The Gillmor Gang — Robert Scoble, Kevin Marks, John Taschek, and Steve Gillmor — plus an active set of realtime commenters on Building 43’s realtime Friendfeed chat, added up to an interesting tour of the emerging AirPlay platform. The Apple TV-delivered streaming service hooks content from iTunes and iOS devices up to the big HDTV screen. According to @Scobleizer AirPlay support is growing from other similar services including Hulu et al via something called Sqrrl. With Google TV ineffectual in delivering content from major studios so far, Apple TV’s low price keeps getting lower as new services are integrated.
In cartel news, Time Warner continues to put pressure on the studios to treat the tablet as a first class citizen. The cable company did pull back from a few networks, most notably Comedy Central and DIscovery. Apparently the Viacom suit still has some teeth left in it with YouTube, as @kevinmarks mentions, encouraging transformers like the cable companies to be careful how they approach the home set. The studios have one more shot with those of us who’ve finally finished the MadMen season 4; creator Matthew Weiner has finally signed a deal to produce at least two and preferably 3 final seasons. Season 5 will return in March, 2012, leaving a whole year to get bored with and abandon network fare. There’s a new sheriff in town as the disruption known as the iPad continues to move through the media.