Media: "LTE Broadcast" - The Next Hyped Broadcasting Challenger

Broadcasting in Norway. 

What is seemingly the best reason to delay a decisions? By refering to something better, often a technology, that is in the process of being developed. Or at least, in the process of being planned.

Media: Why Broadcasting is Needed in Emergencies

The aftermath of the Boston bombings. Creative Commons licenced by Hahatango.

When do you need information the most? In an emergency. The problem is only that your preferred means of communication is unlikely to work. Your smartphone. Which without a connection to the outside world is as dumb as your high school calculator.

The Strengths of a One-Way Network

Yes, it was cold! But the Norwegian DAB transmitter didn't mind.

There's a New Buzzword in Town; LTE-A

A report by independent Dutch research institute TNO compares various networks that may be used to cover a country with digital radio and mobile television. LTE-A (Long Term Evolution Advanced) is the newest buzzword, or buzz acronym rather, to come from mobile network operators and the technology has been included in the comparison.

TNO is looking to its own country for a case. In the Netherlands, 16.5 million people share 31,000 square kilometers. An LTE-A network will require 38,500 transmitters on almost 13,000 sites to reach all of them, according to TNO. A DMB/DAB+ network will require 30 transmitters on the same number of sites. The differences in building costs, site rentals and other running expenses are major. The running costs for a LTE-A transmitter is 60,000 USD per year, according to Arqiva back in 2010.

Given that those figures still are accurate means running costs of 2.3 billion USD a year. In addition to four times as much in investments. That means that whoever would want to buy such a network covering over 99% of the country would need 4 million paying customers (25% of the population) to each pay 1,150USD a year to break even. And a revenue on top would be nice.

The TNO report maintains the need for cost efficient distribution solutions, that the capacity crunch in mobile networks is very real and that broadcasting networks are the most efficient means to distribute live content to a large audience.

The report has been commissioned by IDAG and will shortly be available to paying IDAG members. Not among those? Please get in touch with Ron du Croix to buy a license for individual or corporate use.

In January 2011 I wrote Why 4G is Hyped which you may also find useful.

Video Killed the Internet Star

Both Netflix and HBO are currently expanding to new markets. 

The costs of distributing on demand television via the internet are higher than via broadcasting as soon as you pass only 8,000 viewers, according to IHS Screen Digest.

To distribute one hour of web tv to 8,000 people will cost 29.58 Euro, or 0.003698 Euro per user hour. The price of an hour of broadcasting is 28.62 Euro, again according to IHS Screen Digest. The difference is that broadcasting can reach an infinite number of people bringing the cost per user hour to virually zero.

That means that a programme that is watched by, say 8 million people (as the highest freefall jump last week), will cost 29,580 Euro per hour to distribute via the internet. That is over a 1000 times more than the 28.62 Euro it will cost if it was broadcast.

But is 8 million viewers a lot? Not necessarily. Several events have reportedly had around one billion viewers. The cost then, if it were to be distributed via the internet (this is very hypotethically, as the infrastructure wouldn't at all be able to cope) would then be 3,697,500 Euro per hour, against 28.62 if broadcast. 129,000 times more expensive (given that all the viewers are in one country), in other words.

How does this translate to current television figures? IHS has made an estimation for the UK, given that all current TV viewing were to be distributed via the internet (again, very hypothetically). The CDN costs alone would exceed 1.2 billion Euro per year.

In the US, videos from Netflix alone is to "blame" for 33% of all internet traffic! And Netflix only provides on demand video, which in the US accounts for 2% of viewing times (98% is on traditional television, live or time shifted). Add YouTube traffic, and the figure increases to 44%. What if you add all live television viewing? You do the maths. And remember that Netflix and YouTube are not alone. HBO, Hulu, The BBC and others also provide online video services or are planning to do so.

The internet will not be able to distribute all sorts of radio and television content. It is already struggling with on demand videos. The figures shown above may illustrate why we need both broadcasting and the internet even clearer than other examples. I have provided a range of them in various blog posts the last few years, included posts such as Why the Internet Won't Solve Everything.

Maybe broadcasting isn't so stupid and old fashioned after all.

Which Country Next for FM Switch Off?

The UK is among the countries I believe will decide to switch off FM soon. Brilliant button @ Bob Bob Ricard, Soho.

The Norwegian government has decided to switch off FM in January 2017 (given certain criteria which will be fulfilled). And in neighbouring Sweden, a governmental report on radio and media in general was recently published. It clearly states that radio in Sweden will go digital and that the broadcasters will get extra money to do so. So, the future home of Julian Assange is set to follow in the steps of the Norwegians. The date is however uncertain, but probably by 2020. In the third Scandinavian country, politicians are expected to agree on a switch off in 2019. That is when the Danish FM licenses run out. The announcement can be expected as early as in October or November.

So, who dares go next? Two years ago no one outside the offices of certain broadcasters even dared utter the three words "FM", "switch" and "off" in the same sentence, let alone in that order. Now, to switch off FM is a clear goal being implemented in policies in more and more countries. Why? Because it saves broadcasters a lot of money that can be spent on better programs, it ensures the same radio offering to everyone whereever they live and it is much greener. Do you need more reasons? Here is a selection of articles. Help youself. 

My bet is that at least four out of the five countries below will follow suit and make an announcement of a forthcoming FM switch off no later than the end of 2014. The date of the actual switch off will vary, but a notice of 3-6 years is expected to be given. In reality, users should only be given two years. People are not stupid, they will get a new radio when one is needed. Not before. As is the case with a switch off of analogue television, most people wait until the last 2-3 weeks before the analogue signal goes off air until they buy the needed setup box. Consumers expect prices to fall while extra functionality will be added the longer they wait. Sales also pop up all over the place when retailers know something big is happening, so why buy now if you don't have to?

Great Britain
This was the first country to start a DAB trial, and DAB signals now reach 93% of the population. Coverage will be increased to 97% by the end of 2015. 40% of people in London listen to DAB every week, and the UK seems almost ready to take the plunge as the first big country. How about an announcement in 2013?

The Netherlands

DAB has been on air for years in the Netherlands, but with very little marketing and few devices in shops. This is about to change, and both the public service broadcaster and the commercial ones will have transmissions on air by September 1, 2013. In addition moile TV company MTVNL has mobile TV signals and updated traffic data on air via DMB. The government looks at the licensing of FM and DAB as one matter. If you're not on digital, you will not be allowed to remain on FM. The Dutch are more than ready to switch off FM relatively soon.

