Talk about a crowded industry. In addition to BestBuy, Sears, Walmart, Apple, Sony, Microsoft, Netflix, and others offering online movies for rental and purchase, Intel just announced their plans to launch their own movie and video service, dubbed Intel Insider, by the end of March. But unlike other services in the market today, Intel's movie and video platform will be tied directly to their new second generation Core processors also just announced at CES.

It's an interesting approach and one that's quite different from all of the others offerings in the market as it offers the studios hardware protection for their movies, as opposed to software protection of the content. Pricing for movies has not yet been disclosed, but the release does say that movies will be offered in 1080p quality and will be available the same day as DVD/Blu-ray releases. Intel also mentions a couple of content partners in the release including Warner Bros. Digital Distribution and Cinema Now. In addition, Intel also plan to allow consumers to stream movies wirelessly to their TVs using what Intel calls WiDi 2.0.

We're going to see a lot of news like this coming out of CES this week and it's amazing to think of how quickly the landscape is going to change for the way consumers find, purchase and shift the consumption of video from one device to another.

A big day of news for Vizio. After already announcing that Vizio would launch Android based tablets and cell phones later this summer and a new video download service, Google has now confirmed via their blog, that Vizio will incorporate the Google TV platform in TVs and Blu-ray players slated for sale later this year.

I'm not a big fan of the Google TV platform as to date, it simply does not work the way it should. But Google is in this for the long-term and Google TV is not something Google needs to win at overnight. Partnering with Vizio is really interesting because Vizio is all about getting good TV technology into the hands of as many people as possible, at a cheap price. And with Sony's Internet TV, powered by Google TV being expensive, there is a good chance that Vizio will simply bring the Google TV platform to the masses, at no additional cost.

(Updated: with photos, link to press release and hands-on previews from Engadget, phone, tablet.) With CES starting this week, there have been lots of rumors leading up to the show including reports that Vizio may get into the tablet business. And thanks to a WSJ article from Sunday night, it turns out that the rumors are in fact true. Later this summer, Vizio plans to introduce an 8" tablet as well as a mobile phone with a 4" screen. Both devices will run Android and while pricing had yet to be disclosed, the WSJ interviewed Vizio's CTO as saying their aim is to, "provide the best that's out there to your typical Wal-Mart shopper," something that Vizio has been very successful at with their line of TVs.

The company also plans to launch a new video download service which will run on all of their devices and will allow users to starting watching a movie on one Vizio device finishing watching it on another. Vizio's cell phone, dubbed the Via Phone, will have a 4" screen, a front-facing camera and a rear-facing five megapixel camera. Vizio's tablet, named Via Tablet, will have an 8" screen, WiFi connectivity (but no cellular service), three speakers and a front-facing camera. Vizio's mobile carrier partner has yet to be announced but I've heard from various folks who think it will be Verizon.

If there is one thing Vizio has done very well in the TV business, it's forcing pricing down in the industry and making up for it by the sheer number of units they have sold. If Vizio take this same approach with tablets, and I expect they will, Vizio could very well disrupt the tablet space, especially with the strong ties they have with retail chains. Vizio is a well known brand with a big install base and has the ability to get in front of a lot of customers very quickly.

I don't know exactly how many tablets will be released this year, but I've seen some folks who estimate it to be as high as 100. Even if it's half that, I think it's a safe bet that we'll be looking back on 2011 as the year of the tablet and I would not be surprised if Vizio is one of the leaders of the pack. They won't be displacing Apple anytime soon, but they could very well compete for a large portion of the market, which iSuppli says will be 61M units sold this year.

I'm a big fan of Vizio's TVs, have three units myself, and have helped friends and relatives purchase many others. If Vizio approaches the tablet space the same way they have dominated the TV market, I suspect Vizio will be successful in expanding their business. I'll have a review up of Vizio's new tablet later in the year.

This morning Apple announced that sales of their $99 Apple TV would hit 1M units this week. While that’s a nice round number to reach, it’s not meaningful in the bigger picture and analysts who are quoted saying things like, “one million is a real benchmark” really don’t understand the impact of devices on the over-the-top market.

Sales numbers for devices are pointless without talking about usage. I personally have two Apple TV’s at home and rarely use them at all. In fact, I only use them when I want to test something or need to review certain functionality of the device. So how often are people using the Apple TV device and how much content are they consuming through it? Apple won’t say. It’s nice of them to give out overall iTunes sales figures of movies and TV shows, but they won’t say what percentage of those are via the Apple TV.

Microsoft says that 42% of Xbox LIVE Gold members in the U.S. watch more than 30 hours of digitally distributed television and movies a month. Roku, who is due to reach 1M units sold by the end of this month said in September that the average Roku customer uses their device 43 hours a month. Those are the kinds of numbers we should care about, sales penetration and usage.

