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Scroll down page or click below for news - latest first
Tuesday
Friday 30th March
C4, Sky, Carphone, Emap join in radio bid
"Google will struggle" – Diller
MySpace, Eisner deal
Spain consults on mobile TV
Mobile History
BBC mobile syndication
Granada VOD deal with Gakken
Viaccess claims Euro IPTV lead
NDS for WightCable
Mediaset: E108m from PPV DTT
C4, Sky, Carphone, Emap join in radio bidChannel 4 has joined forces with BSkyB, Emap and Carphone Warehouse, and others in a bid to win a digital radio licence and challenge the dominance of the BBC. The combined group, called 4 Digital Group, submitted its bid for the 12-year licence promising to launch 10 new national digital radio stations from 2008.
Channel 4 Radio would operate three national digital stations: one aimed at 15-to-29 year-olds; one on current affairs; and an all-music station. The other stations would include: Talk Radio from Ulster Television, a music station from Emap, and Sky News Radio, a joint venture between BSkyB and Chrysalis, a 24-hour news channel.
Ofcom advertised for this second national digital multiplex licence in December in a bid to grow the industry. The first licence is majority owned by commercial radio group Gcap.
4 Digital Group plans to work with the Carphone Warehouse to develop digital audio chips built into the next generation of mobile phones. 4 Digital Group said it would rely on its partners to promote the service and would commit £4.5 million (E6.52m) to general marketing of digital radio in the first three years of the licence period. It said it would also work with the BBC to develop digital radio in general.
The group's shareholders are Channel 4 Radio, Emap Radio, UTV Radio, BSkyB and Chrysalis, the Carphone Warehouse and UBC media.
Ofcom said the winning bid could be revealed by July. The other confirmed bidder is National Grid Wireless, a network provider, who has said it would provide its rival with at least two channels if it won.
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"Google will struggle" – Diller
Barry Diller, CEO of IAC and former head of Paramount and Fox, has said that Google will struggle to come to terms with traditional media companies that have so far resisted doing deals to distribute their video content on YouTube. Viacom is suing Google and YouTube for copyright infringement while two other media giants, News Corp and NBC Universal, last week announced plans to start a rival site in a move to control the burgeoning market for online video.
"They’re in an impossible situation," speaking to the FT, Diller said of Google, which is now trying to license content from those companies.
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MySpace has made its biggest push yet into providing its members with original video content with a deal with Michael Eisner, the former chief executive of Walt Disney. The agreement is the first of many expected tie-ups between MySpace and creators of short-form video entertainment. The deal, part of the site’s effort to compete more aggressively with YouTube will see MySpace distribute and promote Eisner’s new online drama, Prom Queen.
Each ‘webisode’ will last 90 seconds and new instalments will air on MySpace every day. MySpace’s 160m users will be able to watch the shows a day before they appear anywhere else on the internet.
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Spain consults on mobile TV
From David del Valle in Madrid
In an attempt to speed up the launch of DVB-H mobile TV, the Ministry of Industry has opened public consultations with all key players involved in the market up to next April 26 aimed at laying the groundwork for the launch of the service by year end.
The industry (operators, broadcasters, content providers, manufacturers, etc) has been called on to give its opinion about how to develop the mobile TV market at a time when the Government is drafting the new mobile TV regulation.
The Administration will award a multiplex, initially "with a limited coverage" until the analogue switch-off in 2010 for lack of spectrum, able to distribute up to 24 mobile TV channels. There will be one single network operator, responsible for the network (it may be Abertis or Axion) and several mobile TV channels operators (among them, broadcasters, content providers, even mobile telephony operators).
In Spain, several mobile TV pilots have taken place in cities such as Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Zaragoza, Gijon and Alcazar de San Juan, with both Abertis and Axion deploying the necessary infrastructure. The tests have shown that the average use of mobile TV is between 16 and 25 minutes per day, with around 20 per cent of users spending between 30 and 60 minutes on mobile TV. Users prefered to watch through mobile TV traditional channels and music, above all.
The Government hopes to pave the way in coming months for the launch of mobile TV services by the end of the year.
