Though interactive TV has been experimented with for decades and promised for years, key roadblocks stand in the way of its wide availability as broadcasters, developers and content aggregators make hay with low end approaches such as text messaging from mobile devices and prepare for polling.
Perhaps the single largest obstacle cited by speakers at the Future TV conference is set-top boxes (STB), which are closed and are not available in the United States via retail. Today’s units are made by a slew of manufacturers and need to be open to drive integration of interactivity capabilities.
“Can we please get the cable companies out of the set-top box business?” asked Hardie Tankersley, vice-president of online content and strategy for Fox Broadcasting Co., adding that their control of this market is holding up interactive TV. As a result of this reality and the state of cable remotes “I really think people will interact via the PC, to send content to the TV.”
Tankersley isn’t alone in his take on STBs.
“It makes it incredibly difficult for programmers, because they need to write apps for 12 set top boxes to really get one out there,” explained Joshua Krane, senior vice-president for interactive and new media at G4 Media. “We know this will be incredibly expensive to do with no return.”
But, with cablecos such as Comcast embracing CableLabs’ OCAP spec to open STBs for those who want to embed previously standalone device functionality into the boxes, their could be a light at the end of what has been a long and dark tunnel for those looking to interact with TV via some type of remote.
Comcast announced its intent to support OCAP at the Consumer Electronics Show two weeks ago in Las Vegas in an effort driven largely by the need to drive innovation in the cable industry.
“Cable has been a very fragmented and difficult platform to develop to,” admitted Elizabeth Schimel, senior vice president of entertainment for Comcast Interactive Media. “We’ll lead the way with applications we create and test,” she added in reference to her parent company’s OCAP initiative.
In the meantime, and for the past few years, broadcasters and their advertisers have met great gains in what’s called participatory TV by enabling viewers to vote for or against people on shows such as Fox’s “American Idol,” via text message, and are excited about adding polling capabilities.
“‘American Idol’ is part of a whole new genre of shows that are part of participatory TV,” said Tankersley. “We’re working with Hollywood TV producers to build this into their shows,” he said of SMS capability.
Interestingly, on the advertising front, it was a sponsor of “American Idol” in it’s second year that brought the participation ability to the masses.
“We wanted to teach America how to send a text message,” recalled Schimel, a former senior media executive AT&T. Later, the revenue model for the show rose in importance.
Some advertisers are actually nervous about new shows that aren’t participatory, added Takersley.
