Author: Fraser Lovatt

Fraser Lovatt has spent the last fifteen years working in publishing, TV and the Internet in various capacities, and believes that they will be seperate platforms for at least a while yet. His main interests at the moment are exploring where Linux is taking home entertainment and how technology is conferring technical skills on more and more people. Fraser Lovatt was born in the same year that 2001: A Space Odyssey was delighting and confusing people in the cinemas, and developed a lifelong love of technology as soon as he realised that things could be taken apart, sometimes put back together again, but mostly left in bits or made into something the original designer hadn't quite planned upon. At school he was definitely in the ZX Spectrum/Magpie/BMX camp, rather than the BBC Micro/Blue Peter/well-behaved group. This is all deeply ironic as he later went on to spend nine years working at the BBC. After a few years of working as a bookseller in Scotland, ("Back when it was actually a skilled profession" he'll tell anyone still listening), he moved to England for reasons he can't quite explain adequately to himself. After a couple of publishing jobs punctuated by sporadic bursts of travelling and photography came the aforementioned nine years at the BBC where he specialised in internet technologies and video. These days his primary interests are Java, Linux, videogames and pies - and if they're not candidates for convergence, then what is?

Tuning In To Visual Radio

Nokia has high hopes for a new service that sends images and information to mobile phones, synchronised to a FM radio station.

Nokia's 7700 showing Visual Radio A new revenue stream

Mobile phone manufacturers and network operators are developing more and more virtual products for their subscribers – ringtones, wallpapers, games, music, you name it. The favoured charging model preferred by networks is a little but often, hence subscriptions to text alerts, music downloads and other services that extract small amounts of cash from users repeatedly, over a relatively long period.

Given the age of many phone owners, music is an important part of their lifestyle, and so consumes a fair chunk of disposable income – this is what prompted manufacturers to converge the mobile phone with the radio. Whilst it’s certainly handy, there was always an air of missing potential about having a mobile with a radio – two communications streams that didn’t meet up: until now, that is.

Radio met GPRS – and Visual Radio was born.

Visual Radio (VR) is a traditional radio broadcast, backed up and accompanied with information, photographs and graphics displayed on a compatible mobile phone. Handset owners can see immediately what track their favourite radio station is playing and explore more information about the artists, or see what’s coming up next. You can all see the potential for album promotions, competitions and quizzes – and advertising. The service can also be used to sell ringtones and logos – other micropayment-sized virtual goods popular with network operators.

Nokia describes the basic service thus: “You will never again have to wonder WHO is playing WHAT on radio – now you can get detailed information on any piece that is being played. During the news you can SEE what they are talking about, weather reports can now show you the maps and tables of sports results can easily be viewed. Entering the middle of a talk show, you can see what has been discussed so far and what is coming up next. Valuable business news or urgent news alerts can be received at any time onto your screen without having to interrupt the broadcast over the air.”

It also enables radio stations to interact in new ways with their audience – by allowing listeners to vote on popular topics, and getting input from people who perhaps would never phone into a show, but would like to interact nonetheless.

VR is currently available on the rather odd looking Nokia 7700, but the company intends to release more compatible handsets in the future.

How does it work?

The system itself is extremely simple: Visual Radio runs in parallel with a traditional radio broadcast, and is transmitted to the user’s handset via GPRS.

A reasonably informative and immersive service can be transmitted in about 200 kilobits per hour, but can vary enormously depending on the amount of graphics used on the service.

The attractive part here is that there’s no additional subscription for the end-user to have to buy into or extra payment system – she just pays for the GPRS data on her mobile phone bill as she would normally.

The service is currently only available for FM broadcasts, but there’s no reason why it can’t be deployed for AM stations, and indeed Nokia are exploring this.

Nokia has selected HP as its technology partner to bring VR to the market. HP sells the solution to mobile operators and FM radio stations worldwide, as well as provides installation, consulting and integration support. In addition, HP hosts and manages the VR service using standards-based HP platforms.

The VR application is part of the phone software, embedded in the handset’s hardware, and is not a downloadable application. This strikes me as odd: why not make it a Series 60 application and therefore deployable to all Series 60 phones with FM receivers?

What does it take to produce a Visual Radio feed?

