Sony and the six largest cable operators announced an agreement Tuesday to move in the direction of eliminating the set-top box from the consumers already cluttered landscape.

The agreement is between Sony and Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable Inc., Cox Communications Inc., Charter Communications, Cablevision Systems Corp. and Bright House Networks which comprises over 80 percent of U.S. cable subs. The Java-based platform will utilize the tru2way specification. According to CableLabs, existing applications include interactive guides, "start over" applications, and games; future applications might include, for example, interactive ads, chat, web browsing, and t-commerce

Specific to IPTV and interactive applications that reside on the multitude of set-top boxes from companies like Ensequence, which basically alluded to an integration of components within the TV form factor.

According to Aslam Khader, chief product officer at Ensequence, "the merging of technology will basically move the set-top box componentry into the TV and the applications that Ensequence customers produce will run on the TV set, which may lead to more consistent interactive television implementations."

One might think this a boon for such companies as they will no longer have write compliant applications across hundreds of different boxes. How this may improve the work flow from a consistency, human resource perspective, cycle time or cost perspective may not yet be known. NueLion which uses a proprietary set-top box for distributing IPTV content did not reply to our request prior to going to press.

Interview with Rob Angelino about Beauty TV. Beauty TV is a 24/7 beauty network and is in pre-production on a daily hybrid syndicated show for traditional broadcast television.. Content is focused on beauty tips, hair, skin, nails, cosmetic surgery, spas, health, fitness, insider interviews, beauty news, product reviews and trends. Current advisory board members include John Paul DeJoria, founder of Paul Mitchell Systems and Patron Tequila and former executives from EXTRA TV, 'E!" Entertainment, Sony Television and AOL.

Audio Interview with Rob E. Angelino, Founder & CEO Beauty TV

Levi Shapiro spoke with noted Advertising, Film and Internet personalities at this year's Digital Hollywood.

Tim Chang, Principal, Norwest Venture Partners
Convergence of Silicon Valley and Hollywood, packaging your story when pitching to a VC or Content House, M&A topics

Richard Kerris, CTO, LucasFilm
How to achieve a mult-discipline output with your content if structured properly. Working with Artists and giving them more options by way of technology tools. Think about the pipeline and not the product.

Matti Leshem, CEO, Protagonist
Thinking about big ideas for brands, the brand experience and how best to give the brand energy on the right platform.

Paul Levine, SVP Corporate Strategy, Development & Extended Platforms, National Geographic Global Media
Producing content that inspires people to care about the planet and how to make it work across all platforms.

Ziv Navoth, VP Marketing, Bebo
The next step for Social Networks amidst their current fragmentation, Hollywood move beyond the idea that the Internet is solely a distribution channel and to create content for online and social networks.

Digital Hollywood Interviews

Charles spoke about the new Expression Encoder 2, the workflow process using hooks, making a case for creating a native Mac version of the application and the community for content creators.

If you are on the Mac, send us an email and we will forward to Charles along with the beta testing of the encoder we have underway.

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Dan spoke about this years SME conference, some of the challenges facing CDN's, how to monetize content issues facing Creatives

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Streaming Media East has just started, here are some photos as companies start setting up. My question is what is the theme for the show, will it be mainly how P2P is ramping and will it be more focused solely on the hardware and software, or will the business of ITV/IPTV be given serious consideration?

Click on slide for show

The following is a press release.

KyLinTV announces its relief campaign to help China earthquake victims. In response to the disaster that rocked Wenchuan County on May 12th, KyLinTV has established the KyLinTV China Earthquake Relief Fund.

Each donation to this fund will be matched by the same amount from KyLinTV and dispersed to those victims in China. In an effort to make an impact and generate the most aid, 100% of all donations will go directly to these victims, with no overhead costs or handling fees. KyLinTV is matching dollar for dollar every single donation to help in this time of crisis.

There are three ways to make a donation: via KyLinTV's website www.kylintv.com; calling the KyLinTV China Earthquake Relief Fund Hotline at 1-877-888-8598 extension 6; or KyLinTV subscribers can donate from their set-top-boxes.

"My deepest thoughts are with the victims and their families. I encourage everyone to reach out and support those who need our help. As a company that strives to connect Chinese worldwide, we urge everyone to aid in this relief effort and save lives," said Nancy Li, CEO of KyLinTV.

About KyLinTV
KyLinTV is the first IPTV service dedicated to the Chinese community living in North America, offering both live broadcast and 30,000+ hours of video on demand programming. For more information on KyLinTV programming please visit www.kylintv.com

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Editors Note:

While much has been made lately in the U.S. presidential campaign about the word "Appeasement", the act of engagement for a potentially constructive outcome can hardly be called the same. In order to appease, you first have to give away something...

While some want to twist the meaning of the word for political motivations, if not for former President Nixon (irony) and his overtures to China, the world might not have seen these images let alone the dialog, trade and cultural exchanges that continues between our two countries. Having said that, it does not negate the repressive policies the countries leaders have in place.

There is a line from the movie Jurassic Park, "life will find a way" In this case, I content that ITV/ IpTV as a component of the Internet will prove overtime as a great tool to reach, inform, engage, entertain and in this case help people, even people who's leaders we disagree with.

A recent interview with Ken Lowe, VP of Strategic Marketing for Sigma Designs. Ken addressed a variety of topics concerning Blu-ray, the IPTV marketplace over the next couple of years as well as competition from Broadcom, IP and the companies recent financial performance.

Audio Interview with Ken Lowe