16 thoughts on “Tablet appliance for editing video”

  1. Why would I want to buy another tablet for video editing when I can wait for the next iteration of the iPad and get iMovie for next to nothing? In general, why consider making any appliance specific tablet when general purpose tablets will be so functional? You ask “Why not build everything as described above and sell it as a desktop application?” Why not sell as just an application for iPad or Android? Oh wait, because those apps are mostly free and would have a tough time recouping the investment at $0.99.

    In terms of hardware, the RIM PlayBook will likely have the necessary hardware, with a dual core 1 Ghz processors and dedicated GPU. It already will use Adobe tools for both apps and developers, so perhaps Adobe will add a tablet-friendly video editing app. Personally, I’m skeptical of the PlayBook’s commercial success – and I was at Lazardis’s keynote where it was introduced.

    I’m ashamed to admit it but I realized this week that between work and leisure I spend more time with my iPad than my wife – scary!

  2. – Windows 7 does display thumbnails for videos in Explorer. (At least, I plugged in my new Sony video camera last night, downloaded some AVCHD videos, and they instantly had thumbnails.)

    – If you use open source (GPL) software as a basis for this, you have to release your software to others to use — and so any development effort you put in there is not a competitive advantage. If you then go and use standard PC hardware… where are your margins? As soon as you charge any reasonable margin a competitor could come along and release a product with lower margins based on your own work and put you out of business.

    – SWEs for $125k/year? Sounds a little low if you include overhead (such as an office, health insurance) and want to hire someone reasonably experienced (instead of hiring someone straight out of school).

    – A competitor you don’t mention: http://www.youtube.com/editor. It has a bunch of the simple functionality you describe, and would work just fine on a much lower-powered tablet. (Sadly, uploading the video may take a while if you don’t have lots of bandwidth.)

  3. David: I agree with you from a tech point of view that all of a family’s IT needs can theoretically be accomplished with a $500 desktop PC and that was the vision of the PC pioneers of the late 1970s. On the other hand, it seems that for video editing somehow the specific configuration of that PC and the interaction among various installed programs almost inevitably compromises the user experience. Also, I think appliances have tended to work well for consumers. We have the heavyweight Sonos whole-house music system instead of a lightweight peripheral driven from a PC. There is the iPad to have and to hold. We have digital picture frames running Linux instead of being dumb peripherals, once again driven from the PC. Given that desktop operating systems continue to baffle consumers, most of whom cannot understand the 20+ separate processes that are already running when the machine starts, I think that there is a place for dedicated appliances.

    That said, I guess it would be tough to sell a typewriter right now…

  4. Chris: Is that true about the GPL? A lot of appliances, including the Sonos, run Linux and don’t make their source code available, as far as I know.

    Health insurance for software engineers? Isn’t our Great Father (the federal government) supposed to pay that for everyone starting in 2013?

    Thanks for the youtube reference. I should have noted that. The problem with youtube is that it compresses AVCHD 1080i files down to the point where they are no longer good quality.

  5. You cite a lack of competition from the iPad because the current iPhone version of iMovie doesn’t handle HD video. It seems like running a startup based on the assumption that Apple will not correct that missing feature would be a bad idea.

    The iPad is $500. The iMovie application is $30. Those are difficult price points to match. Anyone I know that is interested in editing their home movies (most aren’t) edit them with iMovie.

    You and your cousin obviously did not use the current version of iMovie which specifically allows very fancy editing of the sound tracks.

    “I’m going to work on an MP3 music player that will properly sort band names, because The Beatles should be in the B’s, not the T’s.”

  6. I bet the response you got from VCs would be different if you presented this as merely “Touch Screen Video Editing” and concentrated on the software.

  7. First, most companies that use Linux as their OS for their embedded products make their distro available. My Samsung TV certainly does. The app that is the TV’s main brains isn’t GPLed and only comes as a binary blob, but the Linux kernel and whatnot are available from their site (source and binary distro). The FSF usually comes down like a ton of bricks on companies that don’t release the code to the GPL programs they’re distributing.

    But who cares? I don’t think you lose much of an advantage by making the source to the GPLed products you deploy available. Besides, the custom code that you develop for the system, in so much as it’s not derivative of the GPLed code, doesn’t have to be given away.

