A friend was asking me about Playstation Vue recently, and I looked into it and it seems quite decent. For $50 it has all the major channels you could probably want, plus a cloud DVR, so it's like a cheaper alternative to cable. It's only in a few US cities currently, and expanding.

Comcast is also being trialed in a couple of markets but will be rolled out nationwide throughout 2016.  I am inclined to try the skinny package for $15 

BTW, the trend towards streaming everything should continue to underpin the Network Technology sector.  Connected Car Technology is also coming and will be available in a phased fashion, all roads, traffic lights, railroad crossing, intersections, all vehicles, etc... will be connected, I see this as the first real useful segment within IoT, it will make cars far safer than ever.  It should also contribute to drive bandwidth demand further.

While there may be security questions surrounding IoT, I believe it will deliver many applications that will enhance many things around us.

The Networking Industry is in for a continued secular uptrend.

Long term (no pun intended), the secular trend of bandwidth growth as an investing thesis is what makes me feel comfortable having my portfolio way outsized in the sector, with ALU, CIEN, INFN. I don't know (and haven't seen, aside from the regular announcement of deals of achievements for INFN) what is driving INFN's 4% pop today (CIEN and ALU up but less so), but I took the opportunity to sell some covered calls Dec. 18th stk 22 for .80 cents. About 1/2 my current position. (Mindful of your flexible but approximate valuation that above 20 it's rich, below 20 it's probably a buy.) Still can't decide whether to sell CIEN calls for Dec. 4th (wimpy return, but if it finishes OTM, the premium for the Dec. 11th calls are sweet, given that earnings are Dec. 10th) or just sell calls after Dec. 10th. Trying to make sense of these moves will just drive you nuts, as whatever drives this sector-wide beta, often on a daily basis is invisible, as far as I can tell. Might as well be in Vegas choosing Red or Black.

On IoT, I fail to understand why there isn't more concern about the possibility of terrorist cyber attacks. If driver-less cars were the standard, accelerating cars to 100 mph (well, if they're electric, maybe 75 mph), and disabling the brakes - one could probably kill not thousands of people (as did 911), but hundreds of thousands of people. Or, estimates are that if the whole power grid was taken down, and couldn't be repaired for 9 months to a year, the majority of people in the US would be dead by then. (Now *there's* an argument for 2nd amendment gun rights - you're the only guy in your neighborhood who stocked away canned food and your neighbors are at your door. And they're not just asking to borrow a cup of sugar.) Ted Koppel was was interviewed on Charlie Rose, since he has just published a book on that danger, after Koppel interviewing govt. officials on preparedness for a power grid take-down, and he 'discovered' this problem and advised people to stock a 6 month supply of food and water. And he calls his 'discovery' news. James Barrett spoke in depth about this problem in his 2012 book "Our Final Invention - Artificial Intelligence and the End of the Human Era." Koppel could've saved himself a ton of time if he had just read the damn book. Altho it is a good thing to see this danger starting to be introduced in public awareness.

One could argue that IoT systems could be programmed to be 'fail safe' and unhackable. Seems a very dubious argument to me: Three Mile Island, Chernoble, Fukishima were all presumed to be programmed 'failsafe' systems. And if Anonymous can hack virtually any government site, why can't a terrorist with excellent computer skills do the same with 'secured' IoT systems?  Asimov's 3 laws of robotics to protect human life make for good science fiction, but that's about it. And how is it possible that someone can cause the DOW to crash 1000 points in order to profit from it? End of Screed. Can't help it - I find that stuff fascinating.

I hear you and understand your puzzlement.  Security is indeed "the" topic of the times.  That said, human fascination with technology dates back to the Guttenberg era. I personally find myself equally fascinated by technology, more so given that I am a software engineer, but also believe that the security issues are part of the problem that technological advances bring, up until now, that has been an afterthought.  The “Lets make money first”, then worry about the issues later mentality has prevailed. 

I concur that total and absolute security is but a goal, one that is virtually impossible to guarantee. However, I am firmly convinced that security will be addressed over time; there is a lot of money to be made.  And as you and I know, technology follows the money.

lt cap,

I absolutely agree that technology follows the money. And the scarier and more visible security threats become, it is bound to attract big money more easily.  I think this might already be seen in things like skyrocketing valuations of newer, small cybersecurity stocks - PANW, Fireye, etc. The obvious bet is on demand growth going forward.

But I think also that money will follow the security: that is, for instance, it is known that 60 countries are developing AI autonomous battlefield weapons. (Why risk human life when a robot can fire 400 rounds a second with pinpoint accuracy, be less vulnerable to damage, etc.? The funny, well, not-so-funny thing is that 'accidents' with such weapons have already occurred - I think it was around 2005? 2009? S. Africa was developing a fast-firing AI machine gun that accidentally killed or wounded something like 9 of their own soldiers 'by accident' in a fraction of a second. Oops - back to the drawing board. But I digress.) What I mean is, what country is willing to give up development of AI weapons, some of mass destruction, when that hands their enemies a tremendous advantage? The US-China agreement on curbing industrial cyber spying seems a joke to me. The possibility of 'cheating' almost insures both sides will continue to do so. 'Security agreements' about development of such battlefieldweapons are likely to be worthless. We condemned Saddam for WMD's when in fact he had none - but despite it being outlawed by treaty, we have copious stockpiles of bacterial/nerve/chemical weapons just in case our enemies have them. My point is that where battlefield AI will be a weapons advantage, no one will really give up development of them for fear that their neighbors won't. So money gets poured into 'security' in the form (or promise) that our battlefield AI weapons will be superior to anything anyone else produces. The same forces that govern the stock market (fear and greed) will probably drive the AI weapons market. Mutual Assured Destruction, a policy of the last century that was finally deemed as an insane concept, is probably now in vogue again, in a new guise. Lockheed, anyone?