France
This might be a little bit of a surprise, given the reluctancy by the four big commercial broadcasters to go digital. They want to keep the competition away by staying on FM, milking it for what it is worth and sabotaging any attempt by the government to get going. Putting your head in a flower pot never helped anyone defeat hungry competitors, not even where cake should eradicate hunger. Frequency licenses are being handed out as we speak, and there are hundreds of applicants. The question is, will all the big four French dare not apply for digital licenses? What if one of them changes its mind two minutes before the deadline? Legislation is even in place to force all car manufacturers selling cars in France to add a digital broadcasting receiver in cars 18 months after regular DAB+ transmissions covers 20% of the country. This coverage level should be reached before the summer of 2013. 

Germany

The biggest economy in Europe last year introduced nationwide radio transmissions for the first time since WWII, via DAB+. Digital radios are selling reasonably well, and digital radio is attracting new players into the radio business. If you own a global company with a huge marketing budget, why not spend some of the money on a hip and trendy radio station? Did you mention DJ Red Bull?

Poland
This is an outsider, but given its proximity to Germany and it being the fastest growing economy in Europe, I think this may be the surprise country to announce a switch off relatively soon. They have already trialled both DMB and DAB+ with good results in Poland and the players there are innovative and forward leaning. 

Involvement  is a key criteria in any FM switch off plan, also in these five countries. Public broadcasters, commercial broadcasters, retailers AND governments must all work together to ensure success. In most of these countries, such processes have already started. And a switch off date is needed. No matter how many great new radio stations you add on digital, a fairly high percentage of the population will always be happy with what they already have. At least until they experience how much better the alternative is.

But what about all those radios?

Please don't use the awful excuse: "But everyone will have to buy new radios." You don't complain when you and each and every one of your family members, colleagues and friends buy a new Samsung or a new Iphone every 18 months, then brag about your new gadget on Facebook afterwards. One of those smart phones costs more than 10 times the price of an average digital radios and requires much more energy to produce.

You can also safely exclude another overused excuse: "But imagine the waste problem with all the radios that will be thrown away." Again, why not care equally about all those mobile phones, tablets and laptops that you throw away every other year? They contain many more chemicals and electronics than a simple FM radio. And a radio works "forever," so it has certainly done its duty compared to other gadgets that are old after a year or three. A radio also contains parts such as loudspeakers and antennas that can be reused with relative ease. Not to forget cheaper and cheaper adapter solutions that will actually pimp your old FM radio and make it a digital one. 

Don't Give MNOs Broadcast Spectrum(Or Lose 62 Billion USD)

CC licensed by Noah Wesley.

A shift from data transport via the internet to data transport via broadcasting networks will create 62 billion USD (in present value terms) extra in the US economy from 2014 to 2026. This is being claimed in the report The Economic value of Broadcast Innovation - Impact on the U.S. Treasure, by Business Analytix Inc., published last November. Do note that the 62 billion dollars are for the US alone. The world wide ancillary revenue share is much higher.

50 billion connected devices
So, how can this be? Every minute, hundreds of people buy a new or another "connected device," a gadget that is connected to the internet. There are currently around 5 billion such devices in the world. In 2015 there will be 15 billion connected devices, in 2020 there will be 50(!) billion of them, a tenfold increase from today, according to Intel. The number is far higher than the number of people on Earth as many people will have several devices, but more importantly due to machine to machine communication. More and more traffic is shifting from the internet via fibre and other terrestial distribution forms to portable devices via mobile internet. And let us not forget the surge in cloud services. More an more people and businesses now store their data in "the cloud," or on servers that can be accessed "everywhere" via the internet. The downside is that this leads to an explosion in bandwidth usage. There will due to the above mentioned reasons soon be a major traffic jam on the mobile internet. And who likes traffic jams? Only Shell, Texaco and BP. And maybe some street vendors.

Who likes internet traffic jams? Mobile network operators will use the opportunity to introduce new data traffic plans, giving those that pay premium a good service, letting the rest share the leftovers and be stuck in traffic. It's like beating the traffic jam on the motorway by flying a helicopter. Not many can afford to do it, those who can ensure healthy incomes to those who solve their problems.

Business Analytixs agrees with me and an increasing number of people within the industry:

The best way to meet the projected explosive growth in mobile data is to allow broadcasters to use point-to-multipoint "Broadcast Overlay" technology to provide the most efficient possible delivery of high bandwidth data to mobile users. Simply allocating more spectrum to commercial wireless operators would do very little to address projected massive capacity shortfalls and would do even less to address Federal budget deficits. Commercial mobile networks based on "cellular" one-to-one architectures are not designed to efficiently carry the portion of mobile data traffic that is likely to grow the fastest.

70-fold increase in data traffic
By 2026, data traffic via the mobile internet will have skyrocketed, increasing 70 times from the current level, according to the Business Analytic report. So even if MNOs get their hands on more spectrum as they are currently trying to (most of the spectrum from broadcasters), that would hardly help at all. That will only ensure that valuable means of distributing mobile data will end up in the hands of very few companies, essentially creating monopoly like conditions. Who would want that?

A linear increase in the supply of spectrum cannot solve a geometric increase in demand for mobile data. The projected growth in mobile data traffic is so great that re-allocation of television spectrum would provide only temporary and barely discernible relief.

Broadcasting spectrum must remain in the hands of broadcasters that operate independently of MNOs and ISPs. MNOs claim that governments would make billions of dollars on auctions of these frequencies. But a one time auction revenue cannot in any way, form or manner compete with assets that carry an infinite value. The value of annual fees paid by broadcasters will pass the one time fee in an auction within a few years. But the value is not only monetary. This also has to do with culture and language. About securing the right of societies to get news, sports, entertainment and cultural programming and content in their own language, from their own area, preserving their own culture and cultural background. 

This isn't about stopping the advancement of the internet. This is about making sure that relevant content is carried across the optimal distribution method in order to reach everyone in a smart and cost efficient manner. Live television and radio content, which consumes enormous amounts of data, should not be transported via the internet. It is a total waste, unless you are outside the coverage area. Such content should go via broadcasting networks. Normal web surfing, on-demand programming and personalized sevices on the other hand should go via the internet.

Simply using the right architecture for the right traffic will do far more to alleviate mobile traffic jams than any amount of re-purposed spectrum.