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The History Channel has begun distributing its content on mobile. The broadcaster currently streams video via UK operators Vodafone, 3 and Orange and is now complementing this with its own WAP site. Regional versions will follow the UK launch cross Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia. The site includes games, video and picture downloads as well as access to a 30,000-entry encyclopaedia with information on historical dates and facts.
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The BBC announced at the Broadcast Mobile TV Congress the start of a trial to syndicate a range of its television channels and radio networks via 3G to mobile phones with mobile operators Orange, Vodafone and 3.
The trial, which will last up to 12 months, will allow subscribers to Orange, Vodafone and 3’s TV packages to watch BBC One, BBC News 24 and BBC Three (with the exception of some sport and acquired programmes) streamed on their mobiles. They will also be able to listen to up to eight radio stations including Radio 1, 1Xtra, Radio 2, Radio 3, Radio 4, 6 Music, BBC 7 and Asian Network. The trial will start within the month.
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Granada International has concluded a major deal with video on demand company Gakken Index of Japan. The volume agreement is for broadband VOD rights on more than 400 hours of Granada International programming. In the deal, Gakken Index will supply all the major IPTV services in Japan with Granada International content which will be branded Granada Broadband. Titles included in the deal, among many others, are Agatha Christie's Poirot, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Sharpe, Inspector Morse, Prime Suspect, Cracker, Tales of the Unexpected and The Worst Witch. In addition, the company will also create digital versions of masters of the programming, market the service and create Japanese versions of new shows to launch on IPTV servers.
Gakken Index was established by Gakken, a leading educational content and publishing company and Index, an innovative IT and mobile phone technology and solution servicing company.
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Viaccess claims Euro IPTV lead
Viaccess says it has confirmed its European leader position and second position worldwide in IPTV with over 600,000 active subscribers using Viaccess secure technology as of February, 2007.
"In 2006 we heavily invested in order to respond to the requirements of our Telecom customers. That’s how we have become the uncontested leader in IPTV in Europe" says Mathias Hautefort, CEO of Viaccess. "2007 should allow us to consolidate our position, not only through the success of France Telecom but also through the launch of products that should prove promising in the line of Mobile TV."
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NDS for WightCableNDS announced that WightCable North, the second-largest cable operator in the UK serving the West of Scotland and the North West of England, has chosen NDS VideoGuard Express to replace its existing cable television CA platform.
The VideoGuard Express solution includes market-leading NDS conditional access, which secures service revenues of approximately $32 billion worldwide, MediaHighway middleware, which powers more than 50 million STBs around the world, and a flexible seven-day Electronic Programme Guide (EPG). Also, WightCable plans to add NDS’ interactive games to its service offering, which will help grow its subscriber base and increase customer retention.
WightCable is to re-launch its service under the name Smallworld. Additionally, the operator is planning to extend beyond its digital cable platform to offer IPTV services to customers in its franchise areas in the near future. NDS VideoGuard Express will also be used to provide content protection and authentication of its IPTV clients.
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Mediaset: E108m from PPV DTT
From Branislav Pekic in RomeLeading Italian private broadcaster Mediaset closed 2006 with a net profit of E505.5 million, down on E603.4 million registered in 2005.
On the digital terrestrial front, Mediaset sold around 1.1 million new rechargeable pre-paid cards and 4.1 million top-ups. Overall, its DTT pay-per-view service Mediaset Premium generated revenues of E108 million, more than double the E44 million in 2005. Investments last year rose 31 per cent to E84.8 million, with more than half used to develop the digital network. Mediaset chairman Fedele Confalonieri has announced that the broadcaster plans to use the frequencies, that have been made available in the Cagliari area (Sardinia) after the analogue switch-off on March 1, for HDTV trials.
Meanwhile, rival Telecom Italia Media, has reported that its revenues from DTT PPV in 2006 reached E31.5 million, more than triple the figure of E10.4 million in 2005. According to CEO Antonio Campo Dall’Orto, more than one million La7 Cartapiu smart-cards were distributed, 700,000 of which have been activated.
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Thursday 29th March
Sky launches Anytime service on TV
Orange and Bebo partnership
Qualcomm and KDDI mobile broadcast results
Google extends UK online ad lead
iPhone flyer
TiVo initiative linking living rooms
PCCW profit fall
Indian channels for UK
Irdeto mobile TV content security with RRD
Vyyo funding round
VOOM and iD expand HD offerings
Sky launches Anytime service on TV
Sky has launched its ‘Anytime’ video download service on TV, allowing users to access 30 hours of content on-demand. The service stores the week's most popular shows on the Sky platform and gives viewers a week to either watch or store shows through their Sky+ box.
