Verizon is opening its Widget Bazaar up to third-party developers to create a richer application store for its Fios TV service.
(Credit: Verizon Communications)Verizon Communications is about to open up its new Widget Bazaar to third-party developers to create an "app store" for its Fios TV service in a move that could forever change how people watch TV.
Verizon first announced the Widget Bazaar just a couple of weeks ago. Initially, the company described it as a storefront for new widgets or applications developed by Verizon partners for its Fios TV customers. At the time, Verizon executives downplayed the possibility of a sprawling Widget Bazaar teeming with thousands of applications developed by third parties.
Twitter widget for Fios TV.
(Credit: Verizon Communications)But now Verizon is making it clear that the company has much bigger ambitions for the Fios TV app store, which includes opening its APIs and software development kit to third-party software developers. It also plans to create a process for approving those applications. And like the VCast app store, which was announced last week for new wireless applications, Verizon plans to allow developers to charge for their applications, and it will provide hooks into the company's billing systems so that developers can charge for their applications.
"From the beginning we said we wanted Fios to be a platform for innovation," Verizon CIO Shaygan Kheradpir said. "So we are not limiting innovation to any particular circle of developers. But we are taking things one step at a time. And we will start with applications from our partners, and then we'll move toward opening it up to third-party developers."
Details of how applications will be approved haven't been revealed, but it's likely the business arrangement for the Widget Bazaar will be similar to that of the newly announced VCast app store, which means that developers will likely keep 70 percent of revenue from their applications, while giving 30 percent to Verizon. This is the same ratio Apple uses in divvying up revenue for its popular iTunes App Store.
Kheradpir said Verizon will provide more details in the fourth quarter when it makes the Widget Bazaar developer SDK available.
Enhancing TV viewing
The first two applications created for the new Widget Bazaar were for the social-networking applications, Twitter and Facebook. Kheradpir wouldn't share usage numbers, but he said he has been surprised by the quick uptake in usage over the past couple of weeks. And already the company is evolving the applications based on subscriber feedback. For example, when the widgets launched, Fios TV subscribers were only able to read and access only basic information through the Twitter and Facebook services. But as of this past weekend, users are now able to post updates both on Twitter and Facebook.
Even as the company adds more functionality to the existing Widget services, Kheradpir said the company is being careful not to re-create the Web experience on the TV. This is a lesson that Verizon and others marching down the IPTV path have learned from Microsoft's early WebTV efforts in the late 1990s.
WebTV, which came with a keyboard, allowed people to surf the Net on their TVs. But Kheradpir argued that "surfing" isn't exactly what people want to do when they're sitting in front of their TVs.
"People don't necessarily want a full browser on their TV," he explained. "TV viewing is still very much a sitting back experience. And what people really want is a service that is relevant to the TV viewing experience and also provides a simple interface with one click access."
Kheradpir said that Verizon is not trying to completely change the act of watching TV, but instead the company is looking to enhance the TV viewing experience. He thinks that Verizon can do this by providing interactive applications that are contextually relevant to users and the media they are consuming.
This means allowing Twitter subscribes to view in real time Tweets about the TV shows or live events they're watching. The way it works is that the screen is split into two sections. And on one side a small window plays the video, while on the other side of the screen, the tweets fill up the screen.
On a personal note, Kheradpir said he found that linking Twitter to his Fios TV service actually improved his experience of watching the Academy Awards. The new Fios TV Twitter widget was being beta tested when the live awards ceremony aired in February.
"Awards shows like the Oscars can be really boring," he said. "But when I could watch it with the live Twitter feed, it was really funny. When Danny Boyle (director of the award winning movie "Slumdog Millionaire") took the stage, everyone started Tweeting, "Why is Rudy Guiliani up there?' I hadn't thought about it, but then I realized he does look a lot like Guiliani. It was really funny."
Kheradpir, who says he now relies on Twitter for breaking news updates, also said that Twitter on Fios allows people to be engaged in the discussion right from their couch. Instead of viewers being talked at by newscasters and others on TV, they can now contribute to the dialogue and discussion. And if their views are insightful, the Twitter community rewards them by re-tweeting their comments.
It shouldn't come as a big surprise that people would want to be more engaged while watching TV. Over the past decade since the Microsoft WebTV experiment came and went, the Internet itself has turned into a much more interactive medium. News stories posted on the Web encourage reader feedback with "Talk Back" sections. People have created their own blogs to share their views. User-generated video sites like YouTube have exploded. And now social-networking platforms like Facebook and Twitter allow people to easily link to other items on the Web and share their views on various topics.
