Greetings. TiVo is in the process of introducing a direct interface to YouTube for their Series 3 and TiVo HD units. I saw it in operation for the first time yesterday. It is seriously slick. You can browse YouTube on any old connected TV, watching full-screen with surprisingly high quality, completely acceptable resolution in most cases (apparently an H.264 codec is in use).

TiVo has a variety of other broadband content facilities, including downloading of movies, but the availability of the vast range of YouTube content, along with the familiar search and "more like this" features, strikes me as something of a sea change.

Suddenly now, there's always going to be something interesting to watch on TV. Anyone who can't find anything up their alley on YouTube is most likely either not trying or dead.

But if viewers are reduced to counting bits by draconian bandwidth caps, such wonders will be nipped in the bud -- and that's apparently what the large ISPs would like to see (unless they can get a piece of the action, of course, in addition to subscriber fees). The sorts of convergence represented by a broadband TiVo terrifies ISPs whose income streams depend on selling content as well as access.

If a critical mass of viewers becomes comfortable with the concept that "bits are bits" -- whether they're coming from ISPs' own video services or from outside Internet sources -- the ISPs' plans to cash in on content are seriously threatened.

It's becoming increasingly clear that bandwidth caps are being eyed by ISPs largely as a mechanism to "kill the competition" -- to limit the mass migration of viewers from traditional program sources to the limitless bounds of Internet content.

--Lauren--