Sky has made Anytime available to HD customers first, with the service set to roll out to other subscribers within weeks. Sky launched Anytime on mobile and PC last year. The extension of Anytime to TV follows Virgin Media's strategy of putting a video-on-demand channel, Virgin Central, at the heart of its TV offering.
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Orange and Bebo partnershipMobile phone operator Orange is preparing to unveil a partnership with social network site Bebo that will let its 15.3 million UK customers access the site through their mobile phones. Bebo, which has amassed 31 million users in the two years since its launch, hopes that the link will enable it to extend its reach in its target audience of people aged 18 to 24.
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Qualcomm and KDDI mobile broadcast resultsQualcomm, developer of code division multiple access (CDMA) and other advanced wireless technologies, and KDDI Corporation, who together established MediaFLO Japan Planning Incorporated in December 2005, have revealed results from an extensive consumer survey of attitudes towards mobile TV.
The survey, which included more than 3,000 Japanese consumers, showed that subscribers are far more likely to take up mobile broadcast services when they experience it firsthand, and it provided evidence for the commercial viability of MediaFLO services in the Japanese market.
"We are convinced that the survey results illustrate that paid mobile broadcasting services are attractive to Japanese customers despite the availability of the free ISDB-T service, and we believe that both services can coexist," said Kazuhiko Masuda, president of MediaFLO Japan Planning Incorporated. "Based on these results, MediaFLO Japan Planning Incorporated intends to move forward with preparations for a commercial service in Japan."
Google extends UK online ad leadGoogle has increased its grip on the UK online ad market, claiming 43 per cent of the record £2bn spent last year, according to figures from the Internet Advertising Bureau. Google made $1.6bn (E1.1bn) in the UK last year - around 43 per cent of the record £2.016bn ploughed into the medium by marketers. Google's stranglehold on the paid-for search market has increased from 63 per cent in 2005 when it made in UK revenue and the UK online paid-for search market was worth £768.4m. At this rate Google is on track to overtake ITV1 in terms of advertising revenue within two years.
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iPhone flyer
More than one million potential customers have registered interest in Apple’s forthcoming iPhone, said AT&T, the US carrier that negotiated an exclusive deal to sell the device when it becomes available later this year. Apple will offer two versions of the iPhone, one with 4 gigabytes of flash memory will cost $499 (E375), and an 8Gb version that will cost $599.
Apple itself has targeted selling 10m iPhones by the end of next year, though that would also include sales in markets outside the US. Cingular, the largest US-based wireless service which is being rebranded as AT&T following AT&T’s acquisition of BellSouth, will be the first to carrier to sell the iPhone when Apple, the maker of the popular iPod music player, begins shipments in June.
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TiVo initiative linking living roomsTiVo and internet video company One True Media are offering consumers a new way to share home movies and photos directly to each other's TV sets. With automatic electronic delivery to the living room, the initiative allows users to bypass open postings on the internet (which can be viewed by anyone) and share personal video content directly with friends and family.
According to the companies, consumers visit One True Media to create a digital video montage with their own videos and photos, then create their own personal channel with TiVo. Users can then invite other TiVo customers to subscribe to the personal channel for no additional fees. Viewers then select a TiVo Season Pass recording that automatically adds the sender's latest video to a play-list where they can access all of their TV recordings.
The home movie-sharing feature is accessible to the 1.5 million broadband-ready TiVo Series2 and Series3 subscribers. For those publishing video, One True media is offering a free trial to its customers through April 30. (A standard subscription to One True Media is $3.99 (E2.98) per month or $39.99 per year.)
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Honk Kong’s PCCW posted a 21 per cent drop in full-year net profit for last year as the company booked lower net investment and other gains, and announced the departure of managing director Jack So Chak-kwong. The fixed-line operator reported net profit of HK$1.25 billion (E0.11bn), down from HK$1.6 billion in 2005.
