Comcast launched its “ON DEMAND” service in Dallas for about 300,000 customers of digital cable service. Viewers can rewind, fast forward and pause programs, store selections for up to 24 hours and order any time of day.

Several important communications-related items could pass Congress this week as it returns for a brief lame- duck session, industry and congressional sources said. The loudest buzz is on the universal service fund (USF) and the controversy over the FCC’s change in accounting mechanisms that could slow some E-rate payments and possibly lead to a rise in contributions, and several sources expected some efforts to push a legislative solution.

VoodooPC announced it has shipped the Voodoo Vibe, which it claimed was “the world’s first Central Home Theater and Entertainment PC.” Like other custom PCs from the company, the Vibe was optimized for computer gaming, but Voodoo said its latest system also was designed to play DVD movies and download music and video, as well as serve as a central media server PC. The company also shipped a custom “Vibe Xbox” that it said allowed users, in conjunction with the Vibe PC, not only to play Xbox games but also record and pause live TV like a typical PVR. It said that by hooking up the Vibe to the custom Xbox, the user could stream video, display slide shows, play MP3 files and burn recordings to DVD. Unclear Wed. was the custom Xbox’s pricing and whether Microsoft authorized the modified console. Voodoo and Microsoft didn’t respond to requests for comment by our deadline. Vibe is equipped with AMD Athlon 64 processors, its video is powered by Nvidia and it features up to 1.6 terrabytes of Hitachi drive storage.

TV viewers with short attention spans might appreciate work in progress on receivers and recorders that will let them skip commercials or even parts of programs. Patent searches by Consumer Electronics Daily found a handful of such devices in development -- although it’s presumed products won’t likely see the light of day due to commercial and political pressures. One patent filing (US 2004/0155986) by Japan’s Orion describes a TV that detects tell-tale signs of a commercial break and cuts to another program. The set has 2 tuners. One constantly receives a main choice channel while the other is set to receive a 2nd channel. As soon as a commercial interrupts the first program, the set switches to the alternate channel. When the commercial break on the first channel ends, the set automatically switches back. A Thomson patent application (US 2003/0115595) contemplates a different way to deal with commercials. It describes a TV with a built-in videogame which switches on when the set detects the start of a commercial. The viewer plays the game while the ad is in progress, and then the receiver switches back to live TV as the break ends. The TV freezes the game at the switch-over point and stores the score. At the next commercial break, the viewer can resume playing the game where it left off. Meanwhile, Philips is working on a way to improve PVRs that pause live TV by continually recording onto a hard drive. According to Philips’ patent filing (US 2004/0091249), the trouble with current PVRs is that if the viewer switches channels to avoid commercial breaks mid-movie, the hard drive either stops recording or records the disjointed channels hops. Philips’ solution is to use 2 tuners in a PVR, one of which keeps recording a main choice channel while the other lets the viewer zap through other channels during a commercial. If the viewer is slow getting back to the first channel after a commercial, that program will still be recorded to the hard drive intact for viewing. Mitsubishi is working on a system for time-shifters who record a long sports event, but want to watch only the highlights. Its patent application (US 2004/0167767) describes a video recorder programmed to detect the characteristic noise of crowd applause or booing. So when the viewer fast-forwards through a long recording, playback resumes whenever the crowd is perceived to be reacting to a key play or other event in the game. Mitsubishi is leveraging its research on MPEG-7 compression. Previous efforts elsewhere for similar systems have tried to analyze picture content, or used speech recognition software to detect key words from a sportscaster or other commentator.

Promoting widespread use of the term “transmitters disabled” and corresponding screen icons is at the heart of a CEA draft of a standardized “recommended practice” that is circulating for comment and ultimately could ease restrictions on use of wireless personal electronic devices (PEDs) aboard commercial aircraft (CED Sept 22 p7). CEA has set a Sept. 27 deadline for comments on the draft, with the aim of releasing it as a final voluntary standard Oct. 18, opening day of the CEA Industry Forum in San Francisco (CED Sept 3 p5).

Promoting widespread use of the term “transmitters disabled” and corresponding screen icons is at the heart of a CEA draft of a standardized “recommended practice” that is circulating for comment and ultimately could ease restrictions on use of wireless personal electronic devices (PEDs) aboard commercial aircraft . CEA has set a Sept. 27 deadline for comments on the draft, with the aim of releasing it as a final voluntary standard Oct. 18, opening day of the CEA Industry Forum in San Francisco.

