feature iptv/hybrid tv
Broadcast platforms are increasingly turning to hybrid receivers to deliver the power of the Internet direct to the television screen, with MHEG-5 technology a key component. Colin Prior, director of international sales at Strategy & Technology, reports.
How MHEGis bringing interactivity to hybrid
I
nteractivity has been an essential component of digital television since the first broadcast platforms were launched in the late 1990s. However, it has taken the emergence of broadband Internet delivery and on-demand services to transform both consumer expectations and the available content.
The advances in PC and broadband technology have enabled the delivery of video content to the home computer. Consumers have embraced this technology as it has been the only way they can access much of that content - both user generated but increasingly what has historically been broadcast over the mainstream channels. However, where this type of on-demand content has been made available on TVs, (for example the BBC iPlayer on Virgin Media cable in the UK), consumers have abandoned their computers and demonstrated a strong preference to ‘watch TV on TV’. The first sense of change within the consumer electronics industry came when television manufacturers, always on the lookout for new concepts that can be used to sell product, began to pick up on Yahoo!’s Connected TV concept. Using ‘widgets’ developed from Yahoo’s earlier acquisition of Konfabulator, manufacturers started to add an Internet connection that enabled viewers to pull in the latest news, weather and sports scores. More recently, manufacturers such
30 l ibe l march/april 2010 l www.ibeweb.com
Colin Prior, director of international sales at Strategy & Technology.
Catch-up services...can use MHEG and IP- delivered video to offer highly targeted video advertising embedded within the main programme.
as Sony and LG have begun to make deals directly with the content producers in order to differentiate their models by offering the consumer access to often exclusive programming. The danger for broadcasters is that if they supply their own content to portals provided by the television manufacturers, they lose the direct connection with their viewers, and possibly the associated advertising revenue. They’re also likely to find themselves having to re-encode their content to fit with the specific requirements of each manufacturer’s proprietary platform. As a result, the television platforms themselves, not least those with publicly funded content, have begun to embrace what a hybrid IPTV model can do. Shortly before the end of 2009, Freesat, the free-to-air satellite platform run by the BBC and ITV, began public beta testing of a version of the BBC iPlayer. It is expected to go live soon and will be joined shortly afterwards by content from ITV’s own catch-up TV service ITV Player. Freesat is recommending that viewers have an actual download speed of at least 1 Mbps or 2 Mbps to watch in high quality. With television sets not always sitting next to a broadband router, Freesat is looking to the use of Homeplug adaptors to provide Ethernet connectivity, a solution that has already proven successful for Canal+ in France.
Freesat uses an enhanced profile of
MHEG-5 that incorporates richer colour support, HD resolution graphics and the Interaction Channel (MHEG-IC) which allows users to access additional IP-delivered content through a broadcast MHEG application. It means the receiver is able to operate in a hybrid mode, loading interactive applications, data and AV content from the IP network, to deliver a richer experience. At the same time the broadcaster can be confident that the consumer is kept within their own controlled environment and ensure a user experience that is consistent with their other delivery platforms such as to the PC and mobile. Using IP connectivity in this way also has the benefit of reducing the amount of data delivered over the air, meaning that less expensive broadcast bandwidth is used and operational costs are kept to a minimum.
The MHEG technology used in the UK, but picked up by other countries including Australia and New Zealand, conforms to version 6.1 of the D-Book, the reference work maintained by the UK’s Digital TV Group (DTG). The MHEG-5 profile included in D-Book 6.1 has also been standardised as an update to the existing ETSI MHEG specification and is now waiting on the formality of its member vote prior to publication following the completion of technical reviews. By using the Interaction Channel’s hybrid file system, content from the
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