Are consumers ready for all this choice?

Calling the video market fragmented is like calling my home state’s political system corrupt. Everyone knows it’s true, but what exactly are we doing about it?

If you live in Illinois, right now you are bemoaning the lack of legislative action on political reform, while gawking at the former first lady eating tarantulas on TV. But if you are a company depending on revenue from selling video services or video advertising, you have to be wondering now about what the future revenue picture will be.

Thus far, most of the activity seems aimed at preventing competitors from gaining any edge, while pushing one’s own advantage. Cable and telco video operators regularly bash each other in commercials, TiVO takes DISH to court, Hulu keeps boxee at bay, and Apple constantly touts its next greatest thing.

From the consumer perspective, there certainly are more choices than ever existed before, and there are a growing number of consumers quite comfortable with exploring their options. But I suspect there also are many who are increasingly confused by the growing number of choices — and many of those are the ones currently paying the bills for the digital appetites of a younger generation.

The efforts to unite Internet video with “regular” TV have been fragmented to this point and often rely on consumer ingenuity. Even in a down economy, I’d expect to see service providers stepping up more quickly to this challenge. From the telco side of things, maybe they are still in the land-grab phase of adding customers and are less focused on selling features. I wonder if now isn’t the time to be demonstrating to those new customers why buying a telco TV solution isn’t the last video technology they’ll need to get. And if you are a cable provider, with income from advertising and programming, this certainly is not the moment to be sitting back waiting to see how the wind blows with Internet-based content.

E-mail me at cwilson3@telephonyonline.com.