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Indian channels for UKIndia's national public service broadcaster Doordarshan is to launch two 24-hour channels in the UK. The free-to-air channels, which will mostly broadcast in Hindi with around 20 per cent of their content in English, will be launched by Rayat TV on the Sky platform on 16 April.
News channel DD News will feature breaking news as well as business and current affairs while general channel DD India will include programmes from Doordarshan's Indian network across a range of genres such as children's TV, sports and documentaries.
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Irdeto mobile TV content security with RRDIrdeto, together with RRD, a DVB-H solutions provider, have confirmed the successful integration of the Irdeto Mobile Broadcast conditional access (CA) solution with RRD’s DVB-H headend. The two companies have also demonstrated a full DVB Simulcrypt solution running over the same platform. This combined solution enables mobile operators and other players in the mobile broadcast industry to quickly deploy a secure and scalable solution for a rollout of their services.
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Vyyo funding roundVyyo a supplier of broadband access equipment for cable system operators, announced an investment from Goldman, Sachs & Co., an existing investor in Vyyo. The transaction will result in $17.5 million in new funding and an additional $17.5 million (E13.1) to pay off the aggregate of notes issued to Goldman Sachs in 2006. The total financing of $35 million consists of a five-year unsecured note convertible into Vyyo common stock at $10 per share, a premium of 34 per cent over the closing price of Vyyo’s common stock on March 27th. The convertible note will bear a 5 per cent annual interest rate.
Vyyo will use the funding to accelerate deployment of its spectrum overlay and business services solutions for the cable industry. Vyyo sgreatly expands the raw bandwidth of existing cable network infrastructures at a fraction of the cost of fiber, enabling operators to meet current and future bandwidth demands today to capitalize on the lucrative commercial and residential services markets.
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VOOM and iD expand HD offerings
VOOM HD Networks has added 225 new hours of high-definition (HD) original content to its agreement with iD Distribution. The news marks the fifth recent expansion to Rainbow’s VOOM HD catalogue represented internationally by the independent distributor.
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Wednesday 28th March
Shapiro: no panic on switch
PC files for TV in HK
London satellite
Sanyo head steps down
The BBC bolsters digital
Russian Biz channel links with Eutelsat
Tandberg mobile system
3 Vision, Manycast ally
Widevine in Denmark
Shapiro: no panic on switch
US Consumer Electronics Association chief Gary Shapiro says there’s too much scaremongering over the digital switchover in February 2009. "Less than 15 per cent of homes will really be shut out totally," by the transition to digital, he said, "and of those, some of them want to be shut out," he said. "There is fear-mongering going on, and frankly, it has become a political issue."
Sahpiro was talking at his organisations seminar on switchover where National Cable & Telecommunications Association President Kyle McSlarrow said he thought the difference between this and other transitions was that it was a government-mandated ‘flash-cut’ to the new technology, which could require a pretty large education campaign to get right.
John Lawson, president of the Association of Public Television Stations who was on the DTV panel with called the $5 million (E3.7m) (set aside by government as an education fund) grossly inadequate. PBS had asked for $86 million. He said he didn't think he had been fear-mongering. "We've been consistent from day one. We think the government needs to do its part as a major stakeholder in the success of the transition and invest a little bit more in outreach."
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PC files for TV in HKHong Kong Broadband Network, the city's smallest fixed-line operator is launching its BB Box service, which brings computer multimedia files to a user's television screen, according to chairman Ricky Wong Wai-kay. The service, to be launched late next month, is similar to Apple's new product Apple TV, which started shipments last week.
Hong Kong Broadband Network, the fixed-line operation of City Telecom (Hong Kong), said it was working on its product before Apple announced the Apple TV in September last year. "Our ideas came in early last year and the whole system and development was conducted by a Beijing-based software house," Wong said. The BB Box service, which works with Hong Kong Broadband's pay-TV set-top box used by more than 120,000 subscribers, connects a home computer to a television for viewing of photos and films downloaded from the internet. BB Box users need to install a software client in their computer and use a local access network cable for connecting the computer and the set-top box.
Once the BB Box connection is established, users can browse their computer's pictures and watch films on the television screen through the remote controller. The computer's files are viewed on a dedicated television channel, and films can be fast forwarded, rewound or paused just as with a DVD player.
