Mike Slocombe

Teleport, TV-on-Demand Service Launched By Telewest Broadband
Cable company Telewest Broadband is making Teleport, its TV-on-demand service, available to over 26,000 customers in Cheltenham and Gloucester today.
As we reported last month, this forms the first stage of national roll-out which Telewest claims will “revolutionise” digital TV for more than a million customers by the beginning of next year.
The cable company’s Teleport service gives customers instant, 24 hour access to a vast library films and TV entertainment with users able to pause, fast forward and rewind the content, just like a DVD.
Sofa-loafing customers can access the service via the existing set-top box and remote control, with a simple on-screen menu serving up viewing menus.
Teleport Movies offers around 200 current and library films from FilmFlex, with rental charges costing between £2.00 (~$3.59, ~€3) and £3.50 (~$6.28, ~€5.20) for a 24-hour rental period.
Teleport Replay lets TV addicts users catch up on popular programmes from the previous week, and will include riveting programmes such as Eastenders and Casualty (be still my beating heart!), with Teleport Life offering specialist interest programmes.
Soon to be launched is Teleport TV, which will screen classic BBC series such as Morse and Waking the Dead and music videos on a subscription basis.
Freeloaders will be pleased to learn that Telewest is promising a “substantial amount” of free content, including soaps, comedy and documentaries, along with the usual pay-per-view and subscription options.
Subscribers to the company’s premier digital TV package will get most of the new content bundled in for free, including access to the entire TV package.
Eric Tveter, president and CEO of Telewest, mused: “Teleport has arrived and it’s genuinely going to change the way people watch TV. The schedule normally dictates viewing, but our customers will have the choice and convenience of a service they can tailor – it’s TV on their terms.”
Telewest Broadband has already been scooping up secured content from a wide range of providers including Filmflex, the BBC, Flextech, Discovery Networks Europe, National Geographic Channel Europe, Nickelodeon, Jetix (ex-Fox Kids) and Playboy TV.
Such is Telewest’s determination to snaffle a chunk of the burgeoning Video On Demand market, the company is whipping out its wallet like Ron Atkinson on pay day, investing around £20 million in the development of advanced TV services in 2005.
Telewest
30 June, 2005
Quake, Etch A Sketch And Da Yoot On Mobiles And Bluetooth Security – Newsround
Quake to be ported to 3D-enabled mobile phones
A mobile phone version of the famous 3D Blast ‘Em Up’ from id Software is in development by a company called Bare Naked Productions.
The game is being optimised for a new generation of mobile phones handsets that feature dedicated 3D graphics hardware.
The 3D-enabled mobile phones are expected to be coming out of Korea next month.
Mobilemag.com
Bluetooth group offers security tips to avoid attacks
After a paper published earlier this month revealed how security mechanisms in short-range wireless Bluetooth technology could be undermined, members of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) have produced a list of precautions for users.
These include always pairing devices privately, avoiding public places; using eight character alphanumeric PIN (personal identification number) codes and repairing connections in private, secure locations
Bluetooth.com
Etch A Sketch makes a comeback on mobile phones
For the technology-poor, time-rich kid growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, Etch a Sketch was the equivalent of Photoshop.
Launched 45 years ago, the device shifted more than 100m units, allowing very patient users to while away the hours creating basic monochrome drawings by moving two dials to draw lines over a screen.
Originally called the DoodleMaster Magic Screen in the UK, a new mobile phone version of Etch A Sketch has been created by the Ohio Art Company and mobile game developers In Fusio.
Initially available in the UK to Orange customers, the mobile version replaces the plastic drawing dials with the phone keypad.
Sadly, shaking the phone doesn’t clear the screen as in the original, but pressing the ‘0’ key will activate the vibrate function of the phone. Nice touch!
In-Fusio
Da Yoot prefer mobiles to Internet. Innit.
A study from mobile media firm Enpocket, asked which medium consumers would give up last if they had to choose between TV, newspapers, mobile phone, the Internet, radio and magazines.
People were most reluctant to give up the goggle box, with 31% choosing to give it up last, followed by mobile (19%), radio (16%), the Internet (13%), newspapers (10%) and magazines (5%) in terms of popularity.
Young adults (18-24 years olds) loved their mobiles above all, with 30% choosing to give up their mobile last, above television (28%) and the Internet (15%).
The survey also revealed that 81% of 18-24 year olds can access the Internet on their mobiles, with 79% able to send and receive MMS picture messages.
The Mobile Media Monitor also revealed how mobile is growing as a marketing medium; 49% of the UK population and 71% of the loyal 18-24 year old age group had received marketing over their mobiles.
Peter Larsen, CEO of Enpocket, said: “The survey indicates how important the mobile medium is becoming for marketing communications, provided these are user-initiated and personally relevant.
