Old friends fight for space in the digital living room
Take a peek into your living room. It is getting crowded in there. Bill Gates of Microsoft sits on a sofa beside Paul Otellini of Intel. Sir Howard Stringer of Sony wrestles in the corner with Atsutoshi Nishida of Toshiba. Terry Semel of Yahoo walks in with Larry Page of Google. Steve Jobs of Apple could arrive at any moment.
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So it seemed at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week. Convergence of media, software and technology has been predicted for so long that the term became old-hat before there was much sign of the reality. The flurry of deals between friends and jostling among rivals last week suggested that maybe, just maybe, convergence is finally coming to fruition.
Take Mr Gates's presentation at the Las Vegas show. The biggest thing he had to unveil was ostensibly Windows Vista, the long-delayed new version of its Windows operating system. But that was a yawn. It looked pretty but several things that he trumpeted as Vista's best new features had a distinctly familiar look.
Windows Sidebar, a collection of little applications that sit at the side of the screen, seems awfully like Yahoo Widgets. The tabs in the new version of Internet Explorer bear a resemblance to those of Firefox, its open-source rival. Now you will be able to search quickly for all your files but it was Google that paved the way for such improvements.
Still, never underestimate Microsoft's determination to plug away at something until it gets it right. In this case, the product is Windows Media Centre, the version of its operating system for television. This is now sleeker and more elegant: an entertainment hub and hard-disk recorder that allows people to watch television programmes and store and display photos and music.
Televisions and computers have led separate lives but they are coming together. Millions of people are connecting to the internet over broadband, allowing them to download music and films. The cathode-ray television set is on the way out, increasingly displaced by flat-panel monitors. Many households have home networks that should allow them to move content around among devices, given the right software. And it is becoming common to watch television programmes captured on hard-disk recorders, which are small computers.
Companies can see the potential this creates and they want their slice of it. Indeed, several aspire to the biggest slice: becoming the "platform" that all electronic devices work through and on which films, television shows, photos and songs are kept. Having witnessed Apple's dominance in digital music, they are rushing to gain a similar status in home entertainment.
The loudest battle is the stand-off between two competing high-definition video disc standards: Sony's brainchild Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, which is being promoted by Toshiba (and backed by Microsoft, among others). For Sony, Blu-Ray is a chance to re-establish its technology leadership after a rough patch.
HD-DVD had the edge last week. Toshiba will launch a player in March for $499, while Samsung's Blu-Ray equivalent will cost double that. Sony still has an ace up its sleeve - it will build Blu-Ray players into its new Playstation 3 games console - and Blu-Ray discs have more capacity. But it will be hard to get consumers to buy something with a strange name unless the price is right.
Meanwhile, Google and Yahoo tussled with Microsoft over how data and entertainment are stored and displayed. Microsoft is building the capacity to arrange and catalogue photos, for example, into Vista and Media Centre. Yahoo's Go service, which it unveiled last week, holds all material centrally, allowing members to view it on computers, mobile phones and television.
Google's video downloading service will allow people to purchase videos, including television shows from CBS, at up to $1.99 each. They will be replayed on Google's own software and covered by a copy-protection program its engineers have written, rather than Microsoft's version. To rub it in, Google has included Firefox in the pack of free software that it launched in Las Vegas.
But none of this ejects Microsoft from the living room. Whichever alliance wins the high-definition DVD fight, its player could be connected to a network with Microsoft's Media Centre at its heart. Yahoo Go uses Media Centre to get images on to television and even Google Video software runs on Windows.
So the biggest issue for Microsoft, as always, is the need to repel any challenge to Windows. That means its trickiest fight could be not with Sony, Yahoo or Google but with Apple. If Apple managed to extend its digital music dominance into the living room by creating a more popular entertainment hub than Media Centre, that would really hurt.