VR is basically an XML feed sent to the phone’s browser through a standard GPRS connection. It’s simpler than HTML – there are fixed regions on the phone’s display, and certain content types can only go in those regions. By positioning objects relatively on the screen, similarly to web stylesheets, pages can scale to suit phones with different sized displays.

Graphics are highly optimised, and the preferred format is PNG, keeping button sizes, for example, down to typically less than 1k.

One page of VR, or slide, can be less than 3k in data.

Pages are extremely easy to create, and the process doesn’t get in the way for producing imaginative content – keeping punters interested beyond the novelty stage will be the tricky part. No special tools are required – once the basic templates are worked out, the station (or a third party) can use use an off the shelf package like Dreamweaver to layout pages.

The pages are also timecoded – so that the content is synchronised with the broadcast, images are cached to the phone so that slides are complete and ready when a song starts.

Once the VR pages are produced, they are sent via the internet to a hosting centre operated by HP, and then sent to network operators who transmit them to handsets, on a region by region basis.
A side view of the 7700 What’s the business model?

VR is essentially a low bandwidth sales tool. VR users pay for the GPRS data they download – and hopefully buy ringtones and other products advertised on it. The network operator also splits the money made from the GPRS streams with the radio station responsible for the broadcast. The radio station also has a new channel to sell. advertising on.

Sophisticated monitoring facilities are built into the service: the network operator can see how many “listeners” are tuned into the visual radio stream at any one time – providing valuable metrics for the radio station and its advertisers. This also enables the broadcaster to vary the amount of bandwidth and other resources deployed in response to demand.

Where is it?

Visual Radio is currently being transmitted by Helsinki’s KissFM station, and is available to TeleSonera subscribers.

Nokia has a chicken and egg situation here – it needs to sell the idea of Visual Radio to broadcasters as a popular service, but it also needs a range of content to entice users to take part. So far, uptake from both broadcasters and the public is disappointing – but it’s early days.

Visual Radio

Senate Moves to Outlaw P2P Applications

Orrin Hatch, Senate Judiciary Committee chair has moved his focus to P2P applications, claiming that they encourage children and teenagers to infringe copyright.

In a recent statement, he said: “It is illegal and immoral to induce or encourage children to commit crimes. Tragically, some corporations now seem to think that they can legally profit by inducing children to steal. Some think they can legally lure children into breaking the law with false promises of ‘free music.'”

Fairly emotive language. Given that FTP software and email are much more popular ways to distribute potentially infringing content, will legislation curbing those applications be next? Who makes the decision on what is an appropriate program? Clearly the legislation can be misused to stifle the development of legitimate applications and businesses.

The bill is backed by the RIAA and co-sponsored by Senate majority leader Bill Frist, Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy.

Hatch has argued that the new bill will not make devices such as iPods and CD recorders illegal – indeed the freedom to make non-infringing copies goes all the way 1984 Sony Betamax case where the US Supreme Court ruled that VCRs and similar copying devices were legal. Hatch asserts that the bill only targets companies that “intentionally induce” consumers to infringe copyrights – but the law is vague enough to allow it to be targeted at many common devices, say P2P groups such as P2P United.

The RIAA regard the legislation as tightly focussed, and RIAA chair and CEO Mitch Bainwol praised it in a statement this week: “This bill places the spotlight squarely on the bad actors who have hijacked a promising technology for illicit means and ignoble profits. Legitimate uses of peer-to-peer are upheld, while those who intentionally lure consumers into breaking the law are held to account. Under this legislation, the path to legitimacy remains clear: Respect the law and block the exchange of works the copyright owner has not authorized.”

The sponsors of this bill are being blinkered into a view that is entirely concerned with the profits of one group – the music industry. The backers of the Induce act are rallying towards just one group at the moment, because that’s where the money is.

What about all of the legitimate applications for P2P software? P2P technology has a promising, legal, future ahead of it if it does not get hobbled by these misinformed people.

Take, for example, the BBC’s Interactive Media Player project. The only way to distribute this content economically is to rely on a P2P network – yet all content will covered by a digital rights management system.

Of course, the bill will only outlaw the production of P2P applications within the US – it has no teeth elsewhere, and will not apply to programs developed abroad. Using a P2P application is not illegal – he will have to outlaw the possession of such a program to have any real effect. And they wouldn’t do that, would they? Don’t bet on it – remember it was Hatch who suggested the development of software to destroy the computers of people who downloaded illegal music files.