And as people become increasingly more mobile, these tools have moved to cell phones, allowing people to remain engaged and interact with one another on the go.
But Kheradpir also believes that creating new applications for the TV is also about leveraging the big, expensive flat-screen HDTVs that people have in their living rooms. And he believes that for many people, sharing their digital content on the biggest screen they own makes sense.
"I've been shocked at the number of Fios TV subscribers who are streaming pictures from their Facebook pages onto their TVs in the past two weeks," he said. "But it's obvious when you think about why people want to look at pictures from Facebook on the living room screen. It is the biggest and best screen in the house."
Kheradpir added that these screens are the most underutilized technology in the home today. And he is probably right. With many digital cameras offering picture quality of 10 megapixels or more, it makes sense to view those photos on the largest screen possible.
For more than a year, Verizon has been offering Fios TV subscribers the ability to access their digital pictures and music stored on home PCs on TVs anywhere in the house. But now the company is allowing subscribers to also view their home videos on TVs throughout the home. And they will soon be able to attach any device with an SD memory card, like a digital camera or a cell phone, to also view and share pictures, video, and music throughout the home.
Verizon will offer an online simulator to allow developers to test their Widget Bazaar applications.
(Credit: Verizon Communications)Using these basic capabilities in the Fios TV platform, Kheradpir said he envisions developers creating all kinds of new applications. For example, he said a new application could be created that allows people to stream Internet radio while syncing a picture slide show from a laptop or BlackBerry phone.
Kheradpir said the opportunity for developers to create new applications that take advantage of these capabilities is huge. As of the end of the second quarter of 2009, Verizon reported it had more than 2.5 million Verizon Fios TV subscribers. And because most people have multiple TVs in their home, this translates to about 8 million TV screens that developers can access through their applications, he said.
While he couldn't provide too many details since the SDK won't be available until later this year, he did say that Verizon has already created a Web site, code.verizon.com, where developers can go to share ideas and offer suggestions. It will be through this Web site that the SDK will be released, and it will also be the place where developers can submit their applications for approval on the Widget Bazaar.
He also said that the company plans to offer an online simulator to allow developers unable to access the Fios service because they're not located in Verizon's Fios territory to test their applications.
While Verizon's cable competitors are also leveraging their IP networks to offer new services to their subscribers, so far, no one else has opened its network to third party software developers. Still, Verizon is by no means the only company dabbling in widgets for the TV.
The most well-known competitor in this areas is Yahoo with its TV Widgets platform. Yahoo has partnered with HDTV and Blu-ray player manufactures to get its widget technology embedded in the hardware. Some of the manufacturers it's working with include LG, Samsung, Sony and Vizio. Using these TVs or Blu-ray players, users can get access to content from Netflix, Twitter, and Flickr through the Yahoo TV Widgets.
But Kheradpir doesn't seem worried about Yahoo or others who embed technology into consumer electronics products. He said that Verizon's value is in offering its subscribers a total solution.
"Our job is to make it as easy as possible for consumers to consume the applications or services they want to use," he said. "We make it simple."
NEW YORK--As Verizon Communications looks for ways to differentiate itself from its cable and satellite TV competitors, the phone company is adding new social-networking widgets as part of a broader plan to create a Widget Bazaar for its Fios TV service.
The Widget Bazaar is essentially a scaled down version of the increasingly popular wireless application stores that are hitting the market these days. Unlike the virtual application stores being developed for wireless handsets, Verizon's Widget Bazaar will not be open to a wide range of developers, and the company will retain complete control over what applications are in the Bazaar.
Instead Verizon will provide its software development kit only to a select group of developers, and the applications will be tested and verified for use. So instead of thousands of apps available for download, Fios TV customers will likely eventually see hundreds of lighter-weight widget apps, said Shawn Strickland, vice president of video solutions for Verizon Communications.
The idea behind the Widget Bazaar is to give TV viewers more ways to engage with the TV content they view. And it will offer advertisers, marketers and content owners another way to connect with viewers.
"We are not trying to re-create the PC experience on the TV," Strickland said during a demonstration of the new features at Verizon's headquarters in Manhattan. "We're trying to enhance the TV viewing experience."
Verizon has already been offering some widgets as part of its Fios TV service. The company first launched these one-click Internet-based applications to provide news headlines and weather to its TV viewers. Then it added widgets to allow viewers to see what other people in their vicinity are viewing and to help them discover popular TV shows.
