However, digital media is very complex. There are numerous companies competing for a piece of the digital set-top box (STB) market: Wink, Liberate, OpenTV, Media Highway, MicrosoftTV. When it comes to displaying content we have HDTV, SDTV, 1080i, 780p, ATSC, DVB, ARIB, etc. etc.

Digital STBs are steadily increasing in market penetration worldwide - satellite penetration varies by region depending on the availability of cable so, in Japan and Europe the STB installed base may be more heavily weighted towards satellite systems, compared to the US, where cable has very strong penetration into households

Nevertheless, the cable companies continue to experiment with delivering a richer experience through their broadband pipes. It's still primarily Video-on-demand (VOD), Pay-per-view (PPV), and transaction processing (shopping) that drives the trials being undertaken by companies like AT&T, TCI, and Cox Cable, and unfortunately, these are the same things that were tried back in the early 90s by companies like Time Warner Cable, but everyone is trying to figure out what consumers are willing to pay for.

Apparently, we like the flat monthly fees, and we don't want to spend more than a few dollars on VOD, or PPV content, unless it is even driven, but even then, the audience for these services tends to be a small fraction of the total television watching population.

DVD has helped to change our perception of digital media, and more importantly, digital audio, such as MP3.

Digital audio players are set to explode in unit growth according to JPA data.

It's interesting to note that for Christmas 2000, consumers top 5 consumer electronics purchases were, in order, DVD player, CD recorders, digital cameras, mass storage device, cell phone (MP3 players were number 8 on the list).