Vista wins Olympic gold; XP doesn’t place
An NBC deal means Vista users can watch the entire Beijing Olympic Games through online streaming. But those on XP are out of luck, as are Mac and open source users.
Technically the deal isn’t favoring Vista as such; rather the set-up will only work on Media Center, meaning you’ll need either either the Home Premium or Ultimate editions.
That eliminates an even greater proportion of the potential audience: many business users on notebook PCs will be unable to watch, while handheld devices such as video iPods are also a no-go.
Even those who are able to take advantage of the service will have to download an extra piece of software, Wavexpress, to be able to see the video. As analyst Phil Leigh pointed out to Investors Business Daily, that’s likely to be offputting, particularly given that popular video sites such as YouTube don’t require any additional software.
Wavexpress is actually the key to the deal: it’s fundamentally an agreement between NBC and Wave Systems, which produces the software, rather than NBC teaming up with Microsoft.
It’s likely NBC chose to partner with Wave Systems to make it easier to sell advertising that will be inserted in the videos. It’s likely they’ll be able to command high rates among firms which want to target fans of particular sports. However, it’s questionable whether this will outweigh the potential revenue from broadcasting online to a wider audience through all operating systems (or even just all Windows users).
The broadcast deal partially makes up for Vista’s previous Olympic disappointment. Games organisers originally decided to use XP for all official tasks such as scheduling and tracking results, with reports they feared Vista wasn’t reliably stable enough. They later decided to switch to Unix for the core work, though XP will still appear on many official desktop PCs.
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July 1st, 2008
If they don’t want people to watch, thats fine by me.
July 1st, 2008
Isn’t it going to be broadcast on TV? With my lack of bandwidth coupled with Media Centre’s deficiencies I think it would be a total disaster to even attempt to view at probably 1 or 2 fps. I can’t believe that this is a Vista sales pitch, surely not? I’ll watch the TV reports on (the now unavailable) XP through my TV card or from satellite streamed from my box – that’ll do for me. Or of course I’ll just put my feet up on the sofa and watch it via the television.
I bet there are a lot of Mac, XP and open source users biting their fists now though wishing that they had chosen Vista for this treat.
July 1st, 2008
“…video sites such as YouTube don’t require any additional software”
they don’t? what the hell is flash? that’s why i don’t watch youtube videos because i refuse to install flash.
July 2nd, 2008
Xepharian –
Have you ever even used Media Center? 1 to 2 FPS? Media Center is cool, its better looking then Tivo… I just don’t understand everyone hating MS and Vista… I’ve been using it since June 07, and 64 bit Ultimate edition… the only problem I have is that sometimes my Sonicwall VPN client (in beta still…) sometimes conflicts with Virtual PC, which I use to run XP Pro, Server 2003, Server 2008, all at the same time and within Vista Ultimate. Its great.
July 2nd, 2008
Gary – That’s a fair point. To be more accurate, I should have written that Youtube doesn’t require additional software for most users. (Adobe estimates 98-99% of internet users have Flash installed.)
July 2nd, 2008
Hi Chuck
I ran Vista courtesy of Microsoft for the pre-release trials and Dual booted it with XP. I really wanted it to be good but for me it wasn’t. I, like many others was bitterly disappointed. Yes I have tried Media Center as I have Vista Ultimate running fully updated to SP1 but after a long time of trying it out I have gone back to XP as my OS of choice. I’m not anti Microsoft per se just disappointed in the way they are going and their arrogance wrto the consumer. I think that they have lost their direction currently and need to rethink what they are trying to do as a Company.
I’m from the UK and my previous post was meant to be read with a pinch of salt, a little tongue in cheek perhaps however I have had nothing but bad experiences from Media Center in Vista and get on a lot better using the software provided by my TV card manufacturer and running it in XP.