Just like travel sites are posing a serious challenge to conventinal travel agents, so does IPTV have the potential to threaten cable operators in the near future.

Although "direct-to-home" Satellite TV is already available as a byepass to Cable TV, it is IPTV which is expected to offer a more viable option. And the signs are clearly visible.

Around 6 months ago, leading news channel CBS announced its decision to launch CBSNews.com. Soon, sister channel CBS Sports followed suit with Sportsline.com.

ESPN, Fox Sports and Yahoo! Sports are early birds in launching their web-sites. And this is reflected in their massive web-site traffic figures.

So what was so hot about the CBS web-sites?

Synchronizing TV Content with Websites
Unlike the leader ESPN, as well as the larger Yahoo! Sports & Fox Sports which are sports portals, CBS Sportsline.com was positioned as a TV channel - a broadband TV channel, in a new text cum video format. Similarly, CBSNews.com was launched as a 24 hour broadband channel.

Both CBSNews.com & CBS Sportsline.com are based on a solid commitment to integrate all television newsgathering resources with the web-sites - to provide round-the-clock, original reporting & analysis on the web. Unlike the others, CBS clearly aims to replace or at least provide an alternative to its Cable & Satellite delivery.

It's not surprising that CBS Sportsline already hosts the original CBS Sports library along with video blogs covering live sports events. While CBS News' blog ("Public Eye") is a direct line of communication between their news team and the public (viewers).

The Future Format of Television 
News consumption has been shifting steadily from TV to the web. Naturally, news channels like CBSNews could very well shift their primary delivery platform to the web. If we accept this argument, the next logical step is a change in format from the current TV format (streaming video).

A new, youthful format of Television is developing - as is evident from the CBS web-sites. This new format is a mix of:
 • On-demand, 24-hour IPTV news network with
 • Text content
 • Streaming video Downloadable video (including possible paid content for sports)
 • Blogs
 • Citizen reporting & feedback (with video based options)

Add the patented (!) "Cable Byepass" strategy which will permit office workers direct access to news and you have an explosive combination.

New Problems, New Revenues
As of date, broadband video quality cannot compare with satellite & cable television. But this is changing rapidly - over the next couple of years, new compression software along thicker broadband pipelines will yield high quality broadband video broadcast, which will be comparable with conventional television broadcasts.

Meanwhile, the lower quality will be compensated by the fact that IPTV will be viewed during working hours (as news breaks).

Coming to revenues. As of today, web-site revenue comes from banner ads & video commercials which precede the broadband content. Additional revenues are expected from sponsorship for the blogs. As well as product placement on reality shows as well as blogs.

And being early days, it is not unreasonable to expect commercials breaks in-between content - bringing it closer to the TV channel format that we are familiar with!