Dang, I Forgot to Set the VCR!

So, you meant to record that World Cup match taking place while you're at work. But, you forgot to set up the recorder. No problem, if you have a Sony-Ericsson SO902iS keitai (cell phone) and one of several Sony models of high-definition video recorders (hard disk or DVD either one, I think). Just call up the G-guide website on your cell phone, find the right program, and click a couple of buttons, and your phone contacts your video recorder via the Internet, and sets it to record for you.

You have to set up the service beforehand, but it's free. Connect to the program guide website, do some setup there, set a password on your DVR (digital video recorder), then have your phone connect to the DVR via infrared the first time. Presumably they exchange enough information then to find and identify each other via the Internet when you're away from the house.

Obviously, this means your DVR has to be connected to the Internet. Details of that are vague, but my first question is how NAT is dealt with. Does your DVR have to have a permanent, non-NATed, global address? Or does it get around this by polling some shared server frequently? Or, do you have to convince your ISP to set up a passthrough in the NAT so that you can connect to your DVR? Ugh. Just switch to IPv6, man (of course, your home or ISP firewall would still have to be smart enough to let the right traffic through...).