DirecTV in the US has launched 21 new High-Definition channels, including CNN HD and TBS HD. The launch is the beginning of DirecTV’s plan to offer 100 high-def channels by year’s end. It now has 30 national HD channels. DirecTV says it will have 70 HD channels in October.
ITV has awarded a contract to streaming media specialist Limelight Networks to deliver the broadcaster’s programming to viewers online. Limelight will supply its content delivery network (CDN) solution to ITV.com’s free-to-view catch-up TV service. The solution limits access to UK-based viewers while DRM software prevents content copying and sharing.
Modern Times Group (MTG) is restructuring the Viasat DTH satellite pay-TV offerings in Scandinavia. Viewers will now have more than 20 different options of how they structure their pay-TV channel packages. Subscribers will be able to choose between three thematic packages of broad entertainment channels, international documentary and news channels, and children's and music channels, […]
BBC Trust gave its qualified support to plans for the corporation to begin broadcasting in high definition.Until the switchover in 2012, there is not be enough bandwidth on the Freeview platform for putting out HD during the day, so the BBC plans four hours of HD on Freeview between 2am and 6am. It is aimed […]
Existing broadband networks would be unable to cope with future bandwidth-hungry applications such as high-definition television, Ofcom has warned, as it unveiled proposals to encourage investment in ultra-fast networks. Ed Richards, CEO, said that it was possible that companies other than BT, the former state fixed-line phone monopoly, and Virgin Media, the cable TV group, […]
As 'Best Buy' gears up for its important high-definition TV sales months, a new survey from the No. 1 electronics retailer reveals that almost 90 per cent of Americans still don’t understand HDTVs – and close to 50 per cent underestimate the cost of buying one. “We were getting a lot of anecdotal evidence that […]
Europeans’ interest in watching mobile television is tiny, a new study shows. Mobile operators hope that mobile TV could encourage users to spend an extra E5 to 10 a month, compensating for declining revenues from voice calls, but mobile television and video downloads ranked close to the bottom of consumer interest in a Gartner study […]
Facebook has overtaken News Corp’s MySpace site as the highest-traffic UK social networking site with 6.5m unique users last month, according to data published by Nielsen//NetRatings. Since October 2006, Facebook has rocketed from 448,000 unique users in the UK to 6,506,000 during August 2007. Meanwhile, it is being reported that Microsoft is poised to buy […]
UK Television could soon have longer advertising breaks under proposals being considered by Ofcom. ITV1, Channel 4 and Five are currently not allowed to show more than an average of seven minutes of advertising an hour. But Ofcom is discussing raising the limit. The watchdog said it was reviewing the rules at a time when […]
Fox and Apple have reached an agreement to offer free downloads of the shows Fox is trying to promote for the widely covered US sweeps season. Episodes of five new shows including Back To You, Til’ Death and K-Ville, are currently available for free at the iTunes Store. The FOX shows are commercial-free, unlike the […]