Ben Drawbaugh

Follow up to my 14 year old TV prediction editorial

Ben Drawbaugh — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 13:20:24 +0000

What I Got Right About TV, What I Got Wrong — and What Must Change Next

Fourteen years after I argued that discovery was broken and incumbents were holding the future hostage, streaming won — but the experience still hasn’t. Here’s what I nailed, where I missed, and why a unified (I used AI to help write this)

By Ben Drawbaugh
· October 30, 2025

In 2011 I wrote that America’s favorite pastime had “too many options and no easy, enjoyable way to find what to watch.”
I blamed a lack of vision, hostile boxes, and a business model that prized bundles over viewers. Fourteen years later,
the pipes are faster, the boxes are better, and the content is everywhere — yet finding what to watch, especially live sports,
still takes more work than it should.

TL;DR: Streaming won. Discovery didn’t. The next decade belongs to an OS-level, AI-first guide that collapses apps, rights, and playback into a single, truthful interface.

Scorecard: Right, Wrong, and Still Broken

Category	2011 Thesis	2025 Reality	Verdict
Discovery/UI	Too many channels, no way to find anything. Browse first, search second.	Aggregation exists (e.g., Apple TV) but major holdouts wall off metadata. People still rely on JustWatch and AI to bridge gaps.	Mostly right
Channel Identity	“Nothing on” because channels filled grids with filler and drifted from their brands.	Many cable nets shuttered; app-era catalogs refocused brands by title, not by network.	Right
Remotes & HDMI‑CEC	Remotes are a disaster; CEC unused; keyboards don’t belong in the living room.	Voice and touch won, CEC is mainstream, and one remote (Apple TV/Roku/Fire TV) usually rules the stack.	Right
Who Controls the Bundle	Incumbents will defend the bundle and block change at the pipe.	Apps took over; cable operators embraced them and pivoted to broadband + streaming bundles instead of fighting.	Half right
Streaming Viability	OTT can’t go mainstream without regulatory intervention.	Streaming became the default. Consumers — and a few bold startups — forced the shift.	Wrong
DVR	DVRs should disappear; “maintenance” is anti‑TV.	The box died but the term lives on. Cloud DVR is standard, more like a permissions layer than a recorder.	Directionally right
Channels as Apps	App-per-channel is clunky and shouldn’t win.	It won anyway. UX tradeoffs lost to content gravity and habit.	Wrong
Bundling & Cost	Bundles subsidize filler and block better UIs.	Costs rose if you “want it all,” so consumers manage and churn. The bundle is reborn as revolving à‑la‑carte.	Mixed
Regulation	We need utility‑style separation of pipe and content.	The market self-corrected enough to make streaming dominant without new regulation.	wrong
Sports Discovery	Live rights and black boxes make sports hard to find.	Still true. Sports is the last great UX desert.	Still broken

What I Got Right

Aggregation matters. Universal discovery on the box — not on the app — is the only humane way to navigate modern catalogs. Platforms like Apple TV aggregate enough to be useful, but the biggest catalogs still play keep‑away with data. That’s progress but not victory.

Brand drift was unsustainable. Streaming didn’t just unbundle; it exposed which brands had enduring value. The “American Chopper on History Channel” problem dissolved when shows stood on their own pages rather than in a 24/7 grid.

One remote, many inputs. Voice and CEC finally gave us the living‑room calm we were promised. We browse first, search second — and talk instead of keyboards.

Incumbents adapted. Operators shipped app‑centric boxes and invested in the very services that threatened them, because broadband growth mattered more than defending a legacy EPG.

Where I Missed

Streaming’s inevitability. I underestimated how quickly consumers would jump once content windows, connectivity, and device UX aligned. Startups like Netflix and Hulu didn’t wait for policy; they built experiences people wanted more than “channel packages.”

Apps as the default. I argued the “channel-as-app” model was too clunky to win. It won because content gravity beats UI theory — and because people tolerate friction when the payoff is clear.

