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Because the [itvt] editorial team is busy working on The TV of Tomorrow Show (March 3rd-4th in San Francisco) and on our new, post-TVOT EBIF Intensive event (March 5th in San Francisco), we are covering a number of stories in this issue in summary form:

Due to the volume of news generated by last week's Consumer Electronics Show, and because the [itvt] editorial team is busy working on The TV of Tomorrow Show (March 3rd-4th in San Francisco), we are covering a number of stories in this issue in summary form:

Accedo Broadband--a Stockholm-based provider of interactive TV applications and content for IPTV and broadband-connected consumer electronics devices (note: the company, which was founded by telecom and media entrepreneurs, Michael Lantz and Fredrik Andersson, offers a range of applications, but is best known for its games)--said last week that it has launched an interactive TV games service on Colombian telco UNE's IPTV platform.

The BBC has announced the line-up of content that will be available through its red-button interactive TV service for the next two weeks and beyond:

In a posting on a corporate blog last week, Microsoft's general manager of marketing and advertising strategy, Mark Kroese, announced that the company is teaming with the Nielsen Company on a pilot test to measure the effectiveness of in-game advertising. The test is launching with the second season of "1 vs. 100 Live," the avatar-driven interactive TV version of the Endemol-developed "1 vs. 100" game show format, that Microsoft offers on its Xbox Live service. (Note: Like a regular linear-TV game show, "1 vs.

[itvt] has just published interviews with Sezmi co-founder, chairman and president, Phil Wiser, and with Microsoft Xbox Live general manager, Marc Whitten.

Wiser discusses Sezmi's platform (a set-top box-based offering which the company bills as "combining traditional TV content, movies and Internet video in a single, easy-to-use product and service"), its programming partnerships and its various interactive, social and content-discovery capabilities; the company's monetization strategy and roadmap for the

Video rental company, Netflix, announced Tuesday that subscribers to its service can now instantly watch its streaming movie and TV show offerings on Sony Bravia connected HDTV's, on earlier Bravia models that are compatible with the company's Bravia Internet video link module, and on the Sony Network Blu-ray Disc Player.

Here is a round-up of some other interactive TV-related stories we didn't have room for in this issue (as well as stories from the CTAM Summit in Denver, which our editorial team was unable to attend):

According to an article in the October issue of BSkyB's subscriber publication, Sky Magazine, a version of its Sky Player broadband TV service will be available on the Microsoft Xbox 360 console in mid-October.

Microsoft said Monday that "1 vs. 100 Live," the avatar-driven interactive TV version of the Endemol-developed "1 vs. 100" game show format that it beta launched on its Xbox Live service this spring, is proving highly popular, having been downloaded by over 2.5 million people (which makes it one of the top-10 Xbox Live content downloads to date), and with up to 200,000 people around the world playing it every day. In one evening alone, the company says, over 215,000 people in Europe and 230,000 in North America "dressed their avatars" to participate in the interactive game show.

As expected (see the article posted on itvt.com yesterday), Microsoft and UK satellite-TV provider, BSkyB (Sky), have announced a partnership to offer a version of the latter's Sky Player broadband TV service on Microsoft's Xbox 360 games console. According to the companies, the service will launch on the Xbox LIVE content service in the UK and Ireland in the fall (note: in their press release announcing the new service, the companies did not specify whether a subscription to the premium Xbox Live Silver or Gold services will be required in order to access it), and will allow Xbox owners to access 20 or so live channels, as well as on-demand programming.

BSkyB's Sky News arm on Wednesday launched a free-to-download iPhone and iPod touch application on the UK and Ireland Apple App store. According to the company, the new advertising-supported app delivers breaking news via video, images and text, and presents users with seven different content categories: top stories, UK news, sports, business, world news, showbiz and "strange news" (based on a popular feature from skynews.com).