IP Television and Movies

Internet TV and IPTV are popular topics among geeks these days.

Internet TV is the delivery of content through any broadband internet connection and mostly includes television shows which originated from television networks. Everything from F-Troop to Lost can be viewed on your computer now. Some sites charge a nominal fee and some require a special application to view the shows but there are many free programs which will play in your browser window.

Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) is more like cable television in that it's provided on a subscription basis. In its current form (in limited areas), programming is pretty much identical to that available from cable or satellite providers. Most seem to think the future will allow time-shifting, on-demand programming, so you watch any show when you want - no schedules.

In both Internet TV and IPTV, programming is delivered by Internet Protocol (IP) through a network. In the case of IPTV, the network is a closed, private network and the television-to-network interfaces are proprietary.

By the end of this year I suspect we'll start seeing quite a few digital televisions with built-in networking to allow direct connection to the internet. Already there are a few products which attach to your existing television to provide internet connectivity - the most notable of those products being the latest version of Apple TV.

Services such as NetFlix, iTunes, Amazon's Unbox, and even HBO are offering movies (and television shows) for rent or purchase through a broadband internet connection. You make your selections online, download the show and watch on your TV. In some cases you can begin watching within a few minutes and in other cases, especially with movies, it can take a day or so before you can watch. Very little high definition content is available because of bandwidth limitations in delivering such huge files.

If you're like me, you'd much rather watch TV and movies on your television set. I do watch a fair amount of television programming on my computer but I really prefer to watch on my TV. I just don't always have the choice because I cannot transfer shows from my computer to my cable company supplied DVR. A major reason for me to pull the trigger and buy a TiVoHD - and to have that option for high definition content.

For a pretty good article about Internet TV and IPTV, take a look here