"They have the technology to combine the TV and the Internet, I think, but they don't want to because of the Intellectual Property issues."
this isn't entirely true. from the point of view of the network, voip and regular ip (internet) are 1-to-1 connections. with pretty moderate bandwidth required for everyone who's using them concurrently, they can manage. but the bandwidth required for video in the same manner would be unmanageble (not sure of the numbers, but at least a couple mbps per user), not to mention the load on the server. of course, that's why network broadcast technologies were developed (the old mbone - does that still exist? rsvp, etc.) real packet-based broadcast. much of its there. some of it probably needs some upgrades (not sure if this would require ip-v6 or not ...). but nevertheless, its just something that nobody's ever done on such a large scale.
but i'd think, if you're gonna go this way, why not go all the way. why reproduce broadcast technology digitally when you can do better, and without all the problems involved. namely: tivo-like all the way.
but then, nobody ever listens to me :(