And even the devices that do have a big footprint in the market like the Xbox 360 and PS3, both Microsoft and Sony won’t tell us how many movies or TV shows they have sold or rented via their online services. Why? Because the numbers are still so small. I love devices, but we have to set the right expectations on the impact they can have in the market and far too many want to imply their impact is greater than they are. Even Netflix, who streams more video online than anyone says that the vast majority of the usage of their streaming service is to the PC today, not devices.

The Xbox 360 is the number one selling device in the home, connected to the TV and broadband and has sold 21.9M consoles in North America. That one device by itself has not made any content owner rich and has not changed the over-the-top video landscape in any drastic way. So why is Apple selling 1M devices considered such a big deal? It’s not. Even if Apple sells 1M units a quarter in 2011 and end the year with 5M total devices in the market, that will be less than 15% of what the Xbox 360 or PS3 will have.

And considering Apple is renting content for $0.99 on the Apple TV, there’s just not a lot of revenue to be had. Lets assume that the average Apple TV user buys one video per week, for the entire course of the year. That’s a content market size of only $52M a year today. And even if we assume Apple reaches the 5M sales number by the end of 2011, those same assumptions means the market size is only a quarter of a million dollars which is still not a big deal.

No matter how you run the numbers, they simply aren’t big and it’s one of the reasons why the studios are still fighting digital. They don’t see the potential revenue yet and they won’t for some time to come. Until we have mass-market penetration and usage of the devices, the studios won’t have an incentive to give consumers the kind of content they want. I wish they would see the light and help foster the adoption of digital now, but that’s simply the way the studios think.

We see a lot of posts talking about devices, but how often do you see people talk about the sales numbers and usage of the devices? Most who are giving out quotes about these devices don’t even know how many have been sold and haven’t used the majority of the platforms they are talking about. Of course everyone always wants to talk about Apple TV, because it’s from Apple, yet there are far more important devices on the market, offering more content than Apple, which have a larger install base than the Apple TV.

• Xbox 360: number sold as of Nov. 2010: 21.9M in NA, 45M worldwide (source: NPD)
• PS3: number sold as of Sept. 2010: 16.6M in NA, 41.6M worldwide (source: Sony)
• Roku: expect to reach 1M sold by end of 2010 (source: Roku)
• Netgear Roku: number sold to date, too early to know
• Apple TV: number sold as of December 2010: 1M (source: Apple)
• Sony Netbox: number sold to date, too early to know
• Boxee: number sold to date, too early to know
• Logitech Revue Box, Sony Internet TV: number sold to date, too early to know
• WD TV Live/Live Hub: number sold to date, no data released. I estimate less than 2M combined
• TiVo: number sold to date: I estimate 750K TiVo HD units (source: estimate based on TiVo’s subscriber #s of 1.4M)
• Broadband enabled TVs: iSuppli predicts almost 23M by 2013, TDG predicts 43M by 2014, DisplaySearch predicts 31M by 2013, Samsung predicts 20M by 2012
• Broadband enabled Blu-ray players: as of October 2010, the total installed base of Blu-ray Disc playback devices in the U.S. was 21.1M. What percentage of those are “broadband enabled” is not known.

I constantly see people writing about devices, like this article yesterday, saying Amazon’s Video On Demand service is available on the Xbox 360, even though it isn’t. There is so much misinformation coming from the media and analysts on what these devices and platforms can or can’t do, now just imagine what it’s like for a customer who’s trying to figure out which device to buy. Lots of confusion.

In addition to setting the right expectations, analysts and bloggers also need to stop comparing hardware devices like Apple TV to platforms like Google TV. One has nothing do with the other and they don’t compete at all, today. Apple sells a $99 piece of hardware, Google does not sell any hardware. Google is a platform, Apple TV is a device. Stop comparing the two. Of course to be successful you need the device, the platform and the content to all work together, but right now, almost nobody has all three working together in volume, except for the Xbox 360 and PS3.

The good news is that the quality of the video on these devices is getting better, the content being offered grows each year and content platforms like Netflix, VUDU, Zune Video, PlayStation Network, MLB, NHL, Hulu Plus and others are helping to create awareness and adoption. But with that awareness comes the problem with massive fragmentation and no standards.

Instead of so many analysts commenting on how many units of any device has been sold, I’d like to see them commenting on what the financial impact is on the industry from the usage of these devices. Who’s making money from the adoption? How much money are they making? When will devices truly start impacting content licensing models? Can device manufactures survive and make money selling boxes if they don’t get traction with licensing their platform? These are the kinds of questions we should be discussing and the topics we should be trying to run numbers on so we know the real impact devices have on the market. Just talking sales figures, by themselves, is really pointless.

Related: Apple TV and Roku Go Head-To-Head, Here’s The Winner

I can't chat for the next 2-3 days so if you need to reach me, please send me an email. I am still online but it may day a bit longer for me to get back to you than usual. Later in the week I will be back to answering the phone 24×7. Thanks.