The BB Box service also allows users to drag multimedia files from their friends' computers - with their authorisation - provided both users are Hong Kong Broadband broadband subscribers. Each BB Box is theoretically capable of supporting unlimited connections to other computers, as all the files users want to watch from their friends' computers will be transmitted through the internet by streaming technology. The company will charge HK$60 to HK$100 per month for the BB Box service when it launches next month.
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London satelliteLondon is spending £12m (E17m) to help launch a groundbreaking new satellite. The London Development Agency's backing could help Inmarsat win a £600m satellite development contract from the European Space Agency.
"We're keen to secure London's role as a leading player in what could be called the modern space race," said the LDA, at a time when Chinese, American and European companies are competing to create the next generation of global-positioning and telecoms satellite systems. A successful Inmarsat bid could support 200 high-tech jobs in London, the agency estimated. The LDA said the other main purpose of the satellite, not slated for launch until 2011, would be to eliminate mobile-phone masts in the London area. Inmarsat and the LDA said it could also be used to track motorists for road-pricing - but the technology for this has not yet been developed.
Inmarsat and Paris-based Eutelsat are currently competing for the ESA satellite contract, whose winner will be announced in July. Under ESA rules, the project must be partially funded by government money, the total cost will be in the region of E50m.
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The president of Sanyo, the loss-making Japanese electronics conglomerate, is set to resign after a string of management failures and an accountancy scandal that has dented the company’s image. According to reports, Toshimasa Iue’s decision to step down may be a response to mounting pressure from Sanyo’s big stakeholders. Iue’s father, Satoshi Iue, the firm's supreme adviser, is also likely to tender his resignation next week. The Iue family are the founders of the firm.
The company is under investigation by the Securities Exchange Surveillance Commission, which has discovered that the company may have understated valuation losses at its worst-performing subsidiaries. Iue’s expected decision to quit at a board meeting today follows the resignation only six days ago of Tomoyo Nonaka, the chairwoman of Sanyo.
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The BBC has announced two new appoints to its Future Media and Technology division. Nic Newman, head of product development and technology for News, has been given the additional role of Future Media and Technology Controller, Journalism. Colin Whitbread, a former group operations director at Telewest Broadband and ex-Ntl group director, has been appointed Future Media and Technology Controller, Service Delivery.
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Russian Biz channel links with Eutelsat
Russian business channel RBC-TV is to lease capacity on Eutelsat’s Hot Bird-6 television satellite. Taking the channel across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, the five-year contract is for free-to-air broadcasting in an attempt to expand beyond the channel's core markets of Russia and abutting nations.
According to officials at the channel, RBC-TV has built strong coverage in Russia's main cities during the past three years since being launched on Eutelsat's W4 satellite. The channel's initial carriage agreement also delivered programming to the Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and the Baltic countries.
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Tandberg Television announces that it will launch a unique, end-to-end system solution for Mobile TV at NAB. At the core, Tandberg says the new mPlex media processing platform offers eight times the density of current mobile TV solutions and employs proven Tandberg technologies, such as constant and variable bitrate (CBR & VBR) MPEG-4 AVC encoding, native IP processing and flexible architectures for VBR control and mobile-specific scrambling. The addition of mPlex into a system solution that incorporates new and existing Tandberg Television products uniquely enables the company’s customers to extend their subscriber offer, grow revenues and reduce churn through the deployment of TAandberg Television’s broad ecosystem for Mobile TV.
Additional to the mPlex media processing core are Tandberg Television professional receivers for reception, UDCast IPE-10 for DVB-H IPE, time slicing and MPE-FEC, SFN (single frequency networks) and transmission network adaptation including ATM/IP telco networks or DVB-S/S2 satellite modulation. At the remote transmitter site, the Tandberg Television solution provides reception and network adaptation, as well as content regionalization and customization including SFN re-adaptation and time slicing.
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3 Vision, Manycast allyThe UK content strategy and acquisition specialists 3Vision have formed a
strategic partnership with Manycast Consultancy Inc. The companies will work
together on IPTV and Video on Demand projects for Telecom and Media
companies in the Caribbean and South America. Established in 2005, Manycast
has focused on the development of an IPTV platform, in addition to
negotiating regional content deals in the Caribbean."This partnership further extends our reach into new territories and will
deliver a wealth of exciting new projects in the IPTV space," commented Toby
Russell, Chief Executive of 3Vision.
