Audio Interviews from the AFI Digital Content Festival

September 13, 2005
At the American Film Institute's recent Digital Content Festival (see [itvt] Issue 6.11 Part 1), [itvt]'s Tracy Swedlow conducted short interviews with a number of attendees, presenters and organizers. The interviews covered such topics as which interactive TV/multiplatform projects showcased at the Festival were most inspiring, what are the most significant developments in interactive TV today, and what is the current state of the interactive TV industry as a whole. The interviews, in MP3 format,...

Event Preview: International Broadcasters Convention (IBC2005)

September 07, 2005
The annual International Broadcasters Convention (IBC2005) will take place at the Amsterdam RAI, September 8th through 12th (note: the SCTE will hold its annual Benelux Lecture Meeting at the same location on the 13th). The convention, which was first held in 1967, is expected to attract approximately 40,000 attendees from 120 countries, and will feature around 1,000 exhibitors. Although one can expect to see a preponderance of Europeans at the event, its organizers have, over...

DirecTV Launches Interactive TV Channel to Aid Hurricane Victims

September 02, 2005
--Channel Features Text-Messaging Service, Powered by GoldPocket Satellite TV provider, DirecTV, has launched a dedicated 24/7 channel (channel 100 on the DirecTV EPG) to provide information about Hurricane Katrina relief and recovery efforts to evacuees and others. The channel allows customers of any US wireless carrier to send text messages (using the shortcode 48433) to friends and family separated as a result of the hurricane and its aftermath, and scrolls those messages across the bottom...

New Study Claims Sales of Media Center PC's Soaring

September 02, 2005
According to a recent study by the analyst firm, Current Analysis, sales of Microsoft Windows Media Center PC's have skyrocketed since July 9th: during the week ended August 20th, the study claims, Media Center PC's accounted for 43% of all desktop computers sold in the US retail market, based on data from a sampling of US retailers. Current Analysis attributes the rapid increase in Media Center sales largely to a decline in the platform's price:...

Internet Streaming Media Alliance Forms IPTV Workgroup

September 02, 2005
The Internet Streaming Media Alliance (ISMA)--an organization that bills itself as "a global alliance of industry leaders dedicated to the adoption and deployment of open standards for streaming rich media such as video, audio, and associated data over Internet protocols"--has formed an IPTV workgroup. The goals of the workgroup are to monitor developing standards or specifications for deploying an IPTV system, to create an interoperability-conformance program for IPTV, and to promote solutions that pass conformance...

GlobeVISION Taps thePlatform's Media Publishing System for IPTV Service

September 02, 2005
Los Angeles-based GlobeVISION has selected the Media Publishing System (MPS) from thePlatform, a Seattle-based provider of multiplatform video publishing technologies and services, to enable the delivery of programming for a planned IPTV service that will be targeted at Asian immigrants in North America. GlobeVISION, which plans to begin a trial of the service in November, and which hopes to launch it commercially in the second quarter of next year, says that the service will provide...

OpenTV to Integrate Mediabolic Software for Multi-Room PVR Solution

September 02, 2005
Liberty Media-owned interactive TV middleware and applications provider, OpenTV, has signed a multi-year license agreement with home networking company, Mediabolic, that will see it integra

Recreate Solutions Sets Up Offshore Testing Farm for Sky/OpenTV Apps

September 02, 2005
UK-headquartered Recreate Solutions, which provides outsourcing services to a number of well-known interactive TV companies (including YooMedia and Visiware), has set up an Offshore Testing

Weather Channel Using TVN's TVNow Service to Offer Katrina VOD Special

September 02, 2005
--Companies have Just Signed a Multi-Year VOD Services Agreement

BBC Director-General Formally Announces "MyBBCPlayer"

September 02, 2005
In a speech at the Edinburgh International Television Festival last week, BBC director-general, Mark Thompson, stressed that the BBC's survival is dependent on it adapting to an on-demand a

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