And Now… Google TV

Around here we have been having an internal discussion about changing the name of the company.

Rosenblumtv.  It’s the TV part (though some would like to change the first part as well, I am currently opposing that move).

TV smells old.

It smells of 1956 and Howdy Doody and a big DuMont TV set in the living room with the whole family gathered around,

(which in fact was how we grew up when I was a kid).

Qasar – works in a drawer!  The repairman could access the tubes without taking off the back of the set.

Well, mercifully, those days are over. Now we’ve got those 54″ flat panel things hanging on every room in the house.  But it still smells of the 1950’s.  TV.

So it was intriguing to read that Google is now going to get into the TV business.

Next month, Google is going to unveil Google TV.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Google is going to announce its Android based TV software in San Francisco on May 19th.

And what will it be?

From what one can tell reading the tea leaves, it’s going to marry web surfing and television on a set box so that you will no longer be able to tell the difference. That is, (if I am getting this right), you will be able to go to Youtube or Hulu as easily as you go to NBC or CBS.

Well, this is bad news for NBC and CBS.

For the past three years we have run our Apple Mini through the flat screen in the living room (which being Manhattan is also part of the dining room).  The flat screen is on hinges and swivels out to sit perpendicular to the room.  Often at dinner parties we will get into a conversation that entails a trip to Google or something else. If you were at a restaurant, you might reach for you iPhone, but at dinner, increasingly, we have taken the web to the table as part of the conversation.

The other night, with 8 people over for dinner, we migrated to Youtube and starting playing old rock songs from the 70s (yes we are old). It turns out you can find just about everything on Youtube, including old Janis Ian or (gulp) Donovan.  And before you knew it, it was Karaoke night for the AK set.

Now, if you can get to the web in an instant with the touch of a button (if that is not too archaic), who is really going to go to NBC, particularly if you can get House or Law and Order on demand on line?

Watch for a collapse in ad rates as viewership evaporates.

Michael Rosenblum

For more than 35 years, Michael Rosenblum has been on the cutting edge of the digital video journalism revolution. During this time, he has lead a drive for video literacy, and the complete rethinking of how television is made and controlled. His work has included: The complete transitioning of The BBC's national network (UK) to a VJ-driven model, starting in 2002. The complete conversion of The Voice of America, the United State's Government's broadcasting agency, (and the largest broadcaster in the world), from short wave radio to television broadcasting and webcasting using the VJ paradigm (1998-present). The construction of NYT Television, a New York Times Company, and the largest producer of non-fiction television in the US. Rosenblum was both the founder and President of NYT TV, (all based on this paradigm (1996-1998). The President and Founder of Video News International, a global VJ-driven newsgathering company, with more than 100 journalists around the world. (1993-1996). Other clients include Spectrum News, Verizon and CBS News.

2 Comments
  • Chris Kohatsu May 01, 2010

    Martha Stewart uses an all encompassing word: Omnimedia.

  • fosca May 01, 2010

    why would you want to change the name of an established company? it is tv what you do and it doesn´t change a thing if displayed on a set or computer. for reasons unexplicable to me another word reveberates somewhere in the realms of my head when i read the name of your brand.
    ROSEBUD! funny tricks ones brains can play…have a nice mayday.