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Widevine in Denmark
Widevine Technologies announced that Denmark’s largest broadband services provider ComX is deploying IPTV services with Widevine Cypher which has enabled them to license and deliver secure premium. ComX offers a complete lineup of broadcast television, video on demand (VOD) with more than 100 channels and several entertainment packages. In cooperation with established and new content providers, ComX further plans to expand into HDTV service delivery to utilize the advances that digital TV (IPTV) offers. Currently ComX reaches 35,000 broadband subscribers and sees a growing demand for additional services including content delivered to PCs.
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Ofcom may force ratecards on Sky
BSkyB says BT jumped the gun
C4 RoD (Radio on Demand)
ICC latest to threaten YouTube
DISH still wary of DirecTV deal
Disney test chat TV
Spain's TV3 to go HDTV
Telia football
Euronews in S. Africa
Cable vets join Vyyo
Ofcom may force ratecards on Sky
Ofcom’s investigation of the UK pay-TV market is expected to take more than six months – and may result in a referral to the Competition Commission. Alternatively, as with the 2005 telecoms review, the regulator could come to settlement terms with BSkyB.
Some analysyts, including Dresdner Kleinwort, are already speculating this would involve Sky having to publish wholesale ratecards for its channel’s carriage on other networks, making channels available to ISPs and othe rbroadband providers and the dropping of its pay-TV plans for freeview.
Meanwhile, the review could be slowed as Sean Williams, the regulator's partner in charge of competition issues, is stepping down at the end of this month to join the Office of Fair Trading as executive director of markets and projects. Williams was behind the telecoms review and its settlement that saw BT guarantee access and prices for alternative broadband providers.
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The fractious atmosphere in the UK digital media scene continues with BSkyB complaining BT went to the regulator about a lack of access to Sky programming before it had even approached the broadcaster.
BT joined with Virgin, Top Up and Setanta in the complaint in January but Sky says it was only approached in February. Sky said that BT's first approach to the company had been made "a few days after" the satellite broadcaster announced on February 8 that it planned to launch a pay-TV service on digital DTT that would make it easier for BT to buy content.
Sky said: "We engaged with BT in good faith when approached about access to Sky content, so it would be disappointing if BT had filed a complaint about these issues several weeks previously."
BT said Ofcom's investigation was into the entire pay-TV market and not just alleged anti-competitive behaviour by Sky.
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C4 RoD (Radio on Demand)
Channel 4 is to unveil the first UK radio network capable of broadcasting on-demand content when it submits its application for a new generation of digital radio services.
Listeners will be able to buy and store libraries of shows or songs that could then be transferred to personal computers or digital music players. There will be an equal number of live radio stations including a new service produced by magazine publisher Emap and named after its popular weekly celebrity gossip title Closer.
The on-demand technology has been created by UBC Media Group, which is an equity partner in Channel 4's bid. It will allow twice as many channels to be broadcast than the eight stations now available on the UK's first national digital multiplex, which is owned and operated by Capital Radio's parent GCap and masts business Arqiva.
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ICC latest to threaten YouTube
The International Cricket Council (ICC) has ordered YouTube to remove all content that shows footage from the current Cricket World Cup.
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DISH still wary of DirecTV deal
Dish owner EchoStar has suggested the Federal Communications Commission should reject the Liberty takeover of DirecTV unless "meaningful additional commitments" are added to ensure consumers and rival video distributors are not harmed by the deal.
"At its core, this transaction would only exacerbate problems in the broken video programming market," EchoStar said in its comments filed with the FCC last week. "Liberty Media - and its sister companies affiliated with John Malone - has determined that additional 'distribution muscle' of DIRECTV's national platform is critical to its efforts to expand and enhance its programming assets. "Thus, the net result of this transaction is that Liberty will rejoin the ranks of vertically integrated major media conglomerates - including News Corp. - that can dictate the terms and conditions of programming ... higher price and less choice ... to MVPDs and consumers."
EchoStar called for conditions including access and arbitration rights to regional sports networks affiliated with Liberty. An attempt to limit conditions to the three RSNs Liberty Media is gaining through the DIRECTV acquisition should be rejected.
