Digital Economy Bill - A Business Implication

Are the UK government ignoring the business cost of the Digital Economy Bill? Attention has been focused on consumers' internet freedom, but has the Bill business implications?

Digital Economy Bill 101:


Many businesses are arguing that it's not only ISPs and mobile network providers that will incur costs from Bill compliance. Estimated costs for ISPs could be up to £500m, the most of this coming from the implementation of technical measures to restrict internet access.

If one person is suspected of downloading illegal content within a household, the entire household can be disconnected. What if another from the household worked for a company that allowed home working? This could be a cost to business productivity.

The Bill is unclear whether businesses will be classed as subscribers or providers. If businesses provide free WiFi in canteens, and an employee illegally downloads copyrighted content, who's liable and responsible? If responsibility falls to the business, does this also mean that universities and hotels will be classed as providers and face disconnection?

Potentially, this could lead to a choking of innovation in the long-term with these types of providers been treated like ISPs and made responsible for traffic on their networks. Ultimately it is sure to create unknown costs to businesses, universities, and other providers like these in the UK's worst recession.

On the flip side. Could there be a potential solution for businesses? Could this Bill also see the generation of a new area of service? The outsourcing of the monitoring of businesses internet activity to a third party company. What cost would these subscriptions be? It could also see businesses partnering with new ISPs that provide monitoring.

This Bill is set out to protect innovation in the music, film and software industries, but will it in fact restrict innovation in UK schools, universities, and business?

A Letter to Peter Mandelson:

Sony 3D TV - Future Sucess or Failure?

Sony seems to be staking a lot on the belief that their 3D value chain will convince consumers to swap their current home entertainment for an additional dimension in viewing.

The Sony 3D Value Chain:

They aren't alone on the 3D bandwagon, with LG, Toshiba and Panasonic due to release sets this year. Last December, Avatar showed consumers that 3D viewing is not just an 80's novelty. The Bravia 3D TV is set for release in June, and will work in the same manner as how Avatar was viewed in cinemas.

To view your newly purchased 3D TV, you will need glasses. With the Bravia you will need battery operated “active shutter” ones. Will people want to sit in darkened rooms every evening to watch 3D Eastenders in the future? When watching 3D TV it will be near impossible to multi-task, so no tweets about the 3D football match from your iPhone or Laptop.

Sony seems to be riding on confidence gained by winning the hi-def format war with Blu-ray. Will consumers be willing to upgrade there newly acquired flat panels and blu-ray players? Those expensive HDMI cables will need upgrading.

There will also be a serious lack of content come release time. This may be argued by the fact that the Bravia will have built in links to Youtube, Net-Flix and Amazon's video-on-demand. A counter argument would be that 3D movies will be 50% larger than a Blu-ray. Your city would need to win Google's Ultra-Fast broadband competition to stream files of that size without frustration. Thankfully, in the short term broadcasting will see ESPN launch a 3D channel this year with Sony working with Discovery and IMAX to release channels in 2011.

Is this a premature format release for consumer consumption? Will Sony have 3D viewing in our homes by year's end?

Sony Video: