QR codes for TV-based smartphone transactions?

Posted by Barry Flynn on July 27, 2011 No comments

Interesting think-piece here by Rick Howe at Tracy Swedlow’s Interactive TV Today.
Rick wonders if the use of QR codes might take off on (US) TV as a way of enabling secure purchases via smartphones in response to a TV screen prompt. His article contains a number of video-grabs of US examples of such applications.
Rick bases his argument on the growing popularity of QR functionality in mobile phones.
QR codes (short for Quick Response codes) are a high-data-content variation on barcodes (see here).
They can be captured and analysed by phone camera software, triggering a link to a relevant website.
As an example, the QR code below contains a link to farncombe’s website (www.farncombe.com).

‘T2-Lite’: a new candidate for mobile broadcasting

Posted by Barry Flynn on July 14, 2011 No comments

European digital TV standards body DVB has introduced a new, slimmed-down profile as part of the latest version of its next-generation DVB-T2 standard, targeting ‘low-capacity’ applications such as mobile broadcasting.
Known as ‘T2-Lite’, the new profile avoids processing- and memory-heavy modes, allowing more efficient receiver designs to be used – e.g. for a DVB-T2 tuner in a smartphone or tablet.
T2-Lite is limited to a maximum bit-rate of 4MBit/s, whereas the full HD-centric profile can run up to 48MBit/s (in the UK, DVB-T2 uses around 40MBit/s for DTT HD – see here.)
DVB says that “One possible use for T2-Lite enables the simulcasting of two different versions of the same service, with different bit-rates and levels of protection, which would allow better reception in fringe areas.”
According to a post on the BBC’s R&D blog, the BBC has been testing T2-Lite since July 7. In the trial, an HD signal for fixed reception and a T2-Lite version are combined within a single multiplex, with the T2-Lite frames placed in the gaps between the HD ones.
The concept that a single DVB signal could contain different versions of a broadcast which could be extracted by different receivers with different capabilities was proposed by the ‘god-father’ of DVB, Prof Ulrich Reimers, when DVB was originally set up, but has yet to prove popular in practice.
The BBC solution will be demonstrated at the forthcoming IBC exhibition in Amsterdam.

Farncombe supports KBW VOD launch

Posted by Barry Flynn on July 7, 2011 No comments

Farncombe has played a key role in the creation and launch of Germany’s first VOD service on cable for Kabel Baden-Württemberg (Kabel BW).
In a press release out this morning, Kabel BW said the service, Kabel BW Videothek, had met with “enthusiasm” from its subscribers.
Kabel BW engaged farncombe to advise on the VOD project from its inception, with farncombe helping to define the requirements for the service and its features, then supporting Kabel BW with vendor selection, architecture definition and design, as well as advising on the contractual aspects of the project.
Farncombe went on to play a key role in project-managing the system integration of Kabel BW Videothek, working closely with Kabel BW’s Product Management, Engineering, Billing and CRM, Customer Support and Operational teams.
Full text of the press release here. German-language version here.

Kabel BW VideothekKabel BW Videothek

New pay-TV card-sharing scam uncovered in Cyprus

Posted by Barry Flynn on June 21, 2011 No comments

A rare example of a so-called ‘card-sharing’ pay-TV piracy operation has come to light following AEPOC’s announcement of a police raid in Cyprus.
On June 14th a 49-year-old Cypriot man was arrested for illegally providing subscriptions to the pay-TV offerings of BFBS, BSkyB and Nova.
The pirate is accused of having provided illegal pay-TV subscriptions to nearly 1,400 clients in Cyprus and across Europe – earning at least €100,000 over an eight-month period, according to some estimates.
Card-sharing exploits a weakness in the DVB conditional access system through which a legitimate smartcard is hacked to provide a stream of access codes which can be distributed for a fee to consumers unwilling to pay the full price for a pay-TV subscription.
Farncombe discussed the nature of this weakness in detail in a White Paper entitled: Towards a Replacement for the DVB Common Scrambling Algorithm.

Informa forecasts low usage of 3DTV despite rapid penetration increase

Posted by Barry Flynn on June 21, 2011 No comments

Informa Telecoms & Media has a new global forecast out for 3DTV take-up, which is pessimistic about the extent to which 3D functionality will actually be used.
The company is predicting that global penetration of 3DTV-ready displays will rise “fairly impressively”, from 0.2% of TV households in 2010 (~2.9m households) to 16.9% penetration (236.2m homes) in 2016. (Click on thumbnail below).

However, says Informa, only a third of that number (around 78.5m) will be active and regular users of 3DTV content. In other words, 3DTV will be more of a ‘feature’ that some will opt to use and others won’t.