Basic Set-Top Box as a Tool for a Cottage Industry and How You May Get IT
MeterNet and Advent Communications demos the MeterNet telephone-based WB6400 set-top box for Ruel

San Diego (6-7-99) - A couple Mondays ago, I got a chance to get a look at a MeterNet WB6400 set-top box. MeterNet has a partnership with Advent Communications which is a Texas-based communications company. In addition to providing brand identification programs for mainstream companies such as Nokia, Advent Communications specializes in niche communications for multi-level-marketing (MLM) companies and other direct selling companies. While getting a chance to look at the box, the Advent and MeterNet folks told me a little bit about what they are doing. I would normally want to write a review of the set-top box and discuss the box's capabilities with screen shots of the set-top box's screen interface. However, I was only invited to see a hour-long private demo presented by Advent Communications CEO Dr. Clifton Jolley and MeterNet CEO Greg Wible. Also, the WB6400 is currently intended for vertical markets and not for the retail consumer market. So, I'll instead discuss how Advent is marketing the box as well as discuss how this fits into the overall context of the interactive TV arena. If you are interested in finding out about how people may want to use set-top boxes in niche business markets, read on.

Please note that I have NO affiliation with Advent, MeterNet, or with any MLM that is marketing set-top boxes. I just wanted to look at the MeterNet box. They gave me a nice tee-shirt for visiting with them, but I essentially get nothing from Advent or MeterNet for writing this commentary. (Hey, I had to pay six bucks for parking at the Sheraton hotel they were staying at for a convention.) Anyways, this commentary gives me a chance to discuss the overall context of the interactive TV world by looking at where the Advent-MeterNet package fits in as well as discuss how consumers may possibly get their set-top boxes in the future.

Advent Communications is a company that provides marketing communication products and services to MLMs. Advent is not a MLM. The apparent intent in selling the MeterNet WB6400 is to get the boxes to MLM distributors as TOOLS to easily connect with managers and corporate headquarters. The intent is apparently NOT where the MLM sells the boxes as products to retail consumers as some other MLMs are doing with similar set-top boxes. (Other MLMs hope to capture the retail consumer in not only buying the box and paying monthly payments for Internet access, but they also want to capture the consumer by having the consumer buy goods and products via a company store link found on the set-top's default home page.) If you try to have MLM distributors sell set-tops to regular consumers, the distributors will be faced with competition of the soon-to-be wide range of set-top boxes to be sold at retail stores as well as the digital cable set-top boxes provided by cable TV companies. What Advent provides is a relatively inexpensive solution for not only MLMs, but also for companies that do not have established computer network systems where the employees and independent contractors operate out of homes and offices scattered throughout the country.

The Advent solution tries to capture the same electronic communications and database networking capabilities that you find in the typical office situation with a local computer network hooked up to a bunch of dumb computer monitors that you may see in banks, insurance agencies, government offices, and elsewhere. The difference is that instead of an office database network in an enclosed office situation, you would have TV sets with Internet TV set-top boxes electronically connecting distributors and agents to the company's marketing network via the Internet. If you want to take a peek at the future networked world where there are cottage industries with workers out in the field operating out of their homes, then what Advent is doing is a possible good example of what may happen in the future. This is the "business-application thin-client in the home" scenario that some people have said will be coming. Various companies, particularly MLMs, are trying this now with WebTV boxes, WebSurfer boxes, Acer boxes, and Bocavision boxes. Advent would say they have the better solution with the cheaper MeterNet WB6400 box along with Advent's web-based business applications.

Advent's "Intelligent Television" solution sets out to solve three problems: (1) provide an inexpensive box in the form of the MeterNet WB6400; (2) provide an online "Intelligent Television" business applications portal tailored to the specific business; and (3) provide easier-than-a-VCR, instant-on, no-user-configuration access so the user can use the box right away without any fussing around with inputting initial user account registration information. Advent's CEO Dr. Clifton Jolley said Advent conducted research and testing to come up with their "Intelligent Television" solution.