The 62 billion USD extra can be generated thanks to the efficiency of transporting data via a broadcasting network that can reach an infinite number of people at the same time, as opposed to what is possible via the internet which serves one person at the time, something that creates jams and less than optimal services.

Broadcasting will also change
Of course, everything is not perfect when it comes to broadcasting either. Currently, traditional linear radio and TV is more or less the only kind of service being carried across broadcasting networks (except i.e. traffic services and teletext like services in certain countries). How about using the broadcasting networks to also carry other kinds of data that a lot of people want? Such as the 100 most popular Youtube videos. This can then be stored on your device and watched on-demand whenever you want it. I met with Youtube 14 months ago. They were not interested in making their top content available as TV channels. They have however changed strategy since then with the introduction of 100 online tv channels. It may only be a matter of time before they are transmitted via broadcasting networks as well, or before they transit their top content via such networks.

Broadcasting is perfect in a collective society, as we all do live in. "Everyone" will, after all, want to get news, sports and premieres of new shows or episodes first. Then add individuality, which is taken care of by the possibilities we get through the internet, and we have a win-win situation. MNOs will tell us that multicasting solutions will solve the capacity issue sometime in the future, but they have told us so the last 10 years. And it is not only about capacity, there are a number of other reasons why the internet won't solve it all. 
I will finish by repeating myself from an earlier commentary. Greed may be good, but for live television and radio, solidarity is what we need.

The Economic value of Broadcast Innovation - Impact on the U.S. Treasure, by Business Analytix Inc. comes highly recommended for those of you that want to understand the future of media.

The Continuing Success of Linear Radio and TV

CC licenced by Marius Arnesen, NRKbeta.

Linear radio and TV, or broadcasting, is out. It is oldfashioned. No one wants to consume programmes exactly when they air anyway and to have to rely on a schedule. Or is this yet again words that are often echoed thanks to the internet lobby?

I would clearly say the latter. We hear a lot about new over the top and on demand services. They will give everyone the freedom to watch or listen to whatever they want whenever. Such services are great! But they complement live broadcasting, they do in no way replace it. Nor should they, as the internet is not designed nor suited to cater for heavy radio and TV consumption. Claims that the internet will solve "everything" are inaccurate and false.

There are several reasons why live TV and live radio is a success and will stay successful, strong and important also in the future.

1. Sports
You do not want to watch or listen to recorded sports. Not entire games, matches or events at least. Nothing beats the excitement of a good football match, Tour de France leg or crosscountry ski race. Highlights are different, though. You will be happy to relive the fantastic goals of your team many times over.

2. News
Breaking news share some of the characteristics of sports. You want to see the press conference or get information following the terror attack as the events happen. Recorded news are hardly "news" anymore, but archived news. You may be happy with a recorded sum up on a 'normal' day, but especially breaking news events change the game.

3. New releases
Every programme has a premiere. And premieres attract a lot of people, whether we are talking about a blockbuster in the cinema or a television drama. It seems like people prefer to watch television at the same time as everyone else, at least not later. "Lillyhammer," a Norwegian TV drama series airing on Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation's NRK1, is for instance breaking viewership records every episode (three episodes of eight shown so far).

4. Live discussions
You cannot discuss a TV show or a radio programme in realtime with someone who is not watching or listening at the same time as you. My Twitter and Facebook feeds are regularly dominated by discussions or comments on TV and radio programmes.

5. Being served
To be attended to is a luxury. Some people feel that they already make too many decicions during a day. At work, in school, at home. To just unwind and be served quality programmes by someone who knows content and are qualified to pick out eminent programmes can be a luxury. -You know the menu, please serve me your best programmes.

6. Discovery
Linear consumption is a great way to discover new programmes or artists. There is always a new programme that starts after the previous one. And they may be totally different, giving you insight into new subjects, music or genres. 

7. Discrimination free
Broadcasted free to air radio and TV does not discriminate. Everyone can get it and everyone gets the same offering.

8. No personalization!
Linear radio and TV is thankfully not personalized. Think about it. Google and Facebook and many others take pride in personalizing everything. To make it better. Although this "improvement service" is based on your previous behaviour and what other "like you" do or recommend. It is all about guessing. And it is often about making more money from advertisers. With radio and TV, every consumer listener will be presented the same information in the same manner and in the same order. With the Internet, this is no longer necessarily the case, and a lot of on demand programmes or short clips will be followed by "if you like this, you might also like these." I have covered this before in The Bias of the Internet.

9. Emergencies
In the case of major emergencies, broadcasters often stop their regular programming and inform you of what is happening. And they can inform everyone at once without the network going down. To stop a streamed on demand programme should also technically be possible, but I have yet to see it happen. And the internet will go down or at least slow down dramatically if too many people use it at the same time.


Not yet convinced about the future of broadcasted radio and TV? Read about related issues in Why the Internet Won't Solve Everything.

Why FM is More Expensive than Digital

The Kolsås transmitting tower outside Oslo has transmitters for DMB/DAB. 

I often hear that FM is cheaper than digital radio or mobile TV via DMB/DAB/DAB+. This is often argued, especially when it comes to small local radios. Let us create a scenario.

An FM vs DAB coverage comparison on a larger scale. 

Tinyville
This little town has 10,000 inhabitants, all living within an area of 20 square kilometers. There is a small hill on one side where the local radio station, TinyFM, has a transmitter and an antenna which has beamed out it's programs for years. TinyFM is however not very financially stable. The only revenues come from some advertising and the weekly radio bingo, where the listeners buy bingo coupons and play for money prizes every Thursday eveneing. It is therefore important for them to keep all costs down.

Will digital radio be more expensive than analogue for TinyFM? It will not, although this is a common misconception. 

FM costs
TinyFM paid 3500 USD for it's complete FM transission gear. They have one radio station on air and need the following:

1 transmitter / amplifier
1 VHF mask filter
1 VHF antenna
Small bits and pieces

What would it cost to do the same via DAB/DAB+?

DMB/DAB/DAB+ costs
We would need the same kind of stuff, although not identical gear:

1 transmitter / amplifier
1 VHF mask filter
1 VHF antenna
Small bits and pieces

And some more:
1 server
1 front-end

European Broadcasting Union showed such a DMB/DAB/DAB+ setup at a conference in Belfast in October, 2010. The costs? 4 800 USD. That is 37% more expensive than FM.