    Second, I don’t think that 32GB of flash is enough for the storage part. You probably need at enough for 2 camcorders worth of video plus room for the final output, plus room for the OS, unless you’re going to want to deal with external USB storage. Therefore, I’d go with 128GB of flash (like the new Mac Book Airs)if I were designing this product.

    Those two things being said, I like the idea of the product, though I don’t know how big the market is.

  9. “On the other hand, it seems that for video editing somehow the specific configuration of that PC and the interaction among various installed programs almost inevitably compromises the user experience.”

    The exact same problem occurs with higher end computer games. That’s why many have fled from computers to dedicated gaming consoles, which are not as good, but are very consistent. Also, those consoles only cost $200-$400 because of mass adoption (150 million+ for all three current consoles).

  10. chris/philg i’ve worked at several companies that have leveraged the linux OS and built their proprietary drivers on top of the OS and haven’t released any of their software and aren’t required to do so under the licensing agreements. I don’t understand all the legalese, but its certainly possible to build something without having to give away your bread and butter. there are tons of linux based appliances that do this. storage, networking, etc..

    not sure how what the licensing scheme is for android based things (which seems to built off of a 2.6 kernel)

  11. Thanks, folks, for the education on the GPL. I should be an expert given that I’ve been releasing software under the GPL for decades, but I have mostly been producing software for others to use rather than reusing other folks’ tools.

  12. I read with interest your proposal, “Video Editing Tablet”

    Engineering:
    Your HW engineering costs should be separated out from the plastic moulding. I think that you are on the low side –
    Hire an architect to do the specification ($40k for 2 months), and one board designer ($120k as contractor for 6 months) and two layout engineers ($36k total) to implement the design. For redesign, use a contractor at $75 per hour (budget $4k). This is for top-quality Valley talent. If you do this overseas, costs will be 1/3 but you will need more redesign.
    $10k for software tool licenses
    $50k for prototype PCBs,
    Since you are combining a GPU with a CPU, you will need a thermal engineer. You cannot rely on the ODM shop in Taiwan for this. ~$30k for contractor for 2 months worth of work.
    You will need to do radiated and conducted emissions to sell in the US, and immunity testing as well if you plan to sell this in Europe. ~$20k for contractor to do measurements and get certification.
    =~$310k

    no idea on plastic moulding, but I think it is in the 100s of thousands of dollars.

    a larger question
    why constrain this just to video editing? As you said, in the comments, there is a market for dedicated appliances. If you have the UI and the functionality down, you could license the technology to other appliance companies and also people like test equipment manufacturers. With the powerful GPU inside, this will allow advanced display features that a typical low-end PC used in these systems today can’t do. This would allow you to reduce your risk.

    good luck

    -Jay

  13. Just to clarify — if you build software on top of a GPL platform (such as Linux), you only have to release the modifications you make to the GPLed software — independent programs you make on your own you can license however you like.

    But what Phil was proposing was to take a GPLed video editing program and modify it (such as by adding touchscreen support). Such modifications would then have to be released to comply with the terms of the GPL. If he could structure the changes so significant software was provided which was distinct from the original GPLed programs, then cool. If all this product did was repackage or modify GPLed software, then it would be easier for a competitor to copy.

    IANAL — I’m just offering my layman’s understanding of how the GPL works. In particular, I’m not clear on exactly how you draw the boundary between a “modification” and a “distinct piece of software” — the extremes of the spectrum are very clear, but the points in the middle can be fuzzy — and fuzziness is where lawyers get rich.

  14. I’m not sure I agree on the use of Android. You want a device that will have a task for which the hardware will definitely be a constrain, and you want to use a software layer that is already taxing, that makes it hard to write machine optimised code?

    I would rather start with a platform like Meego (née Maemo), more or less — you can customise to your own needs to remove / add anything you need or not.

    As far the GPL, yes you have to release the source code of the kernel, and everything that is GPL and LGPL. Not necessarily the apps you will develop on top – except if you start from a code base that is already GPL. Keep that in mind up front.

  15. I have to think this will be short term problem. I don’t think it will be to long before an iPad can do HD video editing. Also I don’t know if really high resolution would be necessary for the consumer market. The iPhone can edit 720p video which would be more than enough for most people.

    If that does not fill this niche then I think something like the YouTube editor would be the solution. The table just worries about uploading the video and presents the UI while a server does the heavy lifting.

Comments are closed.