Watching and being watched

Ever feel like you're being watched? Television viewers and screen phone users may soon feel that way if a new technology from Bell Labs wins favor.

The research and development branch of Lucent Technologies demonstrated the new solution, MediaLink, for the first time at last week's Western Cable Show in Anaheim, Calif. MediaLink lets TV advertisers use a newly patented algorithm to encode regular programming with callback or ordering information that can be captured and decoded by a screen phone or TV remote control. The information could be flashed on the screen or stored automatically without the user noticing.

In addition, when a consumer dials the number mentioned in the supplemental information, a profile of the customer is automatically transmitted to the advertiser using MediaLink. The profiling device could be added to most screen phones and even touch-tone phones for less than $50 per user, said Bell Labs.

Similar solutions have used the vertical blanking interval (VBI) of the TV transmission signal for data insertion. However, experts have long debated the VBI's stability, its cost to maintain and the method in which to insert supplemental information into it.

ON-LINE The pudding Demonstrations of cable modem services like Roadrunner and @Home at this year's Western Cable Show are proof that last year's modem developments are finally crystallizing. An aggressive telco?

GTE continues its Internet assault with a new modem pooling service for ISPs, showing that it is still cultivating the Internet more progressively than other telcos.

OFF-LINE Don't turn your back Cable TV companies congregate at the Western Show and proclaim the telcos are no longer a threat. Maybe this will be enough to light a fire under telco video strategies.The bigger picture A Yankee Group survey reports that consumer views of the cable TV industry are up in many categories but down in loyalty. Isn't that the most important one?