But there is a major difference:

For FM one transmitter/amplifier is needed per radio station.
For DMB/DAB/DAB+, you can have over 20 radio stations, 6 mobile TV channels or a mixture of mobile TV schannels and radio stations.

 The moment you decide to transmit two radio stations, the costs go down to 2 400 USD per station. With 15 radio stations the cost will be 320 USD per station. That is 9% of the cost of one FM station (or a 90% discount). The prices here are for the equipment, not for running costs. Electricity costs are similar on the transmission side as long as there's only one radio station. The moment you introduce more stations (as you can do digitally), electricity used per station will decline dramatically.

TinyFM will therefore encounter a little higher costs for transmission gear, although not substantially. The moment they start an extra station which could boost listenership and revenues, they should benefit. TinyFM may however not have the staffing nor the potential advertising revenues that may justify another station. In that case, they may want to stay with FM, something that governments in both Norway and the UK have opened up for. They will not put pressure on local radio stations to move away from FM, but they may see the benefits and decide to do this themselves.

Friends on technology, foes on content
This is something that broadcasters in several countries have discovered, although on a much larger scale than in Tinyville. In i.e. Norway, Germany, Australia and the Netherlands competing broadcasters have decided to join forces. They cooperate on technology and compete on content. That is obviously a win win situation financially due to lower actual costs. By cooperating on the same mux, all costs can be devided between several companies. Instead of having to pay everything yourself (equipment, installation costs, running costs, internet / radio lines, etc.) this can now be divided by 2, 3, 4 or split between even more companies. Big savings, in other words.

But there are also other benefits:

• It is greener as one network will serve everyone.
• Hosting can be done more efficiently and secure.
• Marketing is more efficient. Competitors can help each other in getting people to get DMB/DAB/DAB+ receivers with the benefits and possibilities they give.
• A clearer message is carried across. One organization can easier coordinate towards the government, network operators, bureaucracy, etc. This makes communication and formal processes easier and faster. 

Media: Another Case Against T2

A DAB/DAB+ radio from Tecsonic and an Identity tablet with built in DMB/DAB/DAB+. (CC by GG.)

Whenever you have a problem, there will always be someone claiming that a solution will solve the problem in the near future. For digital radio and mobile TV, the so-called solution that is often being referred to is called DVB T2. I have argued that this is an immature standard without available receivers, that it will be very costly to build such a network and that current DVB-T networks will have to be replanned and possibly rebuilt. In other words, not the way to go. DVB T2 as the solution for digital radio and mobile TV is just another biased claim made by false prophets.

The solution is already here. It is called Eureka 147, more commonly known as DMB/DAB/DAB+. It is being used in over 40 countries around the globe, and over 500 million people will be covered by such signals by the end of the year. Germany is only the last country to launch such services, something that will happen through a soft launch in four days and officially one month later.

DVB T2 is not the way to go. It's not here now and may never be here in a form that will prove useful. And telecom networks won't do the trick either, as I have repeatedly covered earlier.

Radio futurologist James Cridland has written a piece looking at DVB T2-Lite. He claims that there are numerous issues with DVB T2 and that DMB/DAB/DAB+ is the way to go, not least due to it's flexibility which opens up for digital radio, mobile TV, additional services (i.e. live traffic information and interactivity) and a combination with the internet.

Cridland's post is well worth a read:

DVB-T2-Lite – a case of the BBC reinventing the wheel?

Half of Norway and a Voyage of Two Screens



Typical view from M/S Nordnorge. CC licensed by NRKbeta.no.

 Norway's five and a half day long Coastal Voyage is broadcast live minute by minute on Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK's national TV channel NRK2 and being streamed 24/7 on the website nrk.no/hurtigruten. It is one of the world's longest, and slowest moving, live broadcast ever. But quite possibly also the most beautiful.

What started as a crazy idea turned into a crazy multimedial concept on TV and the internet. But crazy is good. Norwegians love it. The first weekend, almost 2.6 million people tuned in to NRK2 to watch parts of the voyage. That is more than half the population of Norway (almost 5 million). And many thousands more followed the journey via web TV. 46% of those were watching the streamed journey from outside Norway.

NRKs Head of Research, Mr. Kristian Tolonen, breaks the numbers down a little. 180,000 people have, on average, been watching 24/7 since the start last Thursday. The peak was on Sunday evening, 15 minutes before midnight, when 692,000 was watching M/S Nordnorge (M/S NorthernNorway) enter the fjord of Trollfjorden, one of the highlights of the journey.

Thousands and thousands of people wave at the ship from the shore, other boats, bridges, piers and mountains. Many of the spectators are also shown in close up on national television, something quite a few realise after being told so via mobile phones by television viewers at home. Their typical reaction? Double speeded waving.

Two screens
Judging by comments on Twitter, Facebook and nrk.no/hurtigruten, a lot of people are watching the journey on TV while communicating with others via the web. People are praising NRK, the license funded broadcaster, for daring to do such a thing. And many are saying that they are now happy to pay the license fee. That is not usually uttered loudly by many. My guess is that the number of people paying the license fee wil increase quite a bit the next days and weeks. Around 10% do currently not pay.

The fact that the programme, if we can call it such, is so long and slow moving with continuous spectacular views, cheering people, orchestras playing and choires singing in every port makes it ideal for dialogue. This is a social experience, perfect for two screens. People are watching their beloved coast together on broadcasted television, and they have a need to share and discuss these moments, often in quite personal ways, via the internet. Whether it is with friends or strangers does not seem to matter.

The official Facebook group of the voyage has over 47,000 fans, whereas several of the destinations have "trended" on Twitter.

The concept is intriguing, extremelly fascinating and highly addictive. Some people claim to have watched 72 hours without sleep, others sleep on the sofa in front of the television set to miss as little as possible. This journey seems to make Norwegians extremelly proud of their country. There are dozens of Tweets and Facebook messages from people sharing that they are crying due to the strong emotion. Others proclaim this to be the best TV, or anti TV as some people call it, that they have EVER watched (usually followed by a number of exclamation marks). It may very well be the start of a different genre of programming, unless this is something that only appeals to Norwegians. It is about watching together, knowing that everyone else is sharing and taking part in a social setting which involves the sharing of impressions. Only broadcast television can make people come together like this. But not without the help of social media. Combination is key.

And it ain't over yet. You can follow the journey live on nrk.no/hurtigruten until Wednesday morning, June 22, Norwegian time.



