Don’t worry. It’ll wake up in time to record Jersey Shore. But the question is, how deep a sleep will your DVR go into and how much power will it save?

As profiled earlier this week by consumer-electronics lifestyle pub Electronic House, a wave of energy-efficient innovation has already started to over-run a home device that suddenly — with the wide-scale adoption of high-definition programming and digital video recording — has become a huge power consumer.

Also read: How green are the devices that stream Netflix & Hulu?

The problem has gotten pretty bad. According to an NRDC study released last year, the typical cable-, satellite- or telco-leased HD DVR uses 446 kilowatt hours of power each year — more than an Energy Star rated 21-cubic-foot refrigerator, which uses 415 kWh per year.

Sleep’s the thing

A big part of the problem is that these devices are on 24/7. Even when I power down my DirecTV two-tuner HD DVR, for example, I’m for the most part only turning off the elegant blue-lit display. All of the box’s critical functions remain on.

CableLabs, the cable-industry research consortium, has pledged that by September, the top six cable operators in the U.S. — together representing 85 percent of cable subscriptions — will start leasing their customers set-tops that go into “light sleep” mode.

Defined by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star specifications, light sleep allows essential activities within a set-top to continue while other power-using tasks, such as channel tuning and video display, are discontinued. Unless it’s recording something, the box doesn’t need to be doing these things.

CableLabs research shows that this feature can cut power consumption by as much as 20 percent.

But chips currently available for set-top boxes enable a much more restful, power-saving night of slumber.

Chip sets manufactured by Broadcom, for example, enable a sleep level called “deep standby,” whereby the CPU and almost all other box functions are shut down. The device uses less than a watt of power in this mode, company officials say, and it can restart the basic task of decoding video in about four seconds.

As a Broadcom spokeswoman told us Thursday, the feature is available to the many multi-channel operators the company sells chips to. But for pay TV operators pimping out houses with whole-home-connected always-on systems, four seconds may be too slow. When it’s not inviting litigation from the broadcast networks by deleting their commercials, for example, Dish Network’s new Hopper DVR records every prime time show from the Big Four channels. When does it have time to enter deep sleep?

Citing EPA data, Electronic House pointed out that as of April, only two of the 57 pay TV set-tops that qualify for the Energy Star 3.0 specification enable a deep sleep mode. (Currently, Energy Star specs don’t mandate deep sleep, although the EPA is considering it for revised specifications that will debut next year.)

Beyond sleep

Fortunately, chipmakers have integrated a number of other power-saving features recently that don’t temporarily shut down the box. For example, multi-tuner devices used to require multiple chips. But new products from Broadcom and Intel have consolidated this process onto a single chip, saving the need for wattage in the process.

Meanwhile, so-called “thin clients” have already been widely adopted. Dispersed in areas of the house beyond the living room, these devices connect to the main set-top via Ethernet cable or coax, providing video programming access at a fraction of the power-use of a full-service DVR.

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“Ultimately, this case is about consumer choice,” said Dish in a complaint filed Thursday in Manhattan federal court. The satellite TV provider wants the court to declare that it is not infringing copyright or breaching the terms of its contracts with Fox, NBC, ABC and CBS. Meanwhile, the Hollywood Reporter reports that Fox has filed a separate suit against Dish to “aggressively defend the future of free, over-the-air television.”

Dish’s ad-skipping device stands out because, unlike other DVRs, viewers can skip an entire set of commercials rather than fast-forwarding or skipping in 30 second jumps.

The so-called “ad eraser” may delight consumers, but the TV networks reacted angrily during a conclave with advertisers in New York last week.

“How does Charlie Ergen expect me to produce ‘CSI’ without commercials?” said chief executive of CBS Corporation, Leslie Moonves, according to the New York Times. (Also, see my colleague Daniel Frankel’s excellent report on the strategy behind Dish’s “Molotov cocktail” at the broadcasters.)

In its complaint, Dish portrays its technology as a natural extension of existing time-shifting practices and points out that Americans have for decades chosen to disregard ads in one way or another.

Dish also claims that its technology does not alter the broadcasters’ signals and that viewers can only skip the ads the day after a show is aired live.

The TV networks are facing significant disruptions despite receiving new fees that oblige cable and satellite providers to pay them for carrying their over-the-air signals. In addition to its legal tussle with Dish over ad skipping, the TV networks are also suing Aereo, a start-up service that uses tiny antennas to broadcast shows directly to viewers’ iPads and iPhones.

Here’s a copy of Dish’s complaint:

Dish v TV Networkshttp://www.scribd.com/embeds/94727377/content?start_page=1&view_mode=list&access_key=key-206ttdhsm6nafzerpogj

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To show how — dare I say it — sexy this is, the company’s latest ad shows what happens when you put a female model wearing a camisole top and shorts that are two sizes too small in front of a Smart TV. Of course this is in front of a window where everyone can see her. Hilarity and racy themes ensue. See for yourself how Samsung smartly makes good us of it’s “Look, don’t touch” tagline. Oh and be on the lookout for a previous comedic ad star: It looks like the Old Spice guy is in the mix!

