AllVid was a proposal to develop technology enabling smart broadband-connected video devices to access the content on the managed networks of cable operators, telcos, and satellite-TV operators. It was initially proposed in the U.S.
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction ...
's (FCC) National Broadband Plan in 2010.
The AllVid hardware would act as a universal
adapter
An adapter or adaptor is a device that converts attributes of one electrical device or system to those of an otherwise incompatible device or system. Some modify power or signal attributes, while others merely adapt the physical form of one con ...
for all types of
pay TV
Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...
content such as video-on-demand and pay-per-view, as well as interactive programming guides, delivered through a wide variety of means, including
cable TV
Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broadc ...
,
satellite TV
Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna commo ...
,
VDSL
Very high-speed digital subscriber line (VDSL) and very high-speed digital subscriber line 2 (VDSL2) are digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies providing data transmission faster than the earlier standards of asymmetric digital subscriber line ...
,
IPTV
Internet Protocol television (IPTV) is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial, satellite, and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded media, ...
, and
Internet TV
Streaming television is the digital distribution of television content, such as TV shows, as streaming media delivered over the Internet. Streaming television stands in contrast to dedicated terrestrial television delivered by over-the-air aer ...
.
AllVid was intended to replace
CableCARD
CableCARD is a special-use PC Card device that allows consumers in the United States to view and record digital cable television channels on digital video recorders, personal computers and television sets on equipment such as a set-top box not pr ...
. Unlike CableCARD rules which only applied to cable operators, AllVid would apply to all Multichannel Video Programming Distributor’s (MVPDs) including satellite and telco companies.
As of January 2017, AllVid was never adopted or developed.
Design
The FCC has proposed several design aspects to AllVid while soliciting feedback from interested parties on a final specification before going forward for rulemaking. Major elements of the FCC's AllVid proposal include:
*Gateway device capable of decoding six video streams and feeding through a home network to various devices.
AllVid Notice of Inquiry
', p.10, 25 FCC Rcdbr>4284
/ref>
*Adapter device capable of decoding two video streams and feeding directly to a television or consumer electronics device.
*Physical connection using 100BASE-TX
In computer networking, Fast Ethernet physical layers carry traffic at the nominal rate of 100 Mbit/s. The prior Ethernet speed was 10 Mbit/s. Of the Fast Ethernet physical layers, 100BASE-TX is by far the most common.
Fast Ethern ...
Ethernet
Ethernet () is a family of wired computer networking technologies commonly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 198 ...
.
*Internet Protocol
The Internet Protocol (IP) is the network layer communications protocol in the Internet protocol suite for relaying datagrams across network boundaries. Its routing function enables internetworking, and essentially establishes the Internet.
IP h ...
as a communications protocol between the AllVid gateway and end devices.
*Encryption and authentication using the DTCP-IP Digital Transmission Content Protection (DTCP) is a digital rights management (DRM) technology that restricts digital home technologies including DVD players and televisions by encrypting interconnections between devices. This permits the distributi ...
standard used by the Digital Living Network Alliance
Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA; originally named Digital Home Working Group, DHWG) was founded by a group of PC and consumer electronics companies in June 2003 (with Intel in the lead role) to develop and promote a set of interoperability ...
.
AllVid Notice of Inquiry
', p.11, 25 FCC Rcdbr>4285
/ref>
*Content ordering and billing for VOD and PPV
PPV, ppv or pPv may refer to:
Technology
* Pay-per-view on cable or satellite television
* People Powered Vehicle, a human-powered vehicle from 1970
* Police Pursuit Vehicles, the most common police vehicles in the United States and Canada
Scienc ...
services may be handled via gateway generated screens but additional options are requested.
*Service discovery may use Universal Plug and Play
Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) is a set of networking protocols that permits networked devices, such as personal computers, printers, Internet gateways, Wi-Fi access points and mobile devices to seamlessly discover each other's presence on the n ...
, as suggested by TiVo
TiVo ( ) is a digital video recorder (DVR) developed and marketed by Xperi (previously by TiVo Corporation and TiVo Inc.) and introduced in 1999. TiVo provides an on-screen guide of scheduled broadcast programming television programs, whose fea ...
, but other proposals are invited.
*Content encoding is proposed to support multiple codecs
A codec is a device or computer program that encodes or decodes a data stream or signal. ''Codec'' is a portmanteau of coder/decoder.
In electronic communications, an endec is a device that acts as both an encoder and a decoder on a signal or da ...
to allow devices flexibility in choice of video formats without requiring transcoding by the gateway.