Now the company is adding widgets for the popular social-networking Web sites Twitter and Facebook. At least initially, each of these applications will only allow users to read and access information. Posting new information will be very limited in the first version of the widgets, Strickland said. This means that users will be able to read updates on Twitter and Facebook, but they won't be able to update their accounts from their TVs.
In its first version the Twitter widget will offer a more generic Twitter experience. Subscribers won't be able to access their individual Twitter accounts. Instead they will be able to see tweets from the entire Twitter community based on either a category or topic they've selected or based upon what they're currently watching on TV. The way it works is that the screen is split into two sections. And on one side a small window plays the video, while on the other side of the screen, the tweets fill up the screen.
Verizon executives demonstrate the Fios TV Twitter Widget.
(Credit: Marguerite Reardon/CNET )The Twitter feed could come in handy while watching a live event, like a baseball game or the presidential inauguration, Strickland said. For example, if a Fios TV subscriber is watching the Yankees baseball game, he can continue watching the game while also following a Twitter feed about the game or the team.
Because the Twitter feed comes from the entire Twitter community, it's not necessary for viewers to even have their own Twitter account. Eventually, Fios TV subscribers will be able to access their own Twitter accounts to tailor the tweets they view from the Fios TV service.
The Facebook widget works in a similar way. Fios TV viewers can continue watching a TV show while accessing their Facebook account on the other half of the screen. When in the Facebook application, Fios TV subscribers can view status updates, photos, and other posted items from their friends or from their own page. Since the application allows pictures to be blown up on a big screen TV, Strickland believes that sharing pictures with friends and family from Facebook will become one of the primary uses of the Facebook Widget.
Verizon demonstrates its Fios TV Facebook Widget.
(Credit: Marguerite Reardon/CNET )Unlike the Twitter Widget, which doesn't allow any updates or posts from the TV, the Facebook widget allows users to update their status based on what they are watching on TV. But other updates aren't possible in this first version of the software.
Strickland emphasized again that Verizon is not trying to replicate the Facebook experience from the Web on the TV. But he said that other features and functions will be added down the road. For example, in its first release, the Facebook Widget only allows one user account to be accessed per set-top box. In a few weeks, the application will allow multiple Facebook members to view their profiles and their friends' profiles from a single set-top box.
"We are not trying to re-create Facebook or Twitter for the TV," he said. "Viewers don't want to take time out from their TV. But we are trying to bring these social-networking applications to the mass market in a way that enhances their TV experience."
These two new widgets are just the beginning of what Verizon plans to do with the Widget Bazaar and the Fios TV service in general. The company also plans to add online video viewing to the Fios TV service. Later this month, Fios TV subscribers will be able to search for and view videos from sites such as DailyMotion.com, Veho, and BlipTV. These videos are mostly user-generated or are from independent sources. While Verizon has plans to strike more deals with other online video providers, Strickland said it's unlikely the company will add access to produced content from sites like Hulu.com or from Netflix's video-on-demand service.
Most of the new widgets that will be released will be automatically pushed to subscribers' set-top boxes. And they will come at no extra charge to customers. But some widgets, mostly games, will cost additional money. Verizon already offers some casual games for free as part of the Fios TV service, and they have been a huge success with many subscribers playing the game for an average of 45 minutes each.
One of the main reasons why applications such Facebook and Twitter will initially be consumption-based is because Verizon still hasn't come up with a really good way to provide textual input into the TV experience. Strickland said the company is considering a variety of options for allowing people to input information and interact with the service. One possibility is using smartphones.
"A lot of people are already using smartphones with our wireless service," he said. "The device has been paid for and subsidized already, so it makes sense to use it for other things. I think this adds more functionality at a lower cost than developing an advanced remote control. "
Strickland said that Fios TV customers should expect to see new widgets coming online all the time. The company has greatly reduced the amount of time it takes to develop and roll out the new applications. And it's preparing to introduce a whole slew of new ones in the future. Some widgets to expect in the future include more games as well as widgets developed by programmers and ones to help enhance other online experiences. For example, MTV may want to create a widget to highlight the top song or music video of the day. And Verizon could also offer an online music video widget to stream services like Pandora to the TV.
