Row over French DTT platform’s transition to DVB-T2

Posted by Barry Flynn on September 6, 2011 No comments

A row has broken out in France over the pace at which its DTT platform should migrate to DVB-T2 – the second-generation version of the DVB-T transmission standard.

Earlier this week, Catherine Morin-Desailly, the French senator who heads up the Senate’s media and new technologies working group, put out a press release questioning the imposition of the more efficient standard on new DTT channels. “Migrating to DVB-T2 is premature,” she said. “There’s no reason to make French consumers change their equipment again just to access a few extra channels.”

The channels in question are the so-called ‘bonus’ channels due to be awarded to incumbent terrestrial broadcasters on December 1st this year, the day after analogue terrestrial television is finally switched off in France. The European Commission (EC) has suggested the awards contravene European legislation.

Last month, the French newspaper La Tribune leaked the contents of a confidential notification by the French government to the EC of a projected change in French legislation aimed at imposing DVB-T2 on new terrestrial channels. The newspaper interpreted the move as a ruse designed to delay the launch of the controversial bonus channels, since no DVB-T2 receivers would be available to receive them.

Farncombe designs UI for Digiturk’s new hybrid digital TV service

Posted by Barry Flynn on August 4, 2011 No comments

Farncombe has announced that WeAreAka, its design practice, played a key role in the development of the user experience for Digiturk’s new hybrid IPTV service.
Targeting a launch at the end of 2011, the new digital TV service marries satellite with IPTV delivery through a hybrid digital video recorder from Sagemcom – providing sophisticated video-on-demand and catch-up TV features alongside the Turkish operator’s established linear multichannel satellite broadcasts.
The full press release can be found here.

Non-linear delivery: Nielsen and IHS tell traditional broadcasters not to worry… yet

Posted by Barry Flynn on August 3, 2011 No comments

Two new pieces of research suggest a limited impact so far by OTT and non-linear TV delivery systems on traditional forms of TV consumption:
1) First, IHS is claiming that ‘Broadcasters Have No Cause for Panic Over Rise of Nonlinear TV’, based on predictions that DVR, on-demand and other forms of nonlinear programming will account for “only 15.8% of television viewing in the United States in 2015, up from 9.9% in 2010″ – while in the UK, non-linear will account for 12.7% of television viewing in 2015, up from 7.8% in 2010 (see here).
2) Second, Videonuze, citing a new study by Nielsen and CTAM for the US market, concludes - with caveats – that for those fearing that video consumption through mobile and connected devices threatens to disrupt traditional linear TV viewership, it may not be “happening en masse, at least not yet”. The study suggests that 85% of video app users are watching the same or more regularly scheduled [amounts of] TV.

TBone rebrands as ‘Zeebox’, targeting social TV

Posted by Barry Flynn on August 2, 2011 No comments

PaidContent is running an exclusive on TBone, brain-child of Anthony Rose, the man credited with turning the BBC iPlayer into a runaway success.
TBone is to be launched as ‘Zeebox’, in the form of an application initially for iPads, which will allow users of companion devices to control TV sets in line with what their ‘friends’ are watching on Facebook and Twitter.
An intriguing aspect of the technology, according to PaidContent, is the use of an ‘automated content recognition’ system, which will automatically display ‘infotags’ in real time related to the semantic content of the TV programme being viewed, potentially allowing contextual linking to relevant sites.
Zeebox is due to go live in October.

Apple, Hulu and the rush for content

Posted by Barry Flynn on July 29, 2011 No comments

According to unconfirmed press reports, Apple is considering the acquisition of Hulu.
Hulu’s owners have also held discussions with Yahoo!, Google and Amazon, while Microsoft has stated that it is not interested in the company.
In June 2011, the US-based OTT service, which has significant content deals with NBC Universal, Fox and ABC, had 26.7m unique viewers.
Should Apple acquire Hulu, the main question would be whether Hulu would continue to invest to reach multiple third party devices or would shift the focus to concentrate on iTunes and Apple devices.
For more on the implications of this, see a detailed analysis by farncombe here.