With all the talk about over-the-top video and cord cutting, folks don't seem to mention very often just how many, or in this case how few, streaming enabled devices have actually been sold in the market. The good news is that we're starting to see some growth in the number of devices sold, but overall, the numbers are still small.

It will be a couple of year's before devices act as a major catalyst of growth for the online video industry but at the same time, many device vendors are going to have a hard time reaching critical mass. Already we are seeing quite a few companies who started off as box manufactures shift their business model to one where they license their platform. Two years ago I was using maybe 3-4 streaming media devices, connected to the TV. Today, I have more than 20 in my home. The growth of broadband enabled devices has been amazing, but at the same time, I am not convinced that most stand alone boxes will ever truly be able to get to mass-market adoption.

The best selling device to date, connected to the TV and broadband, outside of the set-top-box, is the Xbox 360 and it's taken Microsoft five years to sell 21.9M consoles in North America. A big number when you compare it to the rest of the boxes that have been sold in the market (see below), yet still a small number when you compare it to the sale of TVs, DVD players, mobile devices and other consumer electronics. Note: Some sales numbers updated January 2011.

• Xbox 360: number sold as of Nov. 2010: 21.9M in NA, 45M worldwide (source: NPD)
• PS3: number sold as of Sept. 2010: 16.6M in NA, 41.6M worldwide (source: Sony)
• Roku: number sold as of January 2011: 1M (source: Roku)
• Netgear Roku: number sold to date, too early to know
• Apple TV: number sold as of January 2011: 1M (source: Apple)
• Sony Netbox: number sold to date, too early to know
• Boxee: number sold to date, too early to know
• Logitech Revue Box, Sony Internet TV: number sold to date, too early to know
• WD TV Live/Live Hub: number sold to date, no data released. I estimate less than 2M combined
• TiVo: number sold to date: I estimate 750K TiVo HD units (source: estimate based on TiVo’s subscriber #s of 1.4M)
• Broadband enabled TVs: iSuppli predicts almost 23M by 2013, TDG predicts 43M by 2014, DisplaySearch predicts 31M by 2013, Samsung predicts 20M by 2012
• Broadband enabled Blu-ray players: as of October 2010, the total installed base of Blu-ray Disc playback devices in the U.S. was 21.1M. What percentage of those are "broadband enabled" is not known.

As you can see, even combined these devices still don't have a deep footprint in the living room today. While many are quick to point out the projections for 3-4 years from now, keep in mind that the most important number that matters is the adoption of these devices, not just how many are sold. Nintendo has sold 35.9M Wii consoles in the U.S as of September of this year, yet Nintendo told me earlier this year that 85% of them weren't connected to the Internet. So the real numbers we have to watch are how many of the broadband enabled TVs and Blu-ray players are actually hooked up to the web, not just how many have been sold.

The good news is that the quality of the video on these devices is getting better, the content being offered grows each year and content platforms like Netflix, VUDU, Zune Video, PlayStation Network, MLB, NHL, Hulu Plus and others are helping to create awareness and adoption. But with that awareness comes the problem with massive fragmentation and no standards.

I spend a lot of time at Costco and BestBuy watching how consumers purchase these products and the number one thing they are always confused about is what kind of content is available on what device, in what quality, with what business model. Lots of platforms exist but there are not many similarities between them when it comes to the quality of the video and the business model. Even Netflix, which is on nearly every box in the market, has a service that looks and performs very differently between the PS3 and Apple TV.

What's exciting to me is that these boxes are getting cheaper, the video quality is getting better, we're seeing more subscription based services and devices likes tablets and phones are showing signs of growing pretty fast. Tablets and phones are really for video on the go and aren't primarily used for getting to video to the TV, but they still help with getting consumers to adopt video streaming services.

I'm doing a device showdown presentation today in NYC comparing all of the different boxes on the market and while it is not being webcast, I will make my presentation available online shortly after. And for those who could not attend the event, I will be doing more of them in the New Year.

The call for speakers is now open for the 2011 Streaming Media East show, May 10th-11th in NYC and the Content Delivery Summit, taking place the day before on May 9th, 2011. If you are interested in being considered as a speaker or presenter, please submit a request via the show website. The deadline to submit is the end of this month. I get about 1,000 submissions and only have about 150 speaking spots so getting a submission in on-time is crucial.

Everyone always wants a speaking spot but I simply don't have enough to go around. The key is to get a submission in on-time and for vendors, introduce us to customers. 75% of the speaking spots go to content owners and end-users, the companies who buy and use online video services. I always need introductions to new customers.

If you are interested in potentially moderating a session, please contact me ASAP and I'll be happy to discuss your ideas. I am ALWAYS looking for good moderators.

If you have any questions about a submission, ideas you want to run by me, thoughts on what you can do to help the show, call me at anytime at 917-523-4562. I pick up my phone 24 hours a day 7 days a week. I am always reachable. If you want to be involved in the show in some way, now is the time to pitch me ideas and suggestions as I will have locked down the advance program by the end of January.