Written by Paul Kapustka
Posted Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 2:00 AM PT

New FiOS Interface Debuts… In Ft. Wayne

Talk about opening off-off-Broadaway: the lucky Verizon FiOS subscribers in Fort Wayne, Ind., will be the first to see the telco’s new TV interface (or Interactive Media Guide, as the marketers call it) for its fiber-to-the-home video offering.

In a sneak-leaked-peek, this demo shows the zippy interface with a cool bass-riff background. Sure it’s canned, but if you are one of the fortunate to be surfing at fiber-optic speed, networked or hard disk are probably the same thing to you these days.

As a frustrated user of Comcast’s Soviet-era on-screen navigation, I can only cheer on any competitive offering, in the hope that all boats will rise. Listening to the Verizon promo, I heard the words that any and all navigation “can be done with the arrow and OK keys” on your remote. I raise a silent, chilled adult beverage in salute, and wait at the curb for fiber to arrive.

(According to Verizon, the FiOS 2.0 interface should be rolled out across the company’s fiber customer base this spring and summer. Hoosiers in Ft. Wayne, however, get first looks.)

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Topic: Online Video

Comments (1)

Did anyone at Verizon Beta test this system? The first ver they put out had some flaws, but it was not as bad as it is now. I’m a long time Verizon customer, but I will be canceling this TV service, and go back to Brighthouse, or one of the Sat providers.
This entire system is too much work to endure, and I would not keep this TV service if it were free. ]
Clearly the people responsible for this have never seen TV!!!

Bill Cave — 6:46 AM on October 28, 2007 Reply

Linkbacks (3)

[...] only cheer on any competitive offering, in the hope that all boats will rise,” Paul Kapustka, deftly using deliciously cruel words, sums up the rage and feelings of many of the cable company [...]

GigaOM » User Interface & The Triple… — 7:00 AM on May 24, 2007
[...] useful for large telecom- (and cable-) based IPTV systems. Their video search powers Verizon (VZ) FiOS TV’s new interface, helping people finds tons of videos quickly from the large library of content stored on [...]

NewTeeVee Soon, Not Just YouTube But All… — 11:55 AM on August 24, 2007
[...] only cheer on any competitive offering, in the hope that all boats will rise,’ Paul Kapustka, deftly using deliciously cruel words, sums up the rage and feelings of many of the cable company [...]

Bleam » Blog Archive » User Interface… — 11:33 AM on November 4, 2007