Former AOL chief predicts transformation of television

Filed in archive IPTV on April 16, 2005

Interactive television may finally flourish amid the long-promised convergence of communications technologies, says Barry Schuler, the former chief executive of AOL. Barry Schuler writes on "What's holding back interactive TV?" in a special feature entitled ME TV on news.com.

He says "new forces in motion may finally transform TV forever". He points out that unmentionable "C word" convergence is finally happening, as previously separate networks for telephone, cable television and the internet begin to merge. This, he says, "will set the stage for the biggest changes we have seen in TV yet".

He concludes: "We are on the precipice of a nuclear battle for the hearts and minds of the very couch potatoes who, up until now, have not been very interested in anything that complicates the TV 'zone out' time."

He goes on to make some valid points about TiVo and other attempts to change television.

The innovators' biggest mistake is to overestimate the desire to engage with new technology and underestimate how difficult it is to change consumer habits. This is a point worth remembering as advocates of DVRs, VOD, and IPTV think that everything must change and soon. Experience teachs us that consumers shift their habits slowly and only when there is a significant advantage in doing so. And the new technology must be mind-numbingly simple to use.