Mobile TV Looming on the Horizon
17 May 2008- Will Free Mobile TV Win Out?
- Local TV Stations Want Their Own Mobile TV Standard
“Is mobile TV ready for its close-up?” asks MSNBC’s Suzanne Choney, who says, “Momentum and interest are building for TV ’snacking’ on the small screen” in her article at:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24586581/
Choney cites several events that point to the beginning of a trend, events that have been previously reported in detail in The Online Reporter:
- AT&T recently launched its subscription mobile TV service. Verizon Wireless was already offering almost the identical service. Both are based on Qualcomm’s MediaFLO mobile TV service but neither seems to have yet picked up any momentum.
- Microsoft recently began selling TV shows for its Zune portable media player.
- Orb Networks last week announced its software for streaming live TV to the iPhone and iPod Touch for those who are willing to unlock them, something Apple doesn’t authorize.
- HBO this week added some of its TV shows to Apple’s iTunes store for viewing on iPhones and video iPods.
- Sprint Nextel, Alltel, AT&T (in addition to the MediaFLO service), US Cellular and other mobile phone operators offer TV on some handset models by using the MobiTV service, which comes with up to 60 channels.
There are two business models now with a third one emerging. One is pay-per-download like Apple’s iTunes, which now violates a once iron clad tenet of Apple’s by offering variable pricing. The others is a monthly subscription fee like AT&T’s and Verizon? $15 a month for 10 channels. It’s the third - free mobile TV - that has proven to be the most popular in Japan and South Korea.
A free mobile TV service may be coming to the US, perhaps as early as next year.
Then there’s EchoStar’s recently acquired Sling Media, whose Slingbox lets users view on some mobile devices any and all of the videos they can see on their home TV sets, even those recorded on a DVR. There is no monthly fee for Slingbox, only the cost of the initial equipment.
Dish Network, DirecTV and Comcast have promised portable devices that will allow their subscribers to record TV shows and movies and then view them on a mobile device.
Dish Network is working with Archos on a device called PocketDish. DirecTV has worked with Humax and Thomson. Comcast is working with Panasonic on a portable media player that uses CableLabs’ Tru2way technology, which Comcast is deploying.
Tru2way will reportedly allow any maker of portable media players to develop Tru2way compatible devices. If, as expected, other cablecos deploy Tru2way, then the same device will be compatible with all the cablecos, not proprietary, as would be the case with Dish and DirecTV.
See “Humax Unveils PMP for DirecTV” at:
http://www.onlinereporter.com/article.php?article_id=5603
See “EchoStar [Dish’s owner] Shines on New Handheld Video Player” at:
http://www.onlinereporter.com/article.php?article_id=5065
Free Beats Paid
A new technology is coming to market that will allow local TV stations to use their existing spectrum to transmit actual live broadcasts to compatible mobile devices. The service would be free, with the TV stations, hopefully, charging advertisers more because of the extended reach and frequency.
The MSNBC piece quotes Michelle Abraham, principal analyst for In-Stat, as saying there are currently around three million mobile TV subscribers in the US. Abraham said, “In the U.S., with these multiple methods of getting video, we expect by the end of 2012, there will be more than 25 million subscribers to mobile video services.”
There are numbers being bandied about that show more than 25 million mobile TV users already in Japan and South Korea and soon that number and more in China. The difference is that in those countries mobile TV is free just as consumers in the States receive free over-the-air TV signals at home from the local TV stations.
The move to free mobile TV in the States will likely be accelerated when the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC), a nonprofit US organization that develops voluntary standards for digital TV, completes its work on a standard for mobile devices for local broadcasters.
Some 420 local for-profit TV stations and 350 non-profit public TV stations have formed the Open Mobile Video Coalition to push for a mobile TV standard that they can use. It would allow them to broadcast directly to suitably equipped mobile devices such as mobile phones plus portable media players, game players and DVD players. The ATSC standard is expected to commence deployment in 2009.
Note: The Advanced Television Systems Committee,describes itself as an international, non-profit organization that develops voluntary standards for digital television. ATSC member organizations represent the broadcast, broadcast equipment, motion picture, consumer electronics, computer, cable, satellite, and semiconductor industries. ATSC creates and fosters implementation of voluntary Standards and Recommended Practices to advance terrestrial digital television broadcasting, and to facilitate interoperability with other media.
It was under its auspices that the ATSC standard for digital television was developed. ATSC will replace the analog NTSC television format that is in use in the US and Canada. The switchover to ATSC digital from NTSC analog is scheduled to take place by February 17, 2009 in the US and by August 31, 2011 in Canada.
In any event, everything else being equal, free, even free with commercials, generally goes over better than pay-per-view or pay-per-month.
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