What was more significant for PayTV the Apple TV+ or Google Stadia announcement?

There have been 2 big announcements this week that impact the TV industry - 1) Apple announcing their OTT proposition and 2) Google announcing Stadia and I’d like to argue that of the two the most significant for the TV industry is the Google announcement.

If we review what we know about each announcement

Apple TV+

• A PayTV Service reaching Apple and some non-apple devices (FireTV)
• A large potential global audience
• Lots of content - both original and from existing networks
• Aimed primarily at Apple Ecosystem, with some support for 3rd party devices (Amazon Fire, Samsung, LG, Roku)

Google Stadia

• A Gaming service based on cloud servers and low latency streaming
• A Game controller offer low latency response
• Tools to enable games to be ported to the service
• Targeted at any device - runs on Phones and Browsers

These are both big announcements but I’d argue the Apple one is less significant. Apple’s offering is similar to Amazon Prime, Google TV, Netflix and existing PayTV operators. It’s got nothing fundamentally new to offer consumers and is just adding to the range of competitors in that space. Google on the other hand are offering a new experience, high quality gaming on any device without needing to buy consoles or high end PCs. This is a fundamental increase in reach for gaming as an entertainment form.

Aston Crews & Surrounds

This is a collection of photo’s of the view from Aston Crews, Ross-On-Wye, Herefordshire, UK during 2018.

Photography

manifesto for cybersecurity

The recent ransomware attacks have focused lots of minds onto cyber security, however many of the solutions being proposed are little more than sticking plasters to the larger underlying issue - namely systems are not secure by default. The ’trend’ in software has been to launch it, then fix it. This is a very attractive proposition for business, as it lets them discover the ideas that work and don’t work, and then iteratively improve them. Most of the gadgets we use in our lives today would not exist without this mentality. However the dark side of this approach is almost all software is not secure, the evidence is pretty much every system deployed has security flaws, the only question is who finds them first - bad people or good people.

WannaCrypt was it good for the security industry?

This weekend we saw ’the biggest cyber attack ever’ and a few people (who don’t work in IT) have asked me - will it be good for you (as I work for Irdeto - a Digital Platform Security company). It’s an interesting question to consider - these big attacks make a lot of noise, so you’d expect on Monday morning the business of cyber security will get easier! However I think the reality is a bit more nuanced.

wanntcryptor 2.0 ransomware and negligence

Yesterday the news rapidly filled up with reports on a ‘massive cyberattack’, as I’m in the UK the press coverage was focused on the NHS and initially was full of comments about ‘smart’ hackers. This reporting is, in my opinion, giving these organizations an excuse for their negligence. The reporting often implies the attack is some kind of ‘act of god’ that they could not avoid, in this case it was trivial to avoid it, simply don’t connect out of date systems to the internet.

Are you feeling lucky?

How lucky do you feel today? It’s an important question as your IT security is probably mostly down to luck.

If we examine most ‘hacks’ we usually see the organisation hit issuing statements about ‘sophisticated hackers’ and the public image of hackers, as lone genius’s wearing hoodies in darkend rooms is re-enforced. In fact most attacks are perpetrated by far less skilled people and succeed by luck. That’s not to say there aren’t some super skilled experts out there, but they are few and far between.

CV