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These kinds of costly cease-and-desist campaings against file sharers aren’t uncommon in Germany; hundreds of thousands of Internet users have been targeted by music labels, porn studios and others with similar demands in recent years, netting rights holders millions. Unusual about this case is that Iron Sky is a crowdsourced and crowd-financed movie, produced by people who made names for themselves with Creative Commons-licensed content that could be freely downloaded and reshared.

Iron Sky is a science fiction comedy, depicting a world in which the Nazis fled to the moon at the end of World War 2. It’s director Timo Vuorensola and its visual effects producer Samuli Torssonen previously rose to fame when they released the Star Trek parody Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning in 2005. That movie was offered for free online and clocked three million downloads within three months. The filmmakers have also in the past  lambasted old media for their take on piracy. In a blog post from 2009, Vuorensola wrote: “Piracy in its current, most common form – the digital download – is not a crime.”

His current German distributor, Polyband, seems to disagree. The company has hired local law office Sasse & Partners, which has in the past sent out similar letters on behalf of German record companies, according to a local law blogger.

Iron Sky has been heavily relying on crowdsourcing for animation, modeling and other parts of the movie making process, and €1 million of the movie’s €7.5 million budget have been contributed by fans. However, the film makers are relying on traditional distributors to actually get the movie in the theaters, and that apparently has resulted in a number of problems.

Iron Sky’s British distributor initially intended to only show the movie in theaters for a single day and then immediately take it to DVD. This strategy was opposed by the film makers themselves, who wrote on their blog: “What they are doing is basically stabbing us in the back.” The duo didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit threats in Germany, but one can imagine that they’re not too happy about threatening their fans with lawsuits either.

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DISHWorld, as the service is called, will offer a number of international packages that bundle Brazilian, Arabic, Hindi and other foreign language content. Bundles go for as little as $5 a month, and all the way up to $44.99, but customers have to mix and match bundles to spend at least $19.99 per month.

Some of the bundles simply offer foreign news stations, while others include movie channels and music TV. Among the networks included in the various bundles are Sony Entertainment Television India, Al Jazeera, Willow Cricket and BBC Arabic. Viewers have access to live TV and can catch up on any of the shows that aired within the last 48 hours on any of the networks they subscribe to.

A press release also hinted at additional offerings targeting other expats in the future, and it suggested that Roku decided against becoming its own operator, partnering with Dish instead:

“Additionally, Roku selected Dish to manage the launch and expansion of future foreign language channels and content on the Roku platform.”

The partnership is a big deal for Roku; the set-top-box has been offering subscription access to a number of foreign channels and packages for some time. But in most cases, these are sold separately by smaller companies, some of which reside outside of the U.S.. Having Dish as a trusted brand to manage and promote these kinds of subscriptions could give Roku a big boost.

But it’s also a remarkable deal for the pay TV world in general. Over the last few months, there have been many rumors that one of the big pay TV providers would eventually decide to go online and target Internet users located outside of its local market with streaming-only packages — an idea that folks in the industry have been dubbing a virtual cable company. Today, this kind of virtual pay TV future became reality — for folks speaking Hindi, Arabic or any other of the targeted languages, anyway.

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Despite earlier provisionally concluding News Corp’s part-owned BSkyB’s exclusive subscription pay-TV deals with Hollywood studios restricts competition, the UK’s Competition Commission has now reversed its decision, saying:

“Whereas in the past consumers wanting to watch recent movies on a pay-TV movie service had to subscribe to Sky Movies through a traditional pay-TV platform, the launch of new and improved movie services in the pay-TV market by Netflix and Lovefilm means that they now have other alternatives.”

That development – the unleashing of new content options over internet TV – was evident to those who have been watching the sector. But it was a a development the Competition Commission had to find for itself, during an inquiry that began almost two years ago.

Sky, led by CEO Jeremy Darroch (pictured), had declared itself “perplexed” by the December 2011 provisional ruling. After provisionally ruling against Sky Movies, the Competition Commission at one point mooted that BSkyB be forced to carry competing services from the likes of Lovefilm and Blinkbox on its own pay-TV box – something BSkyB would have contested vigorously.

But there were especially two factors behind the commission’s change of mind:

“In particular, Netflix launched in the UK in January 2012 and, since the original provisional findings, LOVEFiLM has enhanced significantly its Internet-distributed movie offering.

“As rival services increase the number of their subscribers, the barriers to them acquiring further first subscription pay-TV window rights will continue to fall.”

Indeed, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings had left the door open for the Competition Commission’s reversal when, whilst launching Netflix in to the UK in January, he told paidContent:

“We could just bid against them (Sky). We are not dependent on whatever the Competition Commission does.”

Now Hastings will have to front up. BSkyB will this summer launch Now TV, its own suite of on-demand and live TV channels including movies, over internet TV devices without requiring a full annual satellite subscription as its core business does.

“The CC expects consumer choice to increase further when Sky launches its own Internet-based service in the summer (branded Now TV), which will offer Sky Movies without the need to take any other pay-TV content or subscribe to Sky’s satellite platform.

