On The Yankee Group’s Website, a research summary for a report by analyst Vince Vitore asserts that IPTV is a four-letter word. We at Skitter would agree. Of course, The Yankee Group is talking about IPTV from a specific point of view: that of the cable industry. We also have an aversion to the term, but for different reasons. For the cable industry, being labeled as transitioning to “IPTV” puts them too close to the solutions offered by their competitors in the telco TV and over-the-top video worlds. For Skitter, the IPTV label sells us way short.
There are a number of differences between Skitter.TV and “traditional” IPTV. Those differences fall into three categories:
- The business model
- The architecture
- Features
Skitter.TV was designed from the ground up for “converged” or “hybrid” TV services. Our technology integrates good-old-fashioned live TV with content from sources that most IPTV systems cannot–sources like Internet TV (a.k.a. “over-the-top” Web video) and user-generated content. The “traditional” IPTV vendors are only now starting to build this functionality. The problem is, they will have to tack on such features in an architecture designed for a walled garden, not the untamed territory of Web video.
Secondly, the Skitter.TV architecture simplifies the infrastructure behind IP-delivered television, making the video platform less expensive, and easier to install and maintain. These two factors result in a radically different business model, where both infrastructure and content costs are lower.
That’s why we cringe a little when we’re lumped in with traditional IPTV solutions. Skitter.TV is not IPTV. It’s not purely OTT either. It’s a truly converged entertainment services solution that combines live broadcast TV and satellite networks with Web video/OTT content with video-on-demand with user-generated content. And that’s just the beginning. So please don’t call us an IPTV solution. Skitter.TV is entertainment delivered over IP for the converging worlds of entertainment and communications.
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