Brandeis University has taken a two-pronged approach to making TV surfing easierand more satisfyingacross campus, not only adding on three new channels to Brandeis conventional cable lines, but by also reworking the pilot for Library and Technology Services (LTS) online project, IPTV.
Brandeis has announced that it will add to its regular cable lineup three additional channels: The Food Network, TV Land, and Animal Planet. This follows a tradition from Brandeis, which in 2003 added Cartoon Network to the campus lineup in 2003.
Oh, man, Im stoked, said Kenny Fuentes 08. Ive missed watching I Dream of Jeannie. It makes me glad I lugged this thing up three flights of stairs.
The channels will be available to students in the next few months, as Comcast weighs the different channel options in which to put the new stations.
Meanwhile, IPTV, the Library and Technology Services pet project since the Spring of 2005, is undergoing changes in the next few months to accommodate student responses from the previous years pilot program.
We ran the pilot last year, and we got a whole bunch of questions, said Perry Hanson, LTS Chief Information Officer and spearhead of the IPTV proposal. Were most likely going to restart the pilot.
The IPTV proposal will shortly revolutionize the way Brandeis students watch television: through their computers.
Using a Java applet by the cyber-vendor VideoFurnace, Brandeis students will be able to watch cable television on their desktop and laptop computers using Brandeis powerful Ethernet and T1 Internet servers, saving students money, space, and effort moving and storing televisions. Channels on IPTV could be substituted easily, as substitution of channels on Brandeis current cable line produces static on both the channels above and below the substitute.
IPTV would allow professors to post movies on IPTV for classes, and BTV 65 would be able to have scheduled programming.
Its the whole reason I didnt bring a TV, said Joanie Axelbaum 07. It was because of IPTV.
Anna Tomecka, LTS Chief Technology Officer, described the improvements LTS is striving for in the next IPTV pilot when it is unveiled in the next few months: We are planning on setting up four channels for IPTV that are fed through a digital feed to make the quality of film much better, she said. Those channels will most likely be channels like Starzsome movie channels, maybe Comedy Central and Fox News, as well.