The DVR’s ghost. The physical box died, but the concept survived in the cloud as a set of rights and pointers. It’s less recording and more remembering — a useful fiction.

What Still Needs to Change

1) A Single, Truthful Guide

Users shouldn’t care which app has the rights. Ask to “play the next episode,” and the system should route, authenticate, and continue. The guide should be honest about availability, price, quality, and live blackouts — no promo detours.

2) Sports, Kinda Fixed

Sports discovery needs a universal layer: fixtures, rights, start times, blackouts, and live‑to‑VOD transitions in one place. You shouldn’t need an app — or googl — to find the game.

3) Bundles Without the Baggage

Rebundling is inevitable, but it should be transparent and portable. Let people assemble “micro‑bundles” that follow them across platforms with sane pause/resume options, not cancellation calisthenics.

4) AI That Respects Intent

Today’s “Because you watched…” carousels are shallow. Next‑gen recommendation should parse intent (“smart sci‑fi with strong female lead, no gore, PG‑13 vibe”) and execute across catalogs, not just within a single app.

The 2035 Endgame: The OS Is the Guide

In 2011 I called for separating pipes from content. In 2025, the practical path is separating apps from experience. The dominant platform a decade from now won’t present rows of logos. It will present your shows and your teams. The system will negotiate entitlements, manage subscriptions, surface live starts, catch you up if you’re late, and move you from phone to TV to car without a second thought.

Put simply: You won’t launch Netflix; you’ll launch the story. The OS will do the rest.

That’s the future viewers wanted all along. After fourteen years, the pieces are finally here. It’s time to put them together.

Introducing IT Accelerant

Ben Drawbaugh — Mon, 26 Feb 2024 08:45:30 +0000

I’m very proud and excited to announce that I’ve started a new Managed IT Services company named IT Accelerant. I’ve worked in IT since 2000, in 2018 I started working for an MSP in Annapolis Maryland and learned to love the business of helping other businesses succeed with technology. I’ve been in the Managed IT Services space ever since and love it.

IT Accelerant will focus on serving small to mid-sized business (5-100 people) in Colorado. We’ve just launched a new website that explains our focus and the types of businesses we support. We look forward to serving other business in our area!

Another day another critical Fortigate vulnerability

Ben Drawbaugh — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 06:25:21 +0000

At this point, it’s beyond ridiculous. The device that is supposed to provide security is the one requiring constant updates due to vulnerabilities that are exposed to the internet. Every software vendor has bugs, many of them are security related. It happens. Which is why it is essential that your systems can be quickly and easily updated. Other firewall vendors have provided such automatic updates for over a decade, it’s time we stop using technology that is so difficult to keep updated. Rant over, go update your firewalls now and while you are at it, upgrade to modern solutions that don’t require a VPN at all (like SaaS).

How attackers can bypass Office 365 MFA

Ben Drawbaugh — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 10:59:03 +0000

I’ve always found a good hack fascinating (remember reading 2600?) but while it can be scary, understanding how a good hack works can help you avoid being a victim. This interesting hack against Office 365 accounts uses a few new tricks. One is to embed malicious links in attachments (the attachment itself is safe and the email security tool only scans the embedded URLs), the next is to use the attachment to launch a man-in-the-middle attack to capture a session token when a user goes to the legit Microsoft site to be authenticated. See in the case of MFA, the username and password by themselves aren’t useful without the additional factor, but once you have a token they can access the account until it expires (default 90 days). Anyways, evidently these tactics and more have been in use for years. It’s worth your time to read the whole thing at Bleeping Computer.

TLDR: don’t open attachments or click on links you aren’t expecting, better to call your contact and ask them if they actually meant to send it to you.

