Andreas Haugstrup Pedersen | solitude.dk

Those of us who showed up for VlogEurope a couple of days early had the chance to visit the TVBlob offices in downtown Milan to get a demonstration of the system and a discussion about the possibilities. All helped by the fact that Deirdré works at TVBlob and she didn't mind taking time of of her workday to entertain a group of videobloggers!

I've heard Deirdré mention TVBlob a handful of times, but the concept was a bit hard to grok for me without having seen the box. Thankfully they now have a demonstration video on the TVBlob website. Click the video link below the silly stock photo on the front page. The TVBlob box is like a regular set-top box… only it's two-way. So not only do you get to recieve digital signals, you can also send broadcast quality video to anyone else who has a box. It's like Triple Play that's actually interesting (do we call it Quadruple Play or Quintuple Play?).

What I like about TVBlob are the possibilities for one-to-one communication. Most of the videoblogs I watch I multitask around so I search for information around the video while I watch and that behaviour would be really hard to accomplish with a tv remote. Those are tasks the computer are really well suited for. I imagine that there is a large audience who “just want to watch” that would find comfort in a TVBlob setup. Thankfully we can move digital content around without effort so both groups can be accomodated without extra work.

But back to one-to-one. You can make direct video calls which is fun for the first week (although the group-to-group video calls that will appear as one living room calls another living room will be different that the single person scenarios we've seen fail on mobile phones). What's going to fun forever is the fact that you can splice in video from any input device into the call. So while I'm talking wih my mom on my Jetsons video phone I can send her video from my trip to Milan using my digital camera. I could even hook up my laptop to the TVBlob box and show her exactly how she marks messages as spam in her Thunderbird inbox. Actually it would be even more useful if she hooked up her computer to the TVBlob box to show me what her problem is. I know there are remote desktop utilities, but I just can't get them to work over the public internets. The box just has a standard analog input so you can connect pretty much any device. Camera, DVD player, computer, satellite reciever (mp3-player?). I'm really digging the extensibility of the box.

The biggest downside is that the box really puts a strain on your internet connection. Ideally you need around 1mbit upstream to send tv quality images. While I would be able to use it with my 1024/512 connection I wouldn't be able to send tv quality images across the network. I see that technical issue as one that will solve itself in time (ie. when the Danish telecoms get a grip).

PS. Madge Weinstein interviewed Deirdré during VlogEurope. There is TVBlob stuff in there as well. Not to mention talk about old lesbians so check it out.