Mr Jobs does not visit the Las Vegas show, preferring to keep his powder dry for Apple's Macworld gathering in San Francisco this week, so he remains hard to predict. But, if he harbours such ambitions, he may get help not from Microsoft's rivals but from one of its long-standing technology partners: Intel.
In the past, the roles in the "Wintel" alliance were well defined. Intel made the chips that powered computers and Microsoft contributed the operating software. But Intel, which has already reached a deal to supply chips for Apple's Macintosh computers, now has bigger ambitions under Mr Otellini. It wants not only to supply chips but to create its own technology standards.
That is the thinking behind Viiv, the home entertainment platform that it launched last week. So far, Intel has "played nice" with Microsoft, as one Intel executive says. The companies jointly developed software for Viiv and the launch version works with Media Centre and uses Microsoft copy-protection software.
But Viiv could equally form the backbone of an Apple entertainment hub, a possibility that Intel does not rule out. There were hints of this nascent tension last week. Mr Gates joked about mispronouncing Viiv (which rhymes with "five") and Mr Otellini made his own jab when there was a glitch in Yahoo's presentation about Go. "Oops, I think it's a Windows problem," he said.
Spoken in jest, but it illustrates the competitive reality of software, media and consumer electronics convergence. With so many companies trying to crowd into the living room, it is hardly surprising that there are divisions. You can already see the fights among rivals. Just wait for the tussles between friends.
This column now appears on Mondays
数字时代的较量
瞥
一眼你的客厅，它正变得越来越拥挤。微软(Microsoft)的比尔?盖茨(Bill Gates)和英特尔(Intel)的保罗?奥特里尼(Paul Otellini)坐在沙发上。索尼的霍华德?斯特林格(Howard Stringer)爵士在墙角和东芝(Toshiba)的西田厚聪(Atsutoshi Nishida)角力。雅虎(Yahoo)的特里?塞梅尔(Terry Semel)和Google的拉里?佩奇(Larry Page)一起走了进来。苹果(Apple)的史蒂夫?乔布斯(Steve Jobs)随时都会到来。
媒体、软件和技术的融合
上周在美国拉斯维加斯举办的国际电子消费品展(International Consumer Electronics Show)上，似乎就是这种情况。长久以来，人们一直都在预言媒体、软件和技术的融合，以至于还没出现多少现实的融合迹象，融合一词就过时了。上周，商业伙伴间达成的一批协议，以及对手间的竞争暗示着，也许(仅仅是也许)融合终于要实现了。