Meeting M/S Kong Harald, a sister ship. CC licensed by NRKbeta.no.



Why Telecom Networks Need a Little Help

Telenor, Norway's biggest telecom operator is struggling to deliver the capacity needed by their share of the 5 million people in the country. They are simply put out of capacity. Or to use their own words:

- We have a capacity challenge, Ragnar Kårhus, CEO of Telenor Norway said at a press conference today.

The press conference came after the second network failure in a week. Last week, the telecom network of Norway's biggest telecom operator was down for 12-18 hours in most of Norway. An embarrased mobile network operator voluntarily decided not to charge the 18 million USD they should have made from disgruntled customers the three next days following their little crisis. And then the network went down again today. Not as severely, but nevertheless. Are they experiencing a Friday curse?

3 billion American dollars
The three days of lost revenues amounted, according to themselves, to 18,1 million USD. This was during a weekend and a bank holiday when traffic is lower than during a normal day. 6 million USD a day still means 2,2 billion USD per year in revenues, probably closer to 3 billion given that usage is higher on weekdays. Not bad for the 5500 transmitters needed to cover Norway.

Telenor do not know for sure what really caused the problem, but being out of capacity is something that they should get used to. Internet traffic more than doubles every year. They are no longer encouraging data hungry services such as mobile TV, and they are moving away from all you can eat plans. But is that enough when more and more people are getting their first smart phone and 3G enabled tablet?

Most experts predict that mobile TV and mobile video will generate most of the data traffic in the years to come. I have heard figures that mobile TV and video will account for everything from 50% to 91% of all data traffic. How about relieving the networks and providing a better and more reliable service to all customers by porting all national live TV and radio to digital broadcasting technologies? How about starting to sell mobile phones with such technologies built in (as they do in Korea and Japan)? In Norway and over 40 countries on 5 continents, that means built in DMB/DAB/DAB+, in the US we're talking ATSC M/H and HD Radio while China boasts CMMB for mobile TV and DAB/DAB+ for digital radio.

Emergency proof?
With heavy data usage taking it's toll on networks, what can we do in case of emergencies? Even on every New Years Eve we see that text messages take hours to get through to recipents due to a widespread habit of sending happy new year messages to each other. What if there is an emergency and everyone needs to be notified? A telecom network will go down. A broadcasting network will not. And broadcasting networks can also be used to send messages and even maps or detailed instructions. To everyone. Simultaneously and instantly. Without the risk of going out of capacity or being taken down due to heavy usage. That is something to consider in these times of increasing reoccurences of natural disasters and terror.

Broadcasting and the internet make each other better. But when will Telenor understand that? Maybe not until governments will tell them that they have to.

Intel and Cisco Look To Broadcasting

Under a CC license by Thomas Hawk.

The BBC writes that the number of internet connected devices will explode to over 15 billion, twice the worlds population, by 2015. They point to research done by Cisco which believes that television and video services will continue to dominate internet traffic, and that one million minutes of video will be watched every second. That is a hell of a lot of data. Let's say that the average bandwidth is 2000Kbps. Many will prefer HD quality at a 4-6Mbps, others will have to settle for much worse video quality at a lower bandwidth due to less bandwidths being available from their ISP. An average bandwidth of 2000Kbps is not taken out of the blue. Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK) has the most popular web TV service in Norway.  Their average streamed bandwidth per user is 2500Kbps, although the internet were in for some trouble at the web tv player's record breaking moment, with average bandwidths going down to 1500Kbps.

One million minutes at 2000Kbps is almost 14 Terrabyte of data every second. Or 111Tbps (Terabit per second). Slightly higher than my internet connection at home.

If added up, that means 1.15 Exabyte per day, or 420 Exabyte per year. Cisco's calculations are however based on an average bandwidth of around half at 1024Kbps. We are in that case looking at 215EB per year.

Exawhat?
One Exabyte is the same as one quintillion bytes. As if that helps anyone's understanding of it. I'll leave explanations to Wikipedia. The bottom line is that an Exabyte is an enorumous amount of data. 215 or 420 of it in almost unimagninable.

Cisco is naturally worried about how to be able to deliver infrastructure that can cope with such vast amounts of data.

"The most important question we face is how to manage all this traffic intelligently," Suraj Shetty, the company's vice president for global marketing tells the BBC.

One obvious answer is to use broadcasting technologies for all live radio and TV content. In combination with traditional internet services, obviously. That means that many of the 15 billion internet connected devices out there should have a chipset that also supports broadcasting. Is that going to happen?

Intel jumps on the broadcasting bandwagon
Well, a week ago, the worlds biggest processor and chipset manufacturer Intel, aquired SiPort, a company that specializes in broadcasting chipsets.

SiPort writes the following on their webpage:

"Digital radio is poised to become an important ingredient for handsets and other mobile devices as broadcast radio transitions from analog to digital. Intel’s acquisition of SiPort enhances our abilities to continue as the leading provider of low power, single-chip CMOS solutions enabling wide spread adoption of broadcast digital radio. SiPort’s digital radio expertise and solutions will leverage Intel’s market and technology leadership to provide best-in-class digital radio solutions." 

SiPort produces chipsets for the broadcasting technologies of HD Radio (used in the US) and DMB/DAB/DAB+ which is used in over 40 countries on five continents.

The internet is already struggling at peak times, something that the entire industry knows and understands. Some of the biggest players out there is now pointing to broadcasting as one solution to load unnecessary traffic off the infrastructure, optimizing it's usage for everything else out there on the internet. More and more people are starting to understand that combination is key. That is good news to all of us that cherish the services and possibilities given to us by the internet.

Double Distribution, Just Don’t Do It

The next Eurovision Song Contest finals will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan. CC licensed.


How can we best utilize frequencies or bandwidth? The top trick is to get rid of double distribution. Why distribute the same signals twice? If we stop doing such, we will make those frequencies and that bandwidth available to others. Most industrial countries have realized this when it comes to television. They switched off the analogue signals and replaced them with digital ones. Norway is doing the same for radio in 2017. Other countries will follow also when it comes to radio.

But the examples of analogue and digital television and radio are not the only relevant ones. We are also seeing a lot of double distribution divided between broadcasting and the Internet. Some people, usually titled consultants, think that the Internet will be able to take over for broadcasting. This is a wrong, misunderstood and distorted view. Why?

