Orb Networks is transforming media transportability by enabling consumers to view material from their own homes anywhere on the web or on a mobile device–rather like a Slingbox but without the need for another box. Now they are adding streaming video mail to the mix.
Orb Networks is transforming media transportability by enabling consumers to view material from their own homes anywhere on the web or on a mobile device–rather like a Slingbox but without the need for another box. Now they are adding streaming video mail to the mix.
At the AlwaysOn conference in Los Angeles, digital media consultant Seth Shapiro spoke exclusively for informitv to Orb Networks about their plans for the product.
“Orb is free Windows software that lets you enjoy all of your content everywhere, wherever you want it, whatever device you have, wherever you have the web.” said Ian McCarthy, who is responsible for their product marketing.
Based in California, Orb Networks provides free software that plugs into Windows and allows users to access locally stored media from anywhere on the web, on a personal computer, handheld device, and now even on a mobile phone.
It takes a matter of minutes to set up. The software then makes local media available remotely and automatically transcodes the material into an appropriate format for the remote device based on the available bandwidth.
Mobile devices with streaming Windows Media Player, RealPlayer, or a 3GP player are now supported with any carrier that offers internet access.
Orb enables individual access to personal photos and videos, or commercial material, including audio ripped from CDs or a broadcast television source. The software is compatible with Windows Media Center and the company also has partnerships with hardware providers such as Diamond, Hauppauge, Creative, ADS and Nvidia, allowing users to connect to external audio and video sources.
Users of TiVo Series 2 digital video recorders are also able to play and program their television recordings from anywhere in the world using a DVR Everywhere plugin based on the open-source Orb application programming interface.
The company is also launching a small Orb video mail plug-in for Outlook and Thunderbird email clients. This will enable users to email a link to a video clip that will be streamed directly from their home computer in a suitable format.
“Orb is user infrastructure software,” said McCarthy. “All the tuner card guys of any substance are all lined up behind us now. They make the hardware, they bring your TV experience to your PC, and we make sure you can get that experience wherever you are.”
The Orb software is free to download. “It’s free because this is a radical transformation of an entire ecosystem of access to content,” said McCarthy. “Orb Networks, the company, really just routes stuff to get you hooked up to your application, and then we step back.”
Orb will shortly announce a number of partnerships with mobile services, first in the UK, followed by the US. “Pipe providers, whether terrestrial or mobile, are great partners for us,” said McCarthy. “We deepen the billing relationship.”
Orb is positioning itself as an enabler, rather than a content provider, which is a radically different model to mobile networks that are aggregating material on behalf of their subscribers. “They expect you to pay, yet again, for the same channels that you are paying for at home,” McCarthy suggested. “We’re in the access market. I say access rather than distribution. There are other people out there doing the hard work of aggregating the licenses of content libraries.”