Cox Cable is taking a “don’t ask, don’t sell” posture toward unidirectional CableCARDs, said Rick Guerrero, Cox vp-broadband engineering services. Cox is offering one- way CableCARDs “when somebody asks for one,” but isn’t actively promoting them, he said: “I guess we're just leery of the customer service experience.” When a customer buys a digital cable ready TV and procures a one- way CableCARD from Cox -- only to discover later it doesn’t offer features like video on demand or electronic program guides -- “we're probably going to be the ones who get beat up for it,” he said: “So we'd much prefer to wait” until 2-way CableCARDs become available “because a whole lot more things can be done with them.” Two-way CableCARDs will provide “a much more robust customer experience as opposed to the one-way cards that are out today,” Guerrero said. Ultimately, the fewer digital set- top boxes Cox needs to buy and “the less investment we'll have to make,” the better, when customers begin opting for bidirectional CableCARDs, he said: “That will be pushed down to the customer and help our capital investment side of the house.”

LOS ANGELES -- HDNet’s strategy in HDTV content delivery is to “break the mold, not stick to it” by proving that being consumer-driven and profit-driven aren’t “mutually exclusive,” its chmn., Mark Cuban, told the HDTV Forum here Wed. In a provocative keynote, he sought to rally TV display makers to support him in resisting those who would put “quantity over quality” in the delivery of HDTV programming. He also called on the CE industry to “ignore Hollywood” in building alliances he said have the effect of stifling innovation and working against what’s best for the consumer.

Switzerland’s leading telco will use “Microsoft TV” technology for a 600-channel test of video over DSL to 25 homes starting in Sept., Swisscom announced Tues. The 4- month test by subsidiary Bluewin is to lead up to a planned 2005 market launch, it said. The offering includes 5 pay channels, video on demand and an integrated video recorder allowing users to pause live TV, it said. Bluewin TV plans to offer various program packages and a la carte channels to Switzerland’s 700,000 DSL subscribers.

The Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service asked for comments on issues referred by the FCC in June (CD June 29 p5). The Joint Board said the FCC asked it to consider whether: (1) Universal service support for rural carriers should be based on embedded or forward-looking costs. For example, the joint board said, the agency asked whether “basing support on forward-looking economic costs or on embedded costs better ensures the availability of telecommunications services in rural areas that are comparable to those in urban areas” and whether “basing support on forward-looking economic costs remain integral to providing appropriate incentives for investment, innovation and entry into the marketplace?” (2) The definition of “rural telephone company” for high-cost universal service support purposes should be changed. (3) Multiple study areas within a state can be consolidated. (4) Rules that determine the amount of universal service support for transferred telephone exchanges should be retained or modified. The FCC in 2001 decided to continue using a modified embedded cost support mechanism for rural carriers for 5 years, ending June 2006, while it considered a more permanent mechanism. Nonrural companies are required to base universal service support on forward-looking costs. Mont. PSC Comr. Bob Rowe, who’s joint board chmn., said the board plans to hold an en banc hearing as part of the proceeding. Although the board plans to look at the cost basis for support to rural carriers, Rowe said, “I would not support imposing on smaller companies costing methodologies… that do not in my opinion always work terribly well even when applied to large companies.” He said he has “substantial and long-standing concern about the reliability of the hybrid cost proxy model even as currently applied to large companies.” As he did when the FCC referred the issue to the joint board in June, FCC Comr. Martin said he’s concerned “by the decision to revisit whether the Commission should adopt a universal service support mechanism for rural carriers based on hypothetical forward-looking economic costs.” Martin said he questioned the use of forward-looking costs “as the basis for distributing universal service support for non-rural telephone companies and would have even greater concerns if such an approach would be used to distribute support to rural companies.” He said he thought the agency could “better achieve sufficient universal service support and comparability of rates if we base our universal service support on actual rather than forward looking costs.” Repeating a concern he expressed at the time of the FCC referral, Comr. Adelstein said the use of forward-looking cost models to calculate support for rural telephone companies “gives me great pause.” Said Comr. Abernathy: “Although a prior Commission embraced a forward-looking cost methodology for all carriers, we are launching this renewed inquiry to take a fresh look at the wisdom and feasibility of abandoning the embedded cost mechanism used to support rural telephone companies.” Comments are due Oct. 15, replies Dec. 14.