More details on BBC iMP

UN: We Can Beat Spam in Two Years

The United Nations has decided to tackle spam – and it thinks it can do it within two years by standardising legislation around the world. The International Telecommunications Union is hosting a meeting on spam in Geneva bringing together regulators from 60 countries, the Council of Europe and the World Trade Organisation.

Hopefully their anti-spam strategy will be to get them all in one room and crack their heads together until they agree to do something for a change. Yes, I have had a lot of spam today, thanks for asking.

“(We have) an epidemic on our hands that we need to learn how to control,” Robert Horton, the acting chief of the Australian communications authority, told reporters: “International cooperation is the ultimate goal.”

The UN intends to provide examples of anti-spam legislation for countries to adopt, to make prosecution and cross-border co-operation easier. How this will be regarded in countries that make a profit from sending spam is yet to be seen.

“If we don’t work together,” said Robert Shaw, Internet strategy expert with the United Nations’ International Telecommunications Union (ITU), “we may see millions of people abandoning the Net entirely, out of frustration and disgust.”

You’ve got that right, Bob. I’ll be back in two years to see if the UN’s strategy worked.

The ITU estimates that 85% of all email is now spam, compared to “just” 35% last year, and that anti-spam protection now costs computer users US$25 billion (€20.2 billion) a year. Roughly enough to feed everyone on the planet.

ITU

Bulldog’s 4Mps Broadband Service

Good news if you live in central London and are after a fast, reasonably cheap internet service – Bulldog, who were acquired by Cable and Wireless in June, have launched a 4Mps product for UK£30 (€44.88) per month. Bulldog 4 is being offered through the company’s own exchange equipment in 39 London exchanges, made possible by BT’s local loop unbundling programme.

Richard Greco, CEO of Bulldog said in a statement, “Having our own infrastructure enables us to do this, unlike other Internet Service Providers who are restricted by BT’s wholesale offerings.”

The connection is 4Mbps down and 400kbps up — still faster than most ADSL packages, but a deterrent to peer to peer uploaders.

This is sure to set a fire under BT whose 512kpbs product is only UK£5 (€7.47) cheaper than Bulldog 4.

Bulldog 4

3D Mobile Menus

Is this really easier to read? HI Corporation have launched a new 3D menuing system for mobile terminals. The company believes that by presenting menus in 3D, depth of field enhances the users’ visual recognition of icons.

The menu application will be used as an extension to its Mascot Capsule Engine, a 3D engine already adopted by the three major carriers in Japan and licensed around the world to Motorola and Sony Ericsson.

The company’s plans don’t stop there though – it sees potential for the new UI in many other mobile devices with LCDs, such as digital cameras and camcorders.

With applications like Swerve and Mascot reaching phones around the world, I have to ask if advances in menu systems like this actually make using small devices easier, or if it’s just a way of selling new devices to customers. After all, people do have a tendency to judge a device not just on its looks and perceived capabilities, but tend to make a decision on its sophistication based purely on its display UI.

HI Corp

Microsoft Smart Phone, Sierra Voq, on Sale in Europe

Nifty fold-out keyboard Sierra Wireless’ Voq phone, a handset built around Microsoft’s Smartphone Platform, has just gone on sale in Holland, through Dutch carrier KPN.

The 5 ounce phone contains a 200MHz XScale processor and has 48mb of Flash memory alongside 32mb of SDRAM – expansion is through the usual SD card slot. The display is 2.2 inch, 64,000 colour LCD. A flipout QWERTY keyboard differentiates the phone from most other handsets, emphasising that it’s a business phone for emails. Or for youths that like to send a lot of text messages.

The phone is not yet available in the US – though is expected to be on sale within the next two weeks, priced at about US$500 (€404).

KPN

Gold and Platinum Awards for Music Downloads

The US record industry is to further embrace online music sales by giving Gold and Platinum awards to top-selling artists. Musicians and acts selling 100,000 downloads from a licensed online music store will get a Silver Award, those enjoying 200,000 sales will get a Platinum Award. Multiple-platinum awards will be granted to sales of 400,000 and above.

