According to a press release in the August 4th Wall Street Journal, Hitachi, Matsushita, Sharp, Sony and Toshiba will develop a broadband-ready TV system that will allow their televisions to download and play streaming media from the Internet.
The new, jointly developed and owned Internet-ready televison standard will cover all issues from intellectual rights to the operating system itself. More importantly, this new standard is scheduled for release as early as Spring 2007. Actual broadband-ready television sets are scheduled to be available also in mid-2007.
The significance of this announcement has not been lost on the computer industry, specifically monitor makers. It will be interesting to see how that portion of the computer industry responds.