First or bust
The final of ESC (Eurovision Song Contest) gathers hundreds of millions of million simultaneous viewers. Very few of those viewers would have been satisfied if they had to watch a recorded version of the events after it went on air live. Sports and news are other examples of such events or programmes, where a recorded version in most cases just won’t do. Just think  of the Super Bowl, British royal weddings and the Olympics. Premieres of popular TV programmes also make people want to watch it when it first airs, although they can be equally enjoyed later (but being first or doing something first is something people often strive for, as exemplified through the lines outside cinemas when the newest Star Wars or Harry Potter movie premieres or outside shops when a new iPhone launches.

Even with giant TV successes such as ESC, the latest update on the bin Laden killing or the World Cup final an estimated 30-40 per cent of television viewers watch channels showing other programmes. You can't find the event which virtually everyone watching television wants to watch. Maybe except for the moon landing.

To upgrade the Internet to be able to handle such volumes of viewers may never be realistically possible speaking from a technical point of view. (There is also a range of other reasons why the Internet should not be the only distribution channel of live TV and radio.) Broadcasting will in other words always (at least in many, many years to come) be needed to technically distribute huge televised events. That leaves a natural question. Why even bother to upgrade the Internet infrastructure to be able to handle such volumes? To make it capable of managing peak times (if peak times are defined as being able to deliver television to everyone) is costly and not necessary.

Bandwith explosion even without TV and radio
After all, the Internet even struggles at times to deliver properly on normal surfing. And that is before we have even seen any major cloud computing efforts. Eventually billions of stationary and mobile devices will be depending on each other and centralized servers in order to deliver services. That means a lot of extra data. And that data increase comes in addition to the increased surfing in the population. And they won't start surfing less data hungry services anytime soon.

I am not saying that people should be banned from watching television live via the Internet. People should be able to enjoy their favourites from their preferred device. But broadcasting will always handle the majority of such distribution, let us rather expand and enhance the Internet so that it can do those things it is created to do, only better.

That will also mean that the Internet can deliver live television to more people, but should it? Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK) pushed it to the limits during the World Skiing Championship earlier this year, compromising those people out there that want, need and depend on the Internet for other purposes.

Greed may be good, but for live television and radio, solidarity is what we need.

Digitalized Tunnels are Safer

Creative Commons photo by Peter Fiskerstrand.

The government in Norway has decided that FM will be switched off in 2017. But what does that mean for the radio coverage in road tunnels? Norway has over 1,200 tunnels, 500 of which are longer than 500 meters.

180 of those tunnels do currently have FM coverage for NRK P1, some also carry P4, the biggest commercial radio station. 30 tunnels do currently have DAB coverage. By 2017 the 180 tunnels now covered by FM will need to be covered by DAB. The Norwegian Road Authority does however have a bigger goal in mind. By 2020, all the 500 tunnels of more than 500 meters in length will be covered by DAB/DAB+ and possibly also by DMB.

Why is The Road Authority so keen on DAB? Because DAB doubles as an emergency system. In case of a car crash, accident, fire or similar the operator who follows the tunnels through video cameras will override all radio stations inside the tunnel and read out potentially life saving instructions to drivers and passengers. If the receivers also have a screen, additional info such as maps showing the nearest exit or the the nearest emergency phone can be shown.

Where is this stated? The Norwegian Road Authority has published a manual on Road Tunnels, Manual 021E. The English version was published in 2004. There is a revised version from 2010 with some minor updates, although this version is only available in Norwegian. The manual is very detailed and is considered so well written that it is also being used by several American states for road tunnels and by the Norwegian Railroad Authority for railway tunnels.

The relevant chapters are 602.3 Radio equipment, 602.31 Communication equipment and 602.32 Broadcasting equipment with "interruption facilities." The regulations stated in such an official manual have been made are part of the law and must be fulfilled.

That means that Norway's many long tunnels will be safer than before. The emergency system does however require that the radio (or DMB player) is actually turned on with the volume on (it cannot turn the radio on for you). Information encouraging drivers to keep their receivers on should therefore ideally be posted outside all long tunnels. It is not known if such road signs will be put up.

The Norwegian Road Authority is required by the EU (even though Norway's not a member) to have such an emergency system in place, but The Norwegian Road Authority has imposed tougher rules on themselves than what is being required. The EU directive calls for such emergency system in tunnels above 1,000 meters of length, not 500. Norway does, in other words, not only do what the EU requires them to, but even more for the sake of safety.

The EU directive?

DIRECTIVE 2004/54/EC OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT

AND OF THE COUNCIL

of 29 April 2004

on minimum safety requirements for tunnels in the

Trans-European Road Network.

Chapter 2.16 deals directly with what has been covered here:

2.16. Communication systems

2.16.1. Radio re-broadcasting equipment for emergency service use shall be installed in all tunnels

longer than 1 000 m with a traffic volume higher than 2 000 vehicles per lane.

2.16.2. Where there is a control centre, it must be possible to interrupt radio re-broadcasting of

channels intended for tunnel users, if available, in order to give emergency messages.

Why FM Must Go

I want a good selection of radio stations and merchandise in shops.
This little shop on wheels is in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq. 

The Internet cannot substitute broadcasting as a distribution method for radio. I have covered this before: A Collapse of the Internet Narrowly Avoided - Why 4G is Hyped - 21 Reasons Why FM is Almost History - Internet Radio Expensive in France Too.

So has radio futurologist James Cridland: 3G - radio's future? - 4G for radio? No thanks.

Radio needs broadcasting. FM is broadcasting. Is radio via FM too valuable to society to be switched off and substituted by DAB/DAB+?

Before answering this question, let me ask and answer some others. Was analogue TV too valuable to society to be switched off and substituted by digital TV? No, this has already happened in most western countries. Why? Because television viewers demanded more channels of higher quality and analogue TV was too expensive and not advanced enough to provide this. And people watch more television than they watch radio in most western countries (182 vs. 101 minutes per day in Norway). Did viewers complain? Hardly at all.

So, how about radio? The FM frequencies are full. That means that there is no more room for additional radio channels. FM is very expensive due to high power consumption (one transmitter is needed per channel) and a lot of transmitters required to cover large areas. But maybe the existing radio channels are enough, maybe people are happy with the current selection. If that is the case, maybe FM is so valuable that it cannot be switched off.

But this way of arguing is like speaking for maintaining the shop system that has always been present in a communist country. The food selection consists of two kinds of cheese (both from the same valley), three kinds of bread (all white), one kind of butter (who needs low fat anyway?) and a couple salami types (made by a mixture of animals you don't even want to be able to name).