Currently, artists receive a silver disc for 500,000 CDs sold, and platinum for 1 million sold. As legal music downloads increase, the RIAA may have to revise its new digital eligibility numbers as more and more tracks are sold. The Diamond award was introduced in 1999 for sales of 10 million CDs and above – perhaps they will launch a download version of this for 1 million downloads.

The new awards program launches in late August. “This is a gratifying milestone in the evolution of legitimate digital music services,” said Mitch Bainwol, chairman and CEO of the RIAA. “The fact that the marketplace has already advanced this far, and artists have attained this level of success, speaks volumes.”

The original award programme began in 1958, with Platinum discs first appearing in 1976. So the first Platinum disc was obviously a disco tune then.

RIAA

BBC Closes Five Websites, May Close More

The BBC is to close five websites in the wake of the Graf Report, and is looking at all BBC Online services. The five sites to close initially are Fantasy Football, What’s On, Surfing, Games and Pure Soap. “The process is not over” stated Ashley Highfield after announcing their closure. “The review is going to look at all of our websites. Nothing is going to escape scrutiny of its public value.”

No jobs will be lost immediately as staff will be transferred to other business areas.

Highfield has added another aim to BBC Online’s remit to educate, inform and entertain – connect. BBC sites will connect with audiences whenever and wherever they want. He also added a pledge that BBC Online would never produce e-commerce, e-mail, gambling or dating sites.

This is not quite the bold pledge it sounds – there is already a bbcshop.com, operated by BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the organisation. If the BBC ever wanted to operate any of the services that Highfield has ruled out, BBCWW would be able to do so without breaking any pledges.

BBC Shop

Ofcom’s Broadband Ambitions, Appoints Telecoms Adjudicator

The UK’s communications regulator, Ofcom, has outlined its next steps and long term aspirations for the development of broadband.

Ofcom believes that their initial focus on rollout and coverage has paid off, with 512kbps services now common place and around 15% of the population taking advantage of broadband.

The regulator now wants to define and focus on a phase two: “the new generation of broadband services likely to emerge as competition increases between providers.”Ofcom are still as keen as ever to promote local loop unbundling, and have been successful at goading BT into faster action to improve third-party access to exchanges – they they note that the pace in the UK does not match those in other countries: “If there is sufficient progress in reducing costs and improving operational processes, local loop unbundling in the UK has the potential to deliver the same kind of growth and innovation emerging in, for example, France and Japan, where tens of thousands of local loops are unbundled each month.” Although Ofcom’s first attempts at promoting LLU failed, they are pleased that BT is finally getting the message, and is reducing costs.

By promoting greater competition in access networks, Ofcom believes that they can increase adoption of VoIP services in the next 3 to 5 years, with the majority of households benefiting from video-quality broadband by the end of the decade.

To assist in the further progress of LLU and broadband rollout, Ofcom are keen to promote the establishment of a Telecommunications Adjudicator, an independent post designed to resolve working-level implementation disputes. Indeed, they have today named Peter Black as the man for the job – a former senior executive at BT, Thus and NTL, Black is an experienced telecommunications exec.

The post is supported by BT, AOL, C&W, Video Networks, Wanadoo and others. Ofcom chief executive Stephen Carter said in a Statement: “We welcome the fact that 12 of the most significant companies have signed up to the independent Adjudicator scheme; and we hope this drives growth in the future.”

Ofcom’s aspirations

GNER Trains Get WiFi

GNER Trains in the UK is launching a new WiFi service for commuters on its East Coast Main Line. Ten trains will be equipped with wireless internet access, so if your train actually turns up, you can let people know how late you’re going to be. You can even email pictures of the motionless countryside, if you have a camera. A further ten trains will have WiFi installed in them over the summer.

First class passengers will get “free” access (i.e. it’s included in the astronomical cost of a train ticket), whereas standard fare ticket holders will pay between UK£2.95 and UK£9.95 (€4.40 and €14.83), depending on the length of access. Could be particularly expensive in the Autumn, depending on which kind of leaves fall.

The service can operate on trains travelling up to 125 miles per hour, but given that nothing has moved on our rail network at that speed for at least 100 years, passengers should enjoy uninterrupted access.

GNER Mobile Office