拿盖茨先生在拉斯维加斯展览会上的演示来说。表面看来，他需要展示的最重要产品是Windows Vista――推迟已久的新版Windows操作系统。但那不过是在打呵欠。虽然看上去挺漂亮，但他吹嘘的Vista新特性毫无新意。
Windows工具条，即位于屏幕边上的小应用程序集合，与雅虎的Widgets十分雷同。新版IE浏览器的标签与开放源代码对手Firefox的类似。现在，你可以快速搜索自己的所有文件，而为这一进步铺平道路却是Google。
尽管如此，千万别低估了微软坚持不懈、誓要成功的决心。视窗媒体中心(Windows Media Centre)就是这样的产品，它是用于电视的操作系统版本。目前，该产品变得更加考究，更加精致了：它是带有硬盘刻录机的娱乐中心，人们可以收看电视节目，还能储存和播放照片和音乐。
电视和电脑曾经互不相干，但它们正走到一起。数以百万计的人通过宽带连接到互联网，他们可以下载音乐和电影。显像管彩电即将出局，它将更多地被平板显示器取代。许多家庭都拥有家庭网络，通过网络它们可以在各种设备间传送内容，只要有合适的软件就行。而在硬盘刻录机(也就是小型电脑)上观看录制的电视节目正变得日益普遍。
都想切一块蛋糕
企业能够看到它带来的潜力，而且都想分一杯羹。事实上，有好几家企业都立志切得最大的一块蛋糕：它们希望成为所有电子设备的工作“平台”，电影、电视节目、照片和歌曲都能保存在上面。眼看苹果在数字音乐上取得了统治地位，它们也急于在家庭娱乐方面取得类似地位。
最激烈的较量是两种竞争中的高清视盘格式，即索尼发明的蓝光(Blu-Ray)和东芝推崇的HD-DVD(后者得到了微软等企业的支持)。蓝光是索尼在历经艰难之后，重建其技术领导地位的一次机会。
上周，HD-DVD占了上风。东芝将在3月份推出一款售价499美元的播放器，而三星(Samsung)的蓝光同类产品价格将是它的两倍。索尼手中还藏有一张王牌，它将把蓝光播放器嵌入到它新推出的游戏机PS3内，而且蓝光光盘的容量更大。不过除非价格合适，要让消费者去买这个名字奇怪的产品还是有困难的。
同时，在存储和播放数据和娱乐的方式上，Google和雅虎在和微软角力。微软正在发展整理和编排照片的能力，比如将这一功能加入Vista和媒体中心。上周，雅虎推出了Go服务，该服务集中了所有材料，用户可以通过电脑、手机和电视看到它。
Goole的视频下载服务，将允许人们以每次高达1.99美元的价格购买视频节目，其中包括哥伦比亚广播公司(CBS)的电视节目。这些节目可以在Google自己的软件中重放，而且受到Google工程师编写的防复制保护程序的保护，而非使用微软的保护程序。火上浇油的是，Google还在拉斯维加斯推出的免费软件包中加入了Firefox。
Windows与苹果之争
但这些都不能把微软撵出客厅。无论哪个阵营赢得了高清DVD之战，其播放机都可能要连上以微软媒体中心为核心的网络。雅虎Go要使用媒体中心，才能将图像传到电视上，就连Google的视频软件也要在Windows上运行。
因此，微软最大的问题，一直都是需要击退对Windows的挑战。这意味着，最艰难的战斗可能不是它与索尼、雅虎或Google间的战斗，而是与苹果的战斗。如果苹果开发了比媒体中心更受欢迎的娱乐中心，并因此成功将其在数字音乐领域的主导地位拓展至客厅，那微软将遭受重创。
乔布斯先生没有在拉斯维加斯展会上露面，他宁愿留一手，直到本周在旧金山召开的苹果Macworld大会上才露底，因此现在仍很难对他做出预测。但如果他如此雄心勃勃，可能不会从微软的对手那里得到帮助，反而会从微软的长期技术伙伴英特尔(Intel)那里获得获得帮助。
联盟也闹翻？
过去，在Windows与英特尔的联盟中，各自的角色都很明确。英特尔生产驱动电脑的芯片，微软则提供操作软件。但英特尔已经签署了一份协议，要为苹果的Macintosh电脑提供芯片，在奥特里尼先生的领导下，英特尔的抱负更大了。英特尔不仅想提供芯片，还想打造自己的技术标准。
这就是英特尔上周推出的家庭娱乐平台“欢跃”(Viiv)背后的想法。如一位英特尔高管所说，迄今为止英特尔与微软“相处融洽”。两家公司联合开发了用于“欢跃”的软件，推出的版本与媒体中心兼容，并使用微软的防复制保护软件。
但“欢跃”同样也可能成为苹果娱乐中心的支柱，英特尔并不排除这种可能。上周就出现了这种初露端倪的紧张迹象。盖茨先生拿Viiv发错音来开玩笑(“Viiv”与“five”押韵)，而当雅虎展示Go时出了个小故障，奥特里尼先生也回敬了一句。“哎哟，我想这是Windows出了问题，”他说道。
尽管是玩笑，但却说明了软件、媒体和电子消费品融合的竞争现实。这么多企业都在努力挤进客厅，存在分歧就不足为奇了。竞争对手之间已经在过招了，就等着朋友间的较量吧。
