Yes, it was a legitimate product/service market testing survey. I took it too.
It's common for technology companies to sound out potential customers to see how they react to new features or products, and test the pricing waters.
In my survey (and it's common for product marketing teams to send different versions questioning a subset of features so as not to give the whole game away) I got the following insights:
- A question asking what features I'd be interested in, including 4K and HDR.
- The hypothetical new add-on would have: Pause live tv, skip/rewind live tv
- Go to the beginning of a live TV show if you joined late
- Cloud PVR, with a potential name of "Pin for Later" (there were other names they were testing but that one I remember)
- 2 weeks of storage time, but with an option to pay for 4 weeks (This doesn't match what was seen above, but this might be one of the options they are testing across the survey group)
- A "Just for you" service: I didn't quite understand the value of this one, but it was described as a selection of VoD shows chosen "just for you" based on your viewing interests and available in your Cloud PVR.
The survey also asked me how much storage I would need based on the number of 30 min, 60 min and 2 hour programs I would want to keep in the Cloud PVR.
As to competing with Optik, I think we maybe witnessing the evolution of Pik into Telus's next generation of cloud-based, al a carte, 4k HDR TV service that will eventually replace Optik.
From a product management standpoint, the biggest problem with Optik is a lot of the functionality is buried in those proprietary PVRs. They are hard to program, and need specialist developers. Those skills are not common and expensive. Building value in the Telus cloud, and using off-the-shelf Android and iOS devices bring better user experience and more agile, cheaper development costs, as any Android or iOS developer can skill-up on the respective TV libraries easily.
In this way Telus can have a future proofed TV product delivered over IP, with best of class user experience on Android and iOS devices, giving Telus an agile platform that can add new features without trying to sell you a new Optik box.
I can see a future where Pik for TV at $10 p/m is foot in the door, and all those cool things can be added al a carte if you want them: we already can with HBO, and Sports. Want 4K and HDR? pay a few bucks extra p/m (Netflix does that). PVR? $5 p/m. Dolby Atmos? Sure...
Just because Pik is targeted at the low end of the TV consuming market, it does not mean the technology stack isn't built for scale. The Pik infrastructure is a lot of investment for a relatively small slice of the TV watching cake...
