You would need a set top box at each receiver to have on demand.
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