Pax8 Marketplace will send leads to MSPs

Ben Drawbaugh — Wed, 14 Jun 2023 11:09:46 +0000

The key to any great business — in my mind — is finding as many Win/Win scenarios as possible. The revamp of the Pax8 cloud marketplace does that by enabling customers searching for solutions on SaaS providers websites to automatically get matched up with MSPs who can support that product. The SaaS provider wins because they sell software, Pax8 wins because they get to resale said software and provide more value to cloud marketplace customers. The MSP wins because they get qualified leads from interested buyers. Finally, the customer wins because they can easily find an MSP to support the software they found doing their own research. Of course time will tell how well it all works, but so far it seems like another example of why an MSP and a SaaS provider should do business with Pax8.

Via CRN

Another Fortinet vulnerability requiring immediate action

Ben Drawbaugh — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 10:51:18 +0000

This was already beyond being old after the last one, but here we go again with Fortinet CVE-2023-27997 requiring immediate action. Who knows how many thousands of Fortigate firewalls are out, they’re deployed by MSPs to protect their client’s, are now a major attack vector that requires everyone to stop what they are doing to mitigate. This is about the 4th in the last year, for those counting (CVE-2022-42475, CVE-2022-40684, CVE-2023-25610). Sure hope you have an automated way to address this, if not, now maybe it’s time to start searching an alternative for your standard technology platform.

I’m back

Ben Drawbaugh — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 10:50:00 +0000

Yeah, so it’s been a minute (about 5 mil actually) since I posted here. I’ve been missing writing for years, but you know how it goes. The world has changed a lot in the past 10 years and while my old pastime of HDTVs is officially boring now, my passion technology hasn’t waned at all. One thing I miss about the old web is how brief blog posts used to be — ahh the 150 words or less Engadget posts. Anyways, my only promise to those who take the time to read what I wrote is that I’ll keep it succinct.

How to Ustream with a Co-host on a Mac

Ben Drawbaugh — Tue, 13 Aug 2013 16:59:59 +0000

On the Engadget HD Podcast, we started streaming the show live some time ago. Over the years I’ve struggled to ensure the quality of the podcast was on par, while at the same time, stream the show live via Ustream. For the most part I’ve relied on the Mega Mix feature of Audio Hijack Pro to grab the audio from Skype. This is the method you’ll find on numerous tutorials online, but one with a huge limitation; you can’t easily control the crossfade (the ability to balance the volume of you and your co-host). This isn’t a problem for the podcast itself, because we do a double ender (Richard and I both record our own audio and Joe muxes it together in post, adjusting the levels then). But this has caused lots of problems for the Ustream listeners because one of us is significantly louder than the other. The other problem I had to solve is that my USB pre-amp (Lexicon Alpha) delivers mono audio, while Skype outputs in stereo — again, easily fixed in post for the podcast. So after the break I’ll explain how I configured Audio Hijack Pro in such a way to allow me to control the crossfade between Skype and my mic, monomize it and finally feed it to Ustream Producer.

First you need to install everything:

Audio Hijack Pro
Soundflower
Ustream Producer
Skype

Next I configure a AHP session to record just my mic (for the double ender). This is very straight forward, just select your input device from Audio Devices, silence the output device and set the path and file name for the recording. If you’re using Audacity, or something else to record, you can skip this.

Next I create a session called podcast. I again start with the input Audio Device, setting it to my pre-amp. In my case Skype expects audio from the opposite channel that my pre-amp outputs, so I also use AHP to swap them. To do this I configure the Output Device to the Soundflower (2CH).

Then I hit advanced and change the channel mapping.

Finally, I configured Skype’s microphone to use the Output device (Soundflower 2ch).

Ok, now I move on to the Effects tab. Start by adding three Effects, all from the 4FX Effects menu; Application Mixer, Monomizer, Auxiliary Device Output.

When you add the Application Mixer, it’ll prompt you to select an app. After selecting Skype, choose Advanced and make sure it is set to “Standard Mode.” (Megamix would grab your mic input again, causing echo). Check the “Monitor Output” check box so that you can hear the conversation too and come in here and hit Hijack when you are ready to podcast. You’ll need to play with the Crossfade level once you get on the Skype call to ensure your listeners can hear you and your co-host at the same volume level.