Who is satisfied by this? Well, the customers have never know that French cheese, brown bread and baguettes, Irish butter and hundreds of kinds of sandwich meat from a range of animals even exist. They have therefore never complained very much (unless the food was outdated or tasted worse than normal). Neither has the farmers providing the cheese or the bakeries making the bread. They have always seen very little competition. That is good for business. They are virtually guaranteed a profit, no matter how low the quality of their food. Why would they want to change this?

Let the fight begin
Competition forces better quality. That is also true for radio.

In Norway, Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK) had a monopoly on television and radio until the early 90s. Most people (even those of us employed by NRK) think that the quality of programmes improved greatly after commercial competitors entered the scene. After all, people suddenly had a choice. That means that they don't have to pick your product or programme anymore.

I would like the same to happen again to radio. More frequencies. More choice. More possibilities for good radio, new related services, interactive radio and on demand too. And I live in a country of less than 5 million people. Imagine what the situation is like in other, more populous countries. Where the market for new top quality radio stations with talented on-air personalities may be blooming, but where there are no available frequencies.

In order to make more frequencies available and enable a fair competitive environment, FM needs to be switched off in a range of countries. Not only in Norway. So that there aren't possibilities for "communist shops" anywhere anymore. Not even where the listeners are too busy listening to their existing channels to even bother to try the new ones.

Radio channels should fight for their listeners. Before fighting you have to train. A lot. Those who train become better. Those who train the most usually win the fights. If both sides train equally much you get good fights. Let the fights begin, on even ground. Switch off FM. Give even better radio to the people.

So, is radio via FM too valuable to society to be switched off? Not more than "small communist shops." They are valuable to society if located inside a museum. The same is the case with FM which should continue to exist in a museum, where it is heading and where it very soon belongs.

The Problem of New

We hear about it everyday. A new phone, a new social network, a new pattern or a new invention. There is nothing wrong with this, obviously. I like new. You like new. Everybody likes new, want to be new or just be associated with something new.

The problem is that too many trend setters, journalists and consultants are taking part in a race. The race of new, about being first to tell you about what is new. Or even better, what will be new tomorrow? This is of course a good thing. Who would want to miss out on the newest gadget or website? I wouldn't. The problem occurs when too many people compete about telling you about it. Sometimes it seems like they need to make it sound newer than it sounded when their colleagues or competitors just told you about it yesterday.

There are many people who want to tell you what is new. Some people think there are too many. I recently read a Facebook status update. A friend of mine considered adding "expert on social networks" to his resume, but decided against it as there are already 36 with such titles to the dozen. And some colleagues, who are actually among the top specialists in the field of new media in general, made a mockery out of it all on April 1st when they on one of NRKs websites NRKbeta.no wrote an article about all of them leaving NRK to start their own consultancy called SosialMedia.no (Social Media). The "company" can, among other things, "offer courses in social media and award Gold Standard Social Media Expert badges." It was an April Fools' joke, but it very well pinpointed the fact that many companies now see a need to hire professionals to come tell them what is new.

Is the problem of new new?
Not even the problem of new is new. Nostradamus and George Orwell are only two examples. They tried to predict the future, sometimes allegedly more successfully than others. People soon turned to them to hear more about new. Recently the Swedish professor Micael Dahlén published a book called "Nextopia" where he discusses what expectations of new can lead to. He argues that today expectations about what is just in front of us, but not yet entirely within reach, is what drives us as people. The craving for new.

Dahlén has interviewed loads of people about how they feel about life now, in the past and in the future. We are pretty happy with the current situation, although less so than with the past. What stands out is that nothing compares with the future, including our expectations to what will happen in just a day or two. Nextopia is the future, according to Dahlén.

– Nextopia is the next fantastic date, it is iPad 2 or the incredible career opportunity that waits around the next corner. Nextopia is our driving force, our reason to get out of bed in the morning, he tells Norwegian daily Aftenposten.

He claims that after something has happened, the actual events cannot compare with the expectations you had before it actually happened.

What about old?
To hear about something new that you may be able to try soon is in some ways a good thing. In other ways it is a problem as you are growing accustomized into always having something new to look forward to, thus never being satisfied with what you already have.

Merely being new is however no longer an asset in its own right. New and different, preferrably also groundbreaking, is the current ideal in order to lift eyebrows of listeners or bypassers.

Where does this leave old? Old is no longer synonymous with tested and proven and even the expression "good old" now seem to be used more often than not jokingly. Old has turned into a disadvantage, also when a solution, service or product works perfectly well. One of those "old" things is broadcasting. Broadcasting is the technology that enables everyone - without limit - in a coverage area to receive the same radio or TV signal. Some media experts do claim that broadcasting is out of date and needs to be replaced by the Internet. There are many reasons why this is wrong, capacity restrictions, gate keepers, net neutrality issues, breach of civil rights through data retention, mobile coverage and crisis communication are just some of them. Broadcasting is old, but is works perfectly to do what it is supposed to do. Just like wheeels, boats, tables and chairs.

Broadcasting is also near an all time high, having risen the last few years. People are watching more broadcasted television content and listening more to live radio than before. In Norway the figure is 182 minutes per day for television, 101 minutes for radio.

New is not necessarily bad. To strive for new only for the sake of new is.

A Collapse of the Internet Narrowly Avoided

The world championship in skiing, Oslo. Photo by Erik F. Brandsborg under a Creative Commons license.

Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK) recently broke the national record of web tv streaming. During the World championship in Skiing in Oslo last month, 134,000 simultaneous streams were consumed across Norway at the most popular event (the mens cross country relay). That is an estimated three times higher than the previous national record. Very impressive!

This was furthermore something NRK would previously have been unable to achieve. This time, a CDN agreement with Akamai, ensured that the content was distributed more evenly throughout the Internet in Norway than what has previosuly been the case (when everything was streamed from NRKs servers in Oslo).

But what happened in reality? NRK offers different qualities of available web tv streams, HD quality at 3.2Mbps being the top notch one. Normally, the average bandwidth per user is somewhat lower at 2.5Mbps. NRKs solution serves adaptive streaming, meaning that the bandwidths being made available varies on network conditions, network load, your own bandwidth, etc.