METERNET WB6400 SET-TOP BOX

Advent provides the MeterNet WB6400 box and the Internet access. Do I like the MeterNet WB6400? I like the box. It's about the size of a small cigar box making it much smaller than the older Sony WebTV Classic unit. MeterNet CEO Greg Wible said that it uses the Japanese Netfront browser and the Hewlett-Packard SuperTask operating system where it all takes up about 800K. Simple and elegant for what it does which is only Internet browsing and webpage-based email. It has two megabytes for storage and four megabytes ram. There is a slot for a smart card device, but MeterNet is waiting for standards to be formalized before proceeding to program a smart card function. It uses webpage-based email and not pop email to save on memory. However, don't expect this box to provide the same experience you may have when surfing the web with a computer using Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. The current TV screens do change how a webpage appears on the screen when compared to what you see on a computer screen. And browsers on set-top boxes all seem to be different, but the Netfront browser gets the job done. Also, the WB6400 does not currently handle sound such as RealAudio or MIDI files. Nonetheless, the WB6400 is good for browsing the web. Also, this telephone-based set-top box only has a 33.6 Kbps modem. So it is not a speed demon that will provide serious competition for the WebTV boxes or for the Scientific-Atlanta and General Instrument cable boxes. Again, the WB6400 was in part designed for vertical niche markets -- so only the basics (browsing and webpage-based email) are provided. The Advent and MeterNet folks said that the box was made to be a "disposable" appliance that you can easily replace. So, it's supposed be like an easy-to-use and easy-to-replace toaster oven.

METERNET BOX ONLY FOR BASIC INTERNET AND NOT ENHANCED TELEVISION ENTERTAINMENT

There are generally two functions for the interactive set-top boxes: (1) enhanced television for entertainment; and (2) Internet on TV communications ("Internet TV"). There is a difference between the two. The MeterNet WB6400 set-top box only provides the Internet TV function and is positioned by Advent as a thin-client device for business applications. (Since it can surf the web, you can use it for pleasure too, but it would only be good for basic surfing.)

On the one hand, if you talk to the folks who are more concerned with the consumer retail market, those folks may say you need cross-over hyperlinks in TV shows, video-on-demand, digital recording functions, electronic program guides (EPG), and other entertainment-related capabilities and that Internet TV is not really the best and only way to go. The retail consumer would need enhanced television capabilities in addition to Internet on TV.

On the other hand, if you talk to other folks who are catering to businesses and vertical markets, such as Advent and MLMs, those other folks may say that you can discard the enhanced TV entertainment capabilities to save money but keep the Internet on TV capabilities to simply perform business communications. They simply want thin-client devices for business communications purposes.

You can have both functions in one box such as with a WebTV Plus box. However, that doesn't mean that a box with both functions makes it a "business" box. That just means a box with both functions is a more versatile product for the consumer. Although the MLM folks may want you to think they are the only people who matter, you have to remember that the whole world is NOT made up of only MLM distributors. There are typical consumers out there who want to both be entertained and be able to surf the Internet. (Then there is the further partitioning on the retail consumer side with the deluxe combo-entertainment boxes, the digital recorder-only boxes, the basic Internet-only boxes, the basic email-and-EPG-only boxes, etc.)

For those of you who are familiar with the user-versus-viewer dichotomy that is discussed elsewhere on this website, I would put the MLM and other vertical market business folks in the "user" camp and not in the TV "viewer" camp. There are more TV viewers who just want to watch TV than there are "users" who may want to use particular online business applications. Entertainment-minded TV viewers may think Advent and the other business folks are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole by limiting themselves to only Internet-on-TV boxes. TV viewers would say you have to THINK TV since television is meant to be watched for fun and entertainment where the Internet is merely an extra set of "channels" to be watched. Meanwhile, Advent, the MLM people, and other business-minded folks will think that the rest of the world has gone mad wanting to have more than just Internet on TV in a set-top box which they would say should primarily be used for business and making money. If you thought the "user" versus "viewer" dichotomy was just the computer-techie orientation versus the TV-viewer orientation, it's a little more than that when you throw in the vertical businesses and MLMs who just want business applications.

So, while the rest of the world merely watches enhanced TV and surfs the web for enjoyment and education, Advent provides the basic Internet-and-email set-top box by Meternet to MLMs and other vertical markets for business. For MLMs and other businesses that wish to provide distributors and others with easy and inexpensive Internet access to specific user business applications, the basic MeterNet WB6400 set-top box without any enhanced TV capabilities is good enough even at only 33.6 Kbps (just don't expect enhanced television cross-over interactivity links to pop on their TV sets during television shows).