Also, programme access protections should apply to all DIRECTV-affiliated programming, and to both domestic and international programming and markets, EchoStar said. In addition conditions should apply to Liberty Media for at least six years after the close of the transaction.
The American Cable Association which represents small, independent cable operators also called for programme access rules and non-discrimination conditions. It said the FCC should clarify and strengthen the rights of a collective bargaining agent appointed by independent cable companies for negotiations covering carriage of regional sports networks owned by Liberty/DIRECTV.
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Disney test chat TV
Disney will test a "watch-and-chat" feature on its ABC Family Channel Web site that lets groups of viewers watch TV shows on the Internet and chat about them at the same time.
Disney hopes to build buzz around its ABC Family cable shows through the social networking feature. The feature lets groups of up to 10 people set up "screening rooms" to watch the episode on laptops and write a running commentary that will appear on one side of the screen. Each screening room host can pause, rewind and fast-forward video while they watch.
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Spain's TV3 to go HDTV
From David Del Valle in MadridThe Spanish Regional TV network TV3 will be the first in the country to go HDTV. The state-owned channel will commence HDTV transmissions next month through UHF channel 43 covering the province of Barcelona. Initially, the channel will broadcast on HDTV two to three hours per day offering in-house programmes, cartoons, films from Sony-Columbia and other content.
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Sweden’s Telia has signed to get the exclusive rights to broadcast Swedish football games on mobile phones. The agreement covers both live broadcasts and post-match summaries. In the first phase, Telia customers will be offered live broadcasts of premier division games as part of the television programming package available through Telia's SurfPort mobile portal. Viewers can choose if they prefer to watch live broadcasts or receive post-game summaries. The agreement also enables Telia to offer services such as game results and the broadcast of exclusive material during and after football matches.
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Euronews in S. Africa
Euronews has begun broadcasting in S. Africa on Multichoice. Philippe Cayla, Chairman and CEO of EuroNews says: "We are very proud and excited to broadcast Europe’s first 24hour news channel throughout the whole continent thanks to this agreement with Multichoice South Africa.”
Says Aletta Alberts, MultiChoice GM for Content: “In the pursuit to acquire the highest quality television content from across the world, MultiChoice aims to ensure there is a choice of programming that is compelling and relevant to subscribers. We are very pleased that the EuroNews channel fulfils all of these prerequisites”.
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Cable vets join VyyoVyyo, a supplier of broadband access equipment for cable system operators, announced that two prominent cable industry executives -- Jim Chiddix and Wayne Davis -- have joined the company as vice chairman and chief executive officer, respectively.
Chiddix, whose career includes 15 years as chief technology officer with Time Warner Cable, joins Vyyo after having served as chairman and chief executive officer of OpenTV for the past three years. Davis was most recently executive vice president, engineering, and chief technology officer of Charter Communications, the third-largest publicly traded cable operator in the United States. At Vyyo, both executives will spearhead the company_s efforts to accelerate industry deployment of Vyyo's 3 GHz Spectrum Overlay and business services solutions.
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Monday 26th March
NDVR loses in court
Starz sues Disney
Italy leads pay-TV growth in 2006
XM accused of copyright breach
BT to boost on-demand content
Economic gains from cable TV upgrades
Prasar Bharati mobile TV
AT&T live TV on PC
Cablevision Systems has lost a legal battle against Hollywood studios and television networks to introduce a network-based digital video recorder service. The operator said it is considering an appeal against the ruling by District Court in Manhattan.
Cablevision was sued last May by several studios and networks, including those owned by Time Warner, News Corp, CBS and Walt Disney who claimed that the planned service would violate U.S. copyright laws. Cablevision had hoped a network-based DVR system, called Remote Storage DVR or RS-DVR, would have done away with the need for the deployment of hundreds of thousands of digital set-top boxes to subscribers' homes. Other cable operators had been vocal in their support for such a system.
The studios and TV networks argued that because the proposed service would allow subscribers to store programmes on the cable operator's own computer servers, it would be breaking copyright agreements by effectively re-transmitting the programs. "We are disappointed by the judge's decision, and continue to believe that remote-storage DVRs are consistent with copyright law and offer compelling benefits for consumers - including lower costs and broader availability of this popular technology," Cablevision said.