Selfishness?
During the men's relay the average bandwidth per user was as low as 1.5Mbps, according to my friend and colleague, Mr. Bjarne Andre Myklebust who is NRKs Head of IP Distribution. He says:

"The infrastructure clearly told us that it was filling up. The Internet in Norway was suffering and the world championship showed us that there are limitations to what the web can deliver. The Internet is only a supplement for delivery of TV and radio. Using the web to transport such data consuming services blocks other users from using the infrastructure to more important and sensible tasks."

People not interested in sports were denied optimal access to other services as NRKs users were almost killing the Internet thanks to the vastly popular skiing contest.

Watching big events live via web TV when there is a broadcasted option borders to selfishness. The bandwidth consumed can be better utilized by others that have no option but to use an Internet-only service.

New gatekeepers revealed
What is also worrying is that certain city councils even shut down the access to NRKs website which offered access to the web tv streams for all their employees and all schools. Random IT officers did in other words suddenly act as gate keepers of some of the content on the Internet. CTOs of certain companies supposedly did the same. Why? Because their local networks were crippled and unusable for what they are ment to do: providing communication between employees and systems, possibilities for research, access to teaching materials, etc. Even NRK as a public service broadcaster provides news and a lot of educational resources used by teachers and students, and this was blocked together with the web TV traffic from NRKand made inaccessible to those affected.
The Internet is certainly becoming faster and faster all the time, but the Internet is not made for transport of the same content to many at the same time. Broadcasting is perfect for that, the Internet is perfect for interactivity, communication and on demand services.

This case again shows weaknesses when the Internet is used in ways that it was never intended for. And the weaknesses are not only related to capacity or gatekeepers, there are at least 11 other reasons.

To repeat myself yet again, combination of technologies is the only smart and sensible way forward when it comes to distribution of radio and TV. Let me rub this in through some pity theft. I have below stolen and slightly rewritten a very well put paragraph from a recent blog post of James Cridland who writes about radio:

The internet is a rubbish way of reaching mass-market audiences; it doesn’t work reliably well in a mobile situation, and is many times more expensive to broadcast to large audiences. Broadcast fixes all of that. However, the Internet is excellent at niche content, out-of-area content and additional information – lots of things that are difficult or impossible to achieve through broadcasting. The future is multi-platform. It’s not a war.

Combination Tablets, Finally

I have been talking about the combination between broadcasting and the Internet for a long time. Why not use the best of two worlds to deliver services that outshines what only one of them can do?

The problem so far has been the lack of devices to do so. But that is now changing. IDAG (International DMB Advancement Group) has teamed up with Enspert, tablet maker number two in Korea, to launch several tablet models under the brand name Identity. Their press release came out today.

The tablets run Android and have screen sizes ranging from 7 to 9 inches. They will hit stores in several countries on four continents in June, including Australia, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, South Africa and Vietnam.

It is access to an API communicating with the DMB player that makes it possible to combine broadcasting and the Internet. That opens various possibilities such as the following examples:

1. Give thumb up or thumb down to a TV programme or a part of a TV programme while watching just by pressing the screen.
2. Chat by typing messages on screen while watching TV or listening to radio. Can be done via Twitter, Facebook or any other suited service. Example below.
3. Touch the screen to vote for a competitor in i.e. American Idol.
4. Touch the screen to via 3G or WLAN, download the next episode of True Blood one week before it airs on TV.

Some or all of these services may be free of charge from a public broadcaster, while commercial broadcasters will have great possibilities to enable new and exciting business models.



A tablet with built in DMB, DAB and DAB+ opens up for all sorts of combinations between TV,
radio and the Internet. Enspert's Identity tablets are the first that can do this.  



Plains, Trains and Automobiles

Train on a plain. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Why can't we just move all distribution of live television and radio to the Internet? Then you'll get everything through one cable, or even wirelessly. It's got to be the solution. After all, the Internet service providers (ISPs) out there outbid each other in promising you the broadest, fastest and cheapest broadband to your home in order to give you the Internet, TV, radio, on demand films, news, Internet banking and much more. They wouldn't do that if they couldn't deliver, would they? The funny thing is that ISPs at the same time are limiting how much data you can use per month, as well as wanting to charge media houses to stream TV and radio content to end users since media houses are 'causing so much strain to the broadband networks.'

That means that ISPs want to charge both their end-users and the media houses.

So maybe it isn't all that easy after all. I will try to illustrate the situation through plains, trains and automobiles.

Plains
Plains are in reality nothing more than space that may be covered by i.e. grassland, woodlands or forests. There is only a certain amont of space available. If you use too much of it for one purpose, less is available for other purposes. If you want to build 16 lane motorways, there will be less space for grass or forests.

The same applies to frequencies. They are also like natural resources. There is only a certain amount available, and you have to choose what to .

Trains
Trains are effective. A big train can transport almost one thousand people. Trains have their own tracks, don't run into traffic problems and can therefore go very fast. They are not affected by traffic jams on roads and their speed limits are also much higher than those for cars. But they can only run where there are tracks and they run according to a fixed schedule, not necessarily exactly when passengers want them to.

Trains and railroads are similar to broadcast TV and radio. An unlimited number of people can watch or listen to a programme simultaneously. But TV viewers or radio listeners can only enjoy their shows whenever they are on (unless they record them).

Automobiles
Automobiles or cars are great. They can go almost everywhere and give you personal freedom. But there are speed limits and other traffic rules and roads are easily clogged if too many cars are on the same streets. You can always build new lanes to a road, but you will then have to use of the limited plains to do that. But the more lanes that are available, the more people will hit the streets. And not only private cars, but also lorries, vans and trucks. The bigger the road, the more vehicles it can hold, the more vehicles it will have to hold and the worse the potential traffic jams at peak hours. And they use more energy per passenger than what is the case for trains.

The freedom of cars. By Walid Hassanein, licensed under a Creative Commons License.

So what?
Trains and automobiles have different purposes and do different things well. Both use of the limited space that is available on the plains, both must co-exist and both are dependant of each other. If you take away one of them the other one will struggle and be unable to do what it has been designed to do.

Just imagine forcing every passenger on a train to take his or her own car to the road during rush our, or to force every driver onto a train at the same time. The space on the plains must be optimized in order to accommodate for trains and automobiles, both of which are needed.

Doesn't that sound like broadcasting and the Internet?


The title of this blog post was inspired by the film called Planes, Trains and Automobiles, starring Steve Martin, John Candy and Kevin Bacon.