The Future of TV: No Networks, Remotes...or TVs?

TV networks will be dead in 20 years, replaced with a system of computerized content that will be molded to your preferences.

According to a survey of more than 50 television experts surveyed in advance of the Over-The-Top Conference to be held this week in San Jose, many of the conventions users are used to in the living room - channels, remote controls, and, well, even the "living room" - are going away.

The survey was conducted by Cisco Systems, as part of its Service Provider Practice, which seeks to identify broad trends and market disruptions, and work with service providers and media companies to address them. Cisco first interviewed experts, such as researchers with MIT's Media Lab, then boiled down the freewheeling interviews to a series of predictions. Cisco then followed up with the original experts to see if they agreed.

The results aren't necessarily designed to be a short-term prediction of the future of television, but a "Jetsons"-like look at the future of 2030, said Scott Puopolo, the vice president and global lead of Cisco's Service Provider Practice who led the study and will discuss it at the OTTCon on Tuesday.

The study looked more at the future of technology rather than the business models that will be needed to drive them, although the future of advertising was included.

"Nine months ago, I was really thinking about all the history behind the television industry," Puopolo said. "It's been years since we were kids. I grew up in the Boston area, and there were like five TV channels, all in black and white. Now, I look at my kids today, and they're doing Netflix via the Wii."

Although Puopolo said he will only present five predictions at the OTT conference, Cisco's paper lists ten.

The predictions:

1.) Channels will go away. Instead, most viewers will watch on-demand streams of content with access to libraries of unlimited content, Puopolo said. Screen will have sophisticated recommendation capabilities, so that the TV experience actually aligns itself with your tastes.

"The TV 'channel' you watch won't be the same as the one I watch," Puopolo said, adding that a good way to think of the concept is a combination of Pandora's recommendation engine and Netflix. Users won't have a relationship with a channel like ABC, but with the actual developer of the content, such as Disney.

According to Cisco, 100 percent of the experts the company polled believed that this will come to pass.

2.) Kiss the traditional remote goodbye. Instead, consumers will use gesture- and voice-based controls, such as those used by the Microsoft Kinect, Puopolo said. Users should expect a Minority Report-style experience, where gestures control the TV, which should also be able to sense the user's mood.

3.) Screens should be everywhere. Nielsen estimates that 160 million U.S. homes own a TV. By 2030, that will no longer be true, Cisco's paper predicts. Americans will invest in screens, but there will be thinner, larger than what we have today, and more portable.

Instead of a dedicated "TV screen," displays will be mounted on walls, used as mirrors, worn as wristwatches and elsewhere. Videoconferencing will be built in, the experts polled by Cisco predicted.

But will screens be screens? Probably. The concept of holographic TV remains, for now, a fantasy: only 17 percent of the experts polled believed that holograms would become reality by 2030.

4.) The 30-second ad is history. On the surface, here's some good news: prompted by DVRs and cheap subscription-based broadcasts, the concept of the 30-second ad could go the way of black-and-white television.

Don't think that the ads themselves are going to go away, though. The experts polled by Cisco think that users will eventually be able to point and click on an item used by a TV character: a drink, perhaps, or a shirt. And what ads thee will be personalized and targeted right at the user, based on a wealth of demographic and personalized information that the user has willingly or unwillingly shared.

So how will personalized ads work in a time of no ads? Either via ads that the users will care about, or personalized product placement. Could James Bond drive a souped-up Ford Focus on one screen, and an Aston Martin on another? "Sure, why not?" Puopolo said.

5.) Consumers will get involved. Tomorrow's shows will take today's invitations to follow a company on Twitter and on Facebook and take them down the road to social interaction even further. Fans will follow individual characters on Twitter, and work out plot developments with their friends.

"Although the 'fan' mentality has always existed, it will morph from a process of collecting and following to one of interacting and influencing,"the Cisco report claims. "Technology innovation and adoption have reached levels where this type of interaction is not only possible, but also can be supported without enormous budgets. Social networking and smartphones, key enablers of this experience, have achieved mass-market adoption."

Not surprisingly, 45 percent of those poled felt that this would happen in the near future, rather than later.

6.) Watch together, virtually. Technology like telepresence will allow users to virtually "share" the experience of watching a TV show together. Actually, in a way, this technology launched a little less than two years ago, with Sony's CineChat, part of its BD-Live applications. So far, however, it doesn't appear to be a success. Still, 87 percent of those polled by Cisco felt it would happen, with 45 percent stating it would in the near future.

7.) Smell-o-vision?! That's right. Cisco's seventh prediction is that TV broadcasters are eventually going to try and capture other senses, including smell and touch. "There's an opportunity to make it even more immersive," Puopolo said.

8.) Your content follows you. Of the experts Cisco polled, 93 percent agreed, and 43 percent thought the prediction was too conservative. And who can blame them? Today, Netflix and Sling Media streams to both phones, laptops, and game devices; mobile TV is available in Asian taxicabs.

One advancement, according to the experts, would be the ability to transfer information from one mobile device to another with the flick of a finger. Snapstick already allows users to flick content from a phone to a TV; the question, however, is whether DRM restrictions make this a realistic future.

Still, Puopolo said, it could happen. "The content would reside in the cloud, where the DRM would have to be at that level," he said. "I might flick the content to somebody's screen, but it's my content; on that screen, when my friend has completed the viewing of the content that I flicked, he doesn't retain ownership once the viewing is completed."

9.) Regular Joes go Hollywood. Not surprisingly, this is an extension of today's amateur YouTube videos, into a world where semi-professional content can be monetized.

"The box office success of low-budget films such as Paranormal Activity and Slumdog Millionaire demonstrates that viral marketing can fuel positive revenue outcomes for the independent film market," cisco's report said. "Going forward, web-based collaboration tools will give these amateurs alternatives not only for marketing their content, but also for bankrolling their projects and finding affordable, skilled technical and creative people they need to execute their vision."

Ninety percent of Cisco's experts agreed with this, and more than 40 percent thought that the pace of change would happen more quickly than the other innovations.

10.) Creation goes viral. Even writers run out of ideas. But dedicated fans rarely do. The last prediction made by Cisco's group of experts claims that show writers will encourage fans to either contribute ideas or else give them some limited control of the direction of future episodes - if the show airs on a Wednesday, then the fans will have until Friday to determine the direction of the next episode. Think of it as a "Choose Your Own Adventure" for the video age.

Seventy-three percent of the experts Cisco polled agreed. But 45 percent though this would take longer to come to pass than the other predictions.

At OTTCon, the question will be how the industry monetizes these views - where that money will come from, and how it will be provided. "The implication of all this is that competition for the user will intensify dramatically," Puopolo said.