Verizon's latest enhancements and the emergence of its Widget Bazaar come as the company turns up the heat on its cable TV and satellite TV competitors. While cable has made some technical strides lately to increase bandwidth and functionality, Verizon increasingly is adding more Internet-focused functionality to its service. Strickland believes this is the advantage that the company's all-fiber network has over its competitors. Because it has near limitless bandwidth, it has the capacity to offer advanced interactive services.
Verizon will begin rolling out the new Facebook and Twitter widgets on Wednesday morning in markets in six states including New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Texas. The rest of the Verizon Fios TV markets will get the update starting Thursday. Subscribers will not need to do anything. The updates will come automatically to their set-top boxes.
As more entertainment content makes it way online, Comcast is looking for new ways to remain relevant to its subscribers.
Specifically, the cable giant is launching a bunch of new initiatives to bring more interactive content to its services and keep its subscribers hooked on cable. First on the list is the company's proposed free online video-on-demand service. The service, which will be offered as part of Comcast's Fancast video site, has been discussed publicly for the past couple of months. But the company has kept the details, such as when it will launch and what content will be offered, under wraps.
What is known is that Comcast expects to offer the service free of charge to its existing cable TV customers. In a recent interview with PC World, Karin Gilford, the Comcast Interactive executive in charge of the cable provider's Fancast video site, said with a user name and password, subscribers will be able to access any standard or premium cable content that their cable subscription entitles them to watch.
The service will let users watch TV on their laptops or computers, and eventually it might even be available on cell phones. What will make the service different from other online video sites, such as Hulu.com or TV.com (which is owned by CBS, publisher of CNET News), is that it will feature premium cable content from sources like HBO, ESPN, and CNN. This content has largely been off-limits to free online video aggregators.
But because Fancast online video-on-demand viewers must subscribe to cable TV, the new service won't act as cable replacement. In other words, it's simply an extension of Comcast's existing cable service. This is an important element of the service, because it ensures that Comcast doesn't cannibalize its own lucrative paid TV business.
Apps, to boot
In addition to online video, Comcast is also dipping its toe into online application waters. The company announced earlier this week that it is working with Adobe Systems to embed its Flash technology on set-top boxes used by its TV subscribers. Sree Kotay, senior vice president and chief software architect at Comcast, recently told the Web site Contentinople that the company plans to enable widgets and other Flash-based applications on its set-top box.
Kotay said he sees Flash as a software platform that could allow the company to quickly add new applications to the set-top box. And he said that these applications could be built by Comcast or they could also be built by third party developers. The company was showing off the new set-top box at the National Association of Broadcasters conference in Las Vegas this week.
Kotay hinted at potentially creating an application storefront akin to Apple's iPhone App Store. He said that the App Store was a good example of how companies can maintain control over applications to ensure quality and also easily distribute them to consumers.
But he stopped short of indicating whether Comcast would provide a monetization mechanism through its own customer relationship. This would be easy enough to do, considering that Comcast has a direct billing relationship with consumers and could easily provide one-click purchasing. But Kotay said it was still too early to discuss business models.
For now, Comcast is still in the exploratory phases of how it can keep pace with the online world. It will be interesting to see if subscribers use the Fancast video on demand site and what kinds of applications and widgets will be developed for the TV.
Yahoo TV Widgets are now available on Samsung TVs.
(Credit: Yahoo)Yahoo technology to bring Internet services to TVs has fledged from the demonstration realm to become available in an actual product, Samsung TVs.
Yahoo calls the technology TV Widgets, but Samsung is branding it as Internet@TV. It provides access to a handful of Yahoo services--news, stock quotes, Flickr photos, weather--as well as the Twitter microblogging service, sports scores, eBay shopping, and CBS content. (CBS is owner of CBS Interactive, which publishes CNET News.)
People tap into the services through applications called TV widgets that can be overlaid across the bottom or left of the screen; there's also a gallery that lets people download new widgets. A remote control is used to operate the service.
... Read more
Yahoo's Widget Channel software for TVs and video devices shows a link to Yahoo's Flickr photo-sharing site, stock prices, and an advertisement. Intel, Yahoo, and several partners will show the technology off at CES 2009.
(Credit: Yahoo)Yahoo and Intel built their success upon widespread use of personal computers, but the two companies hope products to be shown at the Consumer Electronics Show in January will ...
Read the full post at CNET's CES 2009 blog.
Yahoo's Widget Channel software lets TVs run network-enabled applications such as this one for Yahoo's Flickr photo-sharing service.
