EchoStar already alluded to licensing out SlingLoaded technology during their debut at CES, but today marks the first time EchoStar has offered up detailed plans to anyone looking to design products around EchoStar/Sling Media's solution.

Until today, EchoStar's SlingLoaded technology has been kept in-house, offering up the EchoStar 922 to Dish Network and recently announcing a Tru2way set-top for cable. Licensing SlingLoaded would allow third-party manufacturers to integrate Sling technology into set top boxes, TVs, and other media devices, not to mention further EchoStar's desire to make "place-shifting as common as DVRs," according to an EchoStar spokesperson.

No licensees have yet been named, but word is EchoStar is going after some of the largest set-top manufacturers in the cable biz, namely like Motorola, Cisco, and Pace.

What impact this would have on the continuation of retail boxes is unclear, but we foresee ongoing interest in standalone Slingboxes at retail for quite some time. Unlike the retail Slingbox and full version of SlingLoaded, EchoStar is giving cable operators the option to restrict a customer's ability to use place-shifting abilities.

Jeff Baumgartner from Cable Digital News points out, according to a spec sheet for the T2200S Tru2Way cable box with SlingLoaded technology, place-shifting can be limited to in network computers and video monitors. Furthermore, place-shifting can also be restricted on a channel-by-channel basis, which pretty much defeats the entire concept of "my TV anywhere" if these restrictions are widely used. Based on the MLB's reaction to place-shifting in the past, we'd say some networks will push to take advantage of those restrictions if they have the choice.  Serious slingers may opt to skip the integrated solution and instead stick to retail boxes which do not contain these restrictions.

Fortunately, cable set-tops aren't the only devices that could take advantage of Sling's place-shifting goodness. So, if the pricing and licensing terms are reasonable, there could be a whole slew of SlingLoaded devices coming your way soon.

Read Jeff Baumgartner's Story at Lightreading's Cable Digital News

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