ADVENT'S "INTELLIGENT TELEVISION" BUSINESS PORTAL

Advent, with its various partners, provides the web-based business applications that distributors would use through the default home page on the WB6400 box. Advent provides an "Intelligent Television" portal as the default home page that the box turns on to. Depending on the MLM or business that equips its people with the WB6400, Advent tailors the home page to that particular business where the user clicks on links to get information and news from management and clicks on other links to check on a database of distributor sales statistics and other business information. It is somewhat similar to what you may get with an online store's affiliate program, but tailored to MLMs and where it is all easily obtainable "in" the box that the distributor uses instead of using a computer that has to be configured. You can still get to the rest of the Internet and do webpage-based email with the WB6400.

MAKING THE BOX EASIER TO USE THAN A VCR

Advent Communications is promoting the MeterNet WB6400 set-top box with an "IT" marketing strategy. "IT" stands for "Intelligent Television." They hope you get "IT." They don't call it "Internet" TV because they found that technological terms such as "Internet" scare away non-computer literate people. The "IT" marketing, as you would expect with any marketing of set-top boxes to non-computer people, promotes ease of use. A significant aspect of the "IT" marketing is the pre-configuration of new user account registration information on the box before the customer gets the box. This pre-configuration is what makes the box "simpler to use than a VCR." Think of all of those people who have VCRs that constantly blink 12:00. Think of the first time you were ever confronted with a fancy new electronics device:   Would you use a fancy new electronics device if you were frightened by the idea of having to set it up? Advent eliminates the user configuration procedures that typically confuse and "block" a user from using a new electronics appliance. When the customer gets home, all he or she has to do is hook up the box and turn it on. The user does not have to input new user account registration information.

The Advent folks feel that this is a significant hurdle for acceptance of the product. They did not call this "pre-configuration," but they said this was why WebTV was "hard to use." (Using Advent's thinking, WebTV is "easy to use" after you get past the user account registration.) They equated this procedure with asking confused non-computer literate people to set up new software on a computer -- confused non-computer literate people will not set up new software on a computer. Similarly, non-techie people may have problems with inputting new user account registration on a new set-top. This is why Advent would say WebTV was not an immediate overwhelming success. So, they cut out this initial technological "hard-to-use" user-account-registration procedure for the user to make their product "simpler to use than a VCR."

(In contrast, some would say inputting new user account registration information is good training for people who are new to computers and the Internet. WebTV presents the registration process this way by showing the new subscriber how to use the remote control and how to input information. PowerChannel's FreePCTV will do the same with its registration and poll process. Nonetheless, you may still have the Catch-22 problem of scaling down or eliminating technological-acceptance hurdles for new non-computer literate users.)

Pre-configuration is part of the process of how cellular telephones are sold. The retail store "programs" the telephone number into the buyer's cellular telephone and sets up the buyer's cellular telephone account for billing. Or the buyer of a digital wireless phone uses the phone to automatically call an 800 number where a service operator does the hard part of programming the phone while buyer waits on the line. The buyer simply starts using the phone. If you have ever looked at an instruction booklet for programming a cellular or digital wireless phone, then you may be scared off by thought of having to program new account information into a wireless phone.

Advent would be doing the same "programming" pre-configuration procedure for the WB6400 boxes. This is already how cable companies provide their boxes with security modules and other security circuits to cable subscribers. This is most likely how telcos and other companies with cellular phone experience will be selling set-top boxes to consumers by pre-configuring the box before the consumer takes it home. And this is possibly how all other telephone-based (56 Kbps and DSL) and digital cable boxes will be sold at retail in the future. The consumer may be asked to fill out a form with name, address, telephone number, payment method, etc., plus check off a selection from a list of connection services to choose from (unless the box is already married to a particular service or if there is only one service), then the salesperson goes into the back of the store to "program" the box, and returns to give the consumer a box that is ready to go. Or the consumer may have to make a simple voice phone call to an 800 number to get the box "turned on" (which may most likely be the case for cable boxes). The idea is to eliminate a technological-acceptance hurdle where the new user simply turns on the box without having to do any "programming," i.e., manually inputting registration information.

Advent and MeterNet are ahead of the game with how they are distributing the WB6400 boxes with their "simpler to use than a VCR" turn-it-on market package. Advent Communications can be found on the web at http://www.adventcommunications.com and MeterNet can be found at http://www.meternet.com.