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Liberty Media Holding 's Starz Entertainment cable network is suing Walt Disney for allowing other movie download services to sell titles while they were exclusively licensed to Starz. The lawsuit was brought against Disney's Buena Vista Television, which this year signed deals to sell movies on iTunes online store and Wal-Mart's new movie download site.
According to the lawsuit, Disney is barred under a 2005 licensing agreement with Starz from selling some of its films for transmission over the Internet before and during a period of exclusivity agreed upon for Starz.
Starz has paid more than $1 billion for the exclusive rights to Disney films since 1993, according to the lawsuit. It also has the right to offer the films on its subscription Internet download service, Vongo.
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Italy leads pay-TV growth in 2006
FromBranislav Pekic in RomeThe Milan-based e-Media Institute has published its annual survey on the pay-TV market in Western Europe, which reveals that Italy was the top country in terms of growth in pay-TV subscriber numbers (+12.2 per cent) during 2006.
If pre-pay DTT packages are included, Italy extends its leadership over other European markets, as it’s the only country where this kind of subscription-free offer exists. Figures from the end of December 2006 show that there were 4.2 million pay-TV subscribers in Italy.
Sky Italia was Europe’s top satellite pay-TV company in 2006 in terms of new subscriber growth (about 430,000, for an increase of 12 per cent). In the ranking of biggest satellite pay-TV operators, Sky Italia is still second behind BSkyB. The survey also showed that, at the end of 2006, there were 169 free-to-air TV channels broadcasting in Italy, while the number of pay-TV channels totalled 106.
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XM accused of copyright breachThe National Music Publishers' Association (NMPA) has filed a lawsuit against XM Satellite Radio Holdings for providing radios that allegedly let users reproduce and distribute copyrighted music without paying appropriate royalties. The suit alleges that XM engages in massive copyright infringement with devices that provide its service known as "XM + MP3," which lets listeners store songs they hear on XM's service and arrange them into playlists.
The complaint seeks a maximum of $150,000 in statutory damages for each work infringed by XM, and lists over 175 songs as a "small fraction" of those being illegally distributed through the "XM + MP3" service.
XM said the lawsuit was a negotiating tactic to gain an advantage in ongoing business discussions. XM said it pays royalties to writers and composers who are also compensated by its device manufacturers.
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BT to boost on-demand contentBT is aiming to increase the programming on its BT Vision on-demand service to 5,000 hours by the end of the year.
Marc Watson, commercial director of BT Vision, said that it plans to expand the service to include more niche content including motoring or cooking. "There is no upper limit on our service. I'd like to see 5,000 hours of content," he said. BT Vision is said to have garnered about 3,000 subscribers so far."
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Economic gains from cable TV upgrades
National economic gains from investment in cable-TV infrastructure could deliver a 54.6 billion rupee (E0.9bn) increase in economic activity and 18bn rupees in new tax revenues within five years, according to the Cable & Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia (CASBAA).
However, even with a target of 20 million cable broadband subscribers by 2010, the India market would remain less than half the size of the China market which, like India, is experiencing national economic growth of more than 9 per cent per year. "The fact is that if we don’t change our entire attitude to cable, we could suffer nothing less than a ‘digital failure’. However, if policymakers get the environment right, there will be huge rewards for the economy, first in the big cities, but then rolling out to the still needy rural areas." said Anjan Mitra, the CASBAA Executive Director (India).
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Prasar Bharati mobile TVPrasar Bharati, the Indian public broadcaster, is currently conducting a pilot project for mobile TV with Nokia, and is also in talks with other firms such as LG, Samsung and Ericsson before its commercial launch later this year.
Chief executive officer B S Lalli said its mobile TV service, which currently offers four Doordarshan channels now, will boast between 10 and 15 at the time of commercial launch.
AT&T has confirmed the launch of AT&T U-verse OnTheGo, a new premium service that will allow AT&T U-verse customers to view live television on a PC using any broadband Internet connection. The service is the first of its kind offered by a television provider. AT&T U-verse OnTheGo is delivered under an existing agreement between AT&T and MobiTV, provider of mobile and broadband television services. OnTheGo subscribers can currently access some 30 channels, several of which feature live programming.
