Fire-Wired Blog

This article was first published by  dmcityview.com It appears within 10 years the Internet will be one giant television. Every major Web entity is creating video content. Connections are slowly climbing to speeds that will easily stream virtually anything. It seems the only obstacle without a clear path to get around is organization. How will users be able to aggregate all the disparate content they’ve subscribed to across the Internet? I see an answer in Plex, a Web content DVR. Last week, HBO finally announced it was getting into the Web streaming arena. The premium cable channel will continue broadcasting on television, however, non-cable subscribers can now access HBO content online through a Web-only subscription. With this announcement, the list of major media providers that offer gated streaming video is getting quite crowded. In addition to HBO, there is Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, YouTube, Yahoo, Sony, AOL and more than 100 others. Searching content across all of these sit...

This article was first published by  dmcityview.com One of my favorite George Carlin’s one liners was simply “Stay tuned, China’s gonna win.” The sentiment is easy enough. China is a sleeping giant whose might will one day make it the crowning super power. Extending this metaphor to the tech world, the obvious China substitute is Amazon with 2014 being the year it comes out from behind the silicon curtain. In the past nine months, Amazon has released a set top box, its first smartphone, a string of critically acclaimed original TV streaming content, and just last month purchased streaming gaming site Twitch, the largest acquisition in the company’s history. Amazon’s bread will always be buttered by online retail, but these recent power plays represent the company expanding into content delivery, telecommunications, the entertainment world and the fervent gaming industry. Nothing at Amazon is done in haste. It waited almost a decade before entering the smartphone market, and i...

This article was first published by  dmcityview.com In today’s world, technology is inescapable. When we’re not spending our working hours staring at computer screens, our eyes are fixed on TVs, tablets and the ubiquitous smartphone. This environment is the reason so many companies want a piece of the action. It seems every business wants to build an application, operating system and, most prevalent, proprietary phones. After Apple reset the industry with the iPhone, every tech company — including Google, Microsoft, Samsung and the better-late-than-never Amazon — unveiled its own smartphone. Building a company-branded phone allows organizations ground floor access to consumer behavior and purchase patterns, and as the world’s biggest online retailer, no one wants this data more than Amazon, who introduced its first smartphone, the Fire, last month. Of course, to enter the Android- and Apple-dominated marketplace, it needed a killer feature. Amazon’s must-have? “Firefly.” Sold...