The monomizer doesn’t have any settings, it just takes the audio from the two channels and mixes them together, otherwise your Ustream listeners might only hear audio out of one speaker.

Now set the Auxiliary Device Output to Soundflower (64ch).

And finally go into Ustream Producer and set your audio input to Soundflower (64ch) to patch the audio from both your mic and Skype to Ustream.

The only thing left is to adjust the levels. You want to ensure that Skype is set to not automatically adjust the mic level. Set your mic gain first and optimize it for your recording, then don’t touch it again. Set your Skype Output volume all the way up (as seen in the image above). Now Hijack everything and note the levels in both your Podcast session of AHP and in Ustream. You can use the Skype call testing service to get a feel for using the Application Mixer’s crossfade, and other levels, but you’ll want to be sure to check them each time before you start recording as you have no control over your co-host’s levels and you want to make sure they match yours in Ustream.

One other tip: if you want to record both ends of the conversation (instead of muxing them in post), you can do this in either Ustream or AHP. I use AHP because I want the recording stored locally and the free version of Ustream will only record to ustream.com.

How do you clean your screens? Here’s how I do it

Ben Drawbaugh — Sun, 14 Apr 2013 11:42:05 +0000

Between TVs, computers, tablets and phones, we spend a lot of our days looking at screens. And I can’t tolerate staring at a dirty screen. While glass touchscreen devices are the easiest to clean, usually getting away with a quick rub on your pants or shirt, laptops and TVs can be very tricky. Of course the best way is to not get it dirty in the first place, but between kids, sneezes and rude-screen-touchers, it happens. Here’s how I clean mine.

I start with two lint-free microfiber cleaning cloths; one damp one dry. First I wipe in circular motion with the damp cloth until I’m confident that I’ve removed all the grime and fingerprints. Then I quickly follow up and dry it with the dry one. On large screens like a TV, it can be necessary to use both cloths at the same time, else parts of the screen might air dry before you get to it, which will leave water spots.

Although I’m happy with the results, I’m curious if I’m doing it the hard way. So how do you clean your screens?

Ultra HD: minmum viewing distance isn’t the same as optimal viewing distance

Ben Drawbaugh — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 07:40:08 +0000

There’s something I’ve been saying for years, but I now don’t believe it’s true. It isn’t just me, there are plenty of other experts who are still saying that if you don’t sit pretty close enough to a display, you can’t appreciate the higher resolution — this was big debate in the 720p vs 1080p days. But now I believe that the distance between you and a 50-inch Ultra HD TV, before you would be just as well off with a 1080p, is so far that your living room probably isn’t big enough to ever worry about it — if you have a huge living room, you probably have room for an 84-inch TV anyways.

The first chink came way back around the time Blu-ray won the format war. Panasonic had a in-dash 720p 7-inch display at the BDA’s CES booth. It was right next to a typical standard definition display, and I still remember being surprised how much better the HD display looked, even on such a small screen from so far away. Then, Apple released the iPhone 4 with retina display and again, you didn’t have to be right on top of it to instantly notice the difference. But then CES 2013 brought a bunch of Ultra HD TVs and a number of side-by-side upconversion demos. In the Toshiba booth, I was trying to capture a picture with my 50mm prime and had to step way back to get the two 84-inch TVs into the shot and noticed how dramatic the difference between the two TVs was, even from over 10-feet away — and this wasn’t even native 4K content!

All of these firsthand impressions started stacking up and then we had a representative from Sharp on the Engadget HD podcast and he indicated that displays have a minimal viewing distance, but this isn’t necessarily the optimal viewing distance. And then it hit me, seeing the pixels is a bad thing. Duh. The rules for sitting too close to a TV are to avoid being able to distinguished the pixels, and thus ruining the experience. And while it is true that if you step back far enough, you won’t be able to tell the difference, that distance is far from the same as the minimal viewing distance. So before you post that I’m out of my mind, please go and grab two displays (one high resolution and one low) and keep stepping back and see how far you have to move back before they start to look the same. I think you’ll be amazed at how far back you can get.