AllVid Notice of Inquiry
', p.12, 25 FCC Rcdbr>4286
/ref>
Responses
Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
has supported the AllVid proposal, stating that "Google supports an all-video (“AllVid”) solution like the one put forth in the NOI.
Consumers would be well-served by having such an inexpensive universal adapter available at retail
Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and t ...
, which would feature an easy-to-use, common interface, and employ nationwide interoperability standards to connect to televisions, digital video recording
A digital video recorder (DVR) is an electronic device that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card, SSD or other local or networked mass storage device. The term includes set-top boxes with direct to d ...
devices (“DVRs”), and other smart video devices. These navigation devices effectively would separate the network interface from the device functionality, making video more “portable” across platforms and devices."
The AllVid proposal has been criticized by the Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distribu ...
for providing insufficient protection against copyright infringement
Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, s ...
by unauthorized multichannel video programming distributor Multichannel television in the United States has been available since at least 1948. The United States is served by multichannel television through cable television systems, direct-broadcast satellite providers, and various other wireline video pro ...
s and by AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...
for preempting market forces already underway.
Industry alliance
On February 16, 2011 several companies announced the creation of the AllVid Tech Company Alliance. This group works to support implementation of the AllVid standard and specifically addresses issues raised by the National Cable Television Association
NCTA – The Internet & Television Association (formerly the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, and commonly known as the NCTA) is the principal trade association for the U.S. broadband and pay television industries. It represents ...
(NCTA). Alliance members include:
*Best Buy
Best Buy Co. Inc. is an American multinational consumer electronics retailer headquartered in Richfield, Minnesota. Originally founded by Richard M. Schulze and James Wheeler in 1966 as an audio specialty store called Sound of Music, it was rebra ...
Co., Inc.
*Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
Inc.
* Mitsubishi Digital Electronics America
*Nagravision
Nagravision (or Nagra Kudelski or simply Nagra) is a company of the Kudelski Group that develops conditional access systems for digital cable and satellite television. The name is also used for their main products, the Nagravision encryption syste ...
*SageTV
SageTV Media Center, now open source, was a proprietary, commercial DVR (Digital Video Recording) and HTPC (Home theater PC) software for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux. It requires that the host computer have a hardware-based TV tuner card. The S ...
, LLC
*Sony Electronics
, commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...
Inc.
*TiVo
TiVo ( ) is a digital video recorder (DVR) developed and marketed by Xperi (previously by TiVo Corporation and TiVo Inc.) and introduced in 1999. TiVo provides an on-screen guide of scheduled broadcast programming television programs, whose fea ...
Inc. - TiVo withdrew from the group in 2014
Successor proposals
Unlock The Box
In January 2016, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler
Thomas Edgar Wheeler (born April 5, 1946) is an American businessman and former government official. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 31st Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.
He was appointed by President Bara ...
proposed rulemaking to "unlock the set-top box
A set-top box (STB), also colloquially known as a cable box and historically television decoder, is an information appliance device that generally contains a TV-tuner input and displays output to a television set and an external source of sign ...
" and the FCC voted to move forward with the proposal in February 2016. Critics claimed that this proposal was essentially AllVid which Wheeler refuted. The FCC never had a vote to adopt the proposal because Wheeler could not get a majority of commissioners to support it. In September 2020 the FCC closed the navigation device proceeding and eliminates CableCARD support and reporting requirements.[, 4 December 2020]
See also
* Keychest
Movies Anywhere (MA) is a Cloud computing, cloud-based Digital rights management, digital rights digital locker, locker and Over-the-top content, over-the-top streaming platform that allows users to Streaming media, stream and download purchas ...
* RVU protocol
The RVU protocol (RVU, a pseudo-acronym pronounced "R-view" ) is an Application Layer protocol, that combines the pre-existing Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) standards and a new Remote User Interface (RUI) protocol, which works similar ...
* UltraViolet
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nanometer, nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 Hertz, PHz) to 400 nm (750 Hertz, THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than ...
* Set-top box
A set-top box (STB), also colloquially known as a cable box and historically television decoder, is an information appliance device that generally contains a TV-tuner input and displays output to a television set and an external source of sign ...
References
External links
In the Matter of Video Device Competition
(Proceeding 10-91) on the Electronic Comment Filing System from the FCC
{{North American DTV
Digital rights management standards
Federal Communications Commission
Cable television technology
Set-top box