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On Tuesday, Glenn Britt, chairman and CEO of the No. 4 pay TV service provider in the U.S., Time Warner Cable, became the first executive from the multi-channel industry to speak out about a controversial new feature in Dish’s Hopper digital video recorders. This feature filters out commercials from the recordings of broadcast-network shows.

“The dual stream of advertising and subscription fees has been great for content providers, and we don’t want to destroy one of those revenue streams,”Britt told a Cable Show audience, which included reporters from publications including Ad Age. “Subscription prices will go up or less content will be made.”

Also read: How broadcasters could have stopped Dish’s Hopper

Mark Greatrex, chief marketing officer for another top cable operator, Cox Communications, also weighed in: “As a marketer it’s not particularly helpful to bring that much uncertaintly into the marketplace.”

During upfront presentations to advertisers last week, virtually every broadcast network chief took verbal aim at the feature, with Fox and NBC even pledging not to let Dish run ads for it on their channels.

But speaking to Associated Press Tuesday, Vivek Khemka, Dish Network VP of product management for Dish, said they’ve got it all wrong.

By recording every minute broadcasted in prime time by ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC, the Hopper is actually enabling consumers to watch more television. “It’s a win-win for consumers and the networks,” he said.

Of course, it’s hard to see how the networks are “winning” when a key aspect of their monetization model has been stripped away.

The other part of that model is the relatively new revenue stream created by broadcast networks demanding retransmission fees from the cable, satellite and telco TV service providers who offer their signals to subscribers.

With Dish trying to grow its current subscriber count of around 14 million, offering consumer-friendly features that let users skip ads probably helps. But all DVRs provided by multi-channel operators feature some level of commercial-skipping ability (it’s simply called fast-forward).

Questions that remain unanswered:

By throwing a Molotov Cocktail directly at broadcasters, might Dish be looking for a negotiating hedge against the Big Four Networks to help control fast-rising retransmission costs? And if so, might Dish have expected a little support from its peers in the multi-channel business?

If the answer turns out to be “yes” to the latter, it sure hasn’t received that support yet.

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Verizon didn’t reveal any details about how this high-quality, long-form content would gel with its restricted data plans when the app launches later this month, but I suspect Viewdini may be Verizon’s first venture into the ‘toll-free’ mobile broadband: Rather than charge the customer for the gigabytes of video consumed, it charges the content provider.

Lately Verizon has been talking up the idea of reversing the mobile data business model (as has AT&T), giving its customers unlimited access to any video or over-the-top content service so long as the owner of the service pays the carriage charges. So far Verizon hasn’t implemented any specific policies – that we know of – but if it can secure the cooperation of content providers, it’s only a matter of time.

Viewdini would fit perfectly with that model because video consumes enormous bandwidth relative to other services. If Verizon customers were to make regular use of TV show and movie streaming they would quickly max out their data plans (or enter into throttling territory in the case of its grandfathered unlimited customers). Without any kind of tweak to Verizon’s capping policies, Viewdini practically invites customers to run up huge overage charges, which would hardly be a customer relations coup.

But the apps-charging structure provides a clue as to how Verizon might offer that pipe for free. “By simply searching for a title, topic, or star’s name, viewdini will let customers know which services have mobile video for streaming, and whether it is available  at no additional charge, by subscription, to rent or for purchase,” Verizon stated in its press release.

In each case, Verizon could skim a little from the top of each purchase, for instance collecting a portion of a movie rental or purchase fee. In the case of subscription video services like Hulu Plus or Netflix, Verizon could take a share of monthly revenue from every subscriber that used Viewdini or just charge the video providers flat per-gigabyte or per-stream fees.

Verizon plans to expand its initial line-up to movie studios and other TV sites. If it is able negotiate revenue sharing deals with every service it aggregates, Verizon could easily offer Viewdini as completely toll-free app.

That would make a lot of consumers happy, as they’d be free to stream away without worrying about their data caps, but it could have a chilling effect on the application developers. Netflix and Comcast may be able to afford bandwidth fees, but smaller companies may not be able to – especially if they’re offering up their content for free.

Comcast is already facing criticism that it’s running afoul of net neutrality rules for capping residential broadband data while giving a free ride to its own Xfinity traffic. But the net neutrality rules don’t apply wireless, so if Verizon wants to go the toll-free route, there’s nothing to stop it.

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While Google has given what amounts to seed money to its video production partners in the past, this contribution marks the first time the company has offered major capital backing for one of them.

Redpoint Ventures and MK Capital also contributed to the Los Angeles-based production company’s fourth funding round. Through three previous rounds, all led by MK Capital, Machinima raised $14.6 million.

Machinima has emerged as Google-owned YouTube’s third most popular video channel, commanding 23.1 million unique viewers in April, according to research company comScore. Notably, Machinima offers better engagement than any other top YouTube channel, with viewers, on average, spending 65 minutes in April viewing it, comScore said.

Machinima said the funding will be invested into its “content and global sales operations, international expansion, distribution strategies, and product and technology initiatives, as the company strives to create a global video programming brand that transforms the way a new generation.”

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