The concept of 'TV middleware' has always been a bit of a movable term. Some companies use it to refer to the software at the playout or head-end of a cable or IPTV service, others use it to refer to the software on the box, others to all three.
It has also long represented the gulf between IPTV and Internet TV. Internet TV has servers and browsers - thin client, if you will, base on some very open concepts, if not delivery systems. IPTV has concepts like conditional access (CA) at its heart and tends to be very system specific.
Now the borders between these technologies is very blurred. Indeed, why deliver a traditional IPTV service at all when you can make everything available via a browser and broadband ? You see how fine the distinctions are..
But the reality is that traditional middleware becomes an expensive un-necessity in the world of Internet TV.
Indeed, in the distant future, the necessity for anything on the server apart from a collection of agents or web services all rendered into a browser, is debatable.
We will live in a world where the content will go from the server to the screen with minimal intermediation.
It has also long represented the gulf between IPTV and Internet TV. Internet TV has servers and browsers - thin client, if you will, base on some very open concepts, if not delivery systems. IPTV has concepts like conditional access (CA) at its heart and tends to be very system specific.
Now the borders between these technologies is very blurred. Indeed, why deliver a traditional IPTV service at all when you can make everything available via a browser and broadband ? You see how fine the distinctions are..
But the reality is that traditional middleware becomes an expensive un-necessity in the world of Internet TV.
Indeed, in the distant future, the necessity for anything on the server apart from a collection of agents or web services all rendered into a browser, is debatable.
We will live in a world where the content will go from the server to the screen with minimal intermediation.