Quantel acquires Snell

In a not so surprising move, Quantel did announced the acquisition of Snell today. In a news release, the company is of course very upbeat about it qualifying it of a “new force in media technology”. Well, I am not sure I’ll be that quick to say that. Is combining two companies that have a…

Twitter and the myth of the “second screen”

With it’s expected IPO coming this week, Twitter has put back the concept of the “second screen” on everyone’s radar it seem. I have heard more discussion about it in the last couple of weeks than in the past year, I think. Thrust marketers to create buzzword and try to make money out of everything….

The end of the road for “Broadcast Engineering”

I had a little bit of nostalgia today when I learned the the magazine “Broadcast Engineering” was publishing its last issue this week. I remember reading it regularly in the 80s when I was beginning my carrer in television engineering. It was one of my favorite “trade magazine” at the time. I didn’t know really…

WWW: A look back at the Web in relation to TV and Social Media

My first look at the “Web” was in early 1992. At the time, the Internet was just beginning to open-up to non-research organization and we had a modem phone connection to a non-profit ISP. A colleague of mine had found and downloaded a copy of the “WorldWideWeb” software from CERN’s Tim Berners-Lee that was available…

New Mac Pro: The independent professional, not the enterprise

Apple did present a “sneak preview” of their upcoming Mac Pro last week at WWDC in San Francisco. As it is the case for most Apple product it created a lot of reaction. I did wait a bit before commenting to try to put in perspective what is the meaning behind it. On one side,…

So… I am overqualified!

I have been working on a project for an LA startup for the last three years. On the technical side (my responsibility), I was able to deliver more than what I thought possible to date, so everything looked good. The problem? Well, it was linked with 3D for the home and that market has not…

3D at home: The mirage

With ESPN announcing it’s plan to shut down it’s 3D channel at the end of the year, it becomes clearer that 3D at home will be a missed opportunity. Without a serious sports channel, it is not possible to built a “3D tier” at the distributors’ level and without that there will be no money…

NAB 2013: And the magic wand this year is… 4K! (and 3DTV was a fraud)

The National Association of Broadcasters convention has a conference program for sure but first and foremost it is the industry largest trade shows. When you are taking about trade shows you are taking first about sales. In an industry whose budget is shrinking everyone is searching for some magic to restore their organizations to their…

NAB 2013: The paradox of the larger but cheaper market

Each year at NAB I make sure that I walk the entire show floor to make sure that I see if there an hidden gem somewhere, especially in the new and small organizations. I have been doing that basically since 1987 when the NAB was held in Dallas. I certainly have the impression that there…

NAB 2013 Begins and the press event of Harris Broadcast shocked me

For me the National Association of Broadcasters convention has been an almost yearly tradition since 1987. The Las Vegas based (since 1991) event has up to 120k media professional converging here. It’s a good place to meet people you haven’t seen in a while, sometimes I see people here only once a year, despite the…