(Credit: Yahoo)Yahoo on Wednesday announced an effort to provide the software underpinnings of network-enabled TV, a move that could transform not only what it means to watch TV but also what it means to advertise on it.
Though the TV experience has been spiced up by voting for American Idol contestants, it generally has retained its famously passive character. Yahoo wants to change this by bringing a version of its Yahoo Widget Engine, a software foundation that can run small applications called widgets, to network-enabled TVs.
This new version, called the Widget Channel, will resemble the version that's available for PCs, but will come with a different user interface to let programmers build widgets that can be controlled from a distance with a remote control, said Patrick Barry, Yahoo's vice president of connected TV at Yahoo.
Yahoo's hope is the move will bring its clout on the Internet to a new domain.
"Our goal is to aggregate a very large, multimillion-person audience across a number of devices with our standard platforms so we can start to address the audience in a unified consistent way, and ultimately create a liquid advertising market," Barry said.
Yahoo is working on partnerships with TV makers to have the software built in and integrated with TV functions. "I'm quite sure there are going to be products on this," Barry said. "I expect to see some things next year."
A first example of the technology emerged at the Intel Developer Forum on Wednesday during a speech by Eric Kim, general manager of Intel's Digital Home Group. A demonstration of the technology showed widgets for monitoring eBay auctions, using the Twitter microblogging service, and viewing Flickr photographs.
Natural allies
Intel and Yahoo are natural allies in the technology effort. Both companies are powerful in their current markets, but as much in the giant consumer electronics market. Intel wants to sell processors--in this case the newly named Media Processor CE 3100 that had been code-named Canmore, and Yahoo wants to expand the reach of its content and ads.
ZDNet video: Intel, Yahoo team up on interactive TV platform
But history shows the effort won't be easy; the consumer electronics industry has withstood years of attempted incursions by computing companies employing various "convergence" strategies.
One of Intel's chief advantages is that so much existing software and programming tools already are compatible with the widely available x86 processor family used in all of today's PCs. "We see the PC architecture coming to consumer electronics over the next few years and that driving a ton of value," Barry said.
Though the Intel-Yahoo demonstration used a system based on Intel's processors, the Yahoo technology will run on other hardware, Barry said. And because it uses platform-independent standards such as HTML and Flash, programmers won't have to worry about having to adapt their widgets for the underlying hardware, he added.
The software can work in different modes, including a sidebar that overlays part of the TV image and a full-screen mode that takes over completely.
A new ad market
Naturally, Yahoo is eyeing the ad business that it expects will come with the Widget Channel, though it won't be the sole conduit for advertisers.
Yahoo believes the Widget Channel will come with the best features of both TV and Web advertising, Barry said.
"We're not getting into this game for our health," he said, pointing out that television ad spending is still five times that of online spending. "Yahoo will provide advertising services to this platform, but we're not going to be the only ones. And we're not going to be a gatekeeper or tollkeeper," Barry said.
Users will be able to select TV widgets from a gallery, but the Widget Channel software will be built into the TV, Barry said.
Among those developing TV widgets are Blockbuster, CBS Interactive, CinemaNow, Cinequest, Disney-ABC Television Group, eBay, GE, Group M, Joost, MTV, Samsung Electronics, Schematic, Showtime, Toshiba, and Twitter, Yahoo said. (CNET is a division of CBS Interactive.)
Update 12:35 p.m. PDT: I corrected a reference to AOL's parent company.
AOL said Wednesday it's integrating interactive "widget" ads with Platform-A, the Time Warner subsidiary's advertising network.
An example of a widget ad from Advertising.com.
(Credit: Advertising.com)Widgets are small Web-based applications, and widget ads offer more interactive possibilities than conventional ads. AOL acquired Goowy in February to advance its widget push, and the Goowy technology for creating and managing widgets is now integrated with Platform-A.
Widgets already could be distributed on AOL's Bebo and on Facebook through Advertising.com service, which is part of Platform-A, but Platform-A has a much broader reach. According to June statistics from ComScore, Platform-A is the top-ranked ad network, reaching 90 percent of the nearly 190 million Americans who are online. (The Yahoo Network was second, at 83 percent, followed by the Google Ad Network at 81 percent, and Specific Media at 78 percent.)
AOL said distributing widget ads through Platform-A won't cost extra.
"Widget-based advertising is gaining momentum in the industry, and Platform-A's network approach allows our customers to build brands, encourage interaction, and drive site traffic--all at scale," said Lynda Clarizio, president of Platform-A, in a statement.
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