Young adults prefer mobiles to Internet
30 June, 2005
BT Gets Botty Smacked By ASA Over ‘Free Calls’ Claims
Delivering a king size slipper to the ample bottom of BT, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled that BT’s PC-based internet telephony service, BT Communicator, does not make “free” calls.
In one of its mailings, the UK telco behemoth had bragged: “BT Communicator – FREE UK Calls for a year” emphasising the freebieness of the deal with the strap line: “The power of BT Broadband to enjoy free calls for a year”.
But a concerned consumer in Kent was having none of it, arguing that by gleefully proclaiming “FREE UK Calls for a year”, BT was pulling a fast one.
The Kentish complainant pointed out that by using the VoIP service he’d rapidly burn up the 1 gig a month usage limit that BT slaps on its Broadband Basic packages – and once he exceeded that limit, he’d have to start forking out for additional time online.
Hauled in front of the ASA, BT mumbled something about the fact that they “had not intended to charge customers for the service, but they had not fully considered the impact of usage allowances on the ability to make free calls”.
The ASA was not impressed, making a savage sauté of BT’s nether regions: “The Authority was concerned that, although the promotion offered ‘free calls’, those calls depleted the monthly usage allowance that a broadband customer paid for on a monthly basis as part of their broadband package”.
Smarting from a derriere rouge par excellence, BT was told “not to describe calls that depleted a consumer’s usage allowance as ‘free’ and to state prominently in advertisements for BT Communicator that making telephone calls depleted a consumer’s broadband usage allowance”.
This ruling raises the suggestion that BT hasn’t fully considered the impact of VoiP usage allowances on its services.
With BT ramping up bandwidth-gorging offerings with innovations like video on demand and smarty pants hybrid mobile/landline BT Fusion handsets, the broadband experience of the future may prove to be a mighty expensive one for consumers.
BT Communicator
ASA
BT thrashed for ‘free’ VoIP call claim
29 June, 2005
Google Adds New Personalised Search Features
Google has launched an updated beta version of its personalised search tool that learns from your history of searches and search results you’ve clicked on, shuffling more relevant results to the top of the page.
Here’s how it works: if a mad keen boozer was always searching for man-sized glasses to sup his ale from, Google would learn from his search history with future searches for the keyword “glasses” automatically serving up glass-related results, while ignoring results for the four-eyed variety.
Similarly, if the surfer was a teetotaller with an Elton John-like obsession with spectacles, Google would only serve up spec-related results and links when they searched for “glasses”.
According to Google’s Marissa Mayer, the more users search and build up a search history the better the results will become.
“We need to have a history of the user,” Mayer added. “When people first sign up they may not see results right away, but it will build over time.”
Consumers need to have a Google account for the free service and those using the previous version of the personalised search service will automatically be switched to the new version.
The service only works when the user is signed on to their Google account.
Clearly, there could be a shedload of potential privacy concerns here with the search history feature compiling a detailed list of every page you’ve ever searched for, but sneaky surfers hoping for a bit of discrete titillation can sign out of the personalised search service, pause it or remove it through their accounts page.
Furtive track-coverers can also remove individual items from their search history as well.
This latest personalised search beta is a refinement of the previous version, launched in March 2004, which only customised searches after users had manually selected categories of interest.
Like all Google public betas, the new personalised search service is currently sitting in Google Labs, described by the company as an “engineer’s playground”.
Mayer said she could not speculate on when a final version will be launched, adding that Google will not be customising advertisements based on the personalised search.
This latest search development reflects Google’s drive to let users customise their Web experiences, and follows on from the personalised Google home page feature introduced in May.
Google labs
29 June, 2005
Handango Announces the Champion Award Winners for 2005
Mobile download site Handango has announced the winners of their Champion Awards at the fifth annual Handango Partner Summit.
Judged by a panel of industry boffins, experts and media, the Handango Champion Awards were dished out for applications written for BlackBerry, Palm OS, UIQ, Series 60 and Windows Mobile-based Pocket PC and Smartphone platforms.
The categories were Best Application for Work, Best Application for Play, Best Application for Life, Best New Application and Best Industry Application.
For the Palm platform, the winners included Snapper Mail Deluxe in the ‘work application’ category, with Pocket Tunes Deluxe scooping up the ‘Play’ category.
SplashData’s SplashBlog – a nifty application that lets mobile users easily create and update a mobile photo blog – grabbed the coveted “Best New Application” award.
Winners in the Windows Mobile Pocket PC included high-powered organiser software Pocket Informant 2005 (“Work”) and the ultra-configurable Today plug-in, SPB Pocket Plus. Expect reviews on these products in the near future.
The comprehensive MobiLearn Talking Phrasebook, a talking multi-language phrasebook for the Pocket PC with “pure native voices”, snagged the “Best Industry Application” award.
Other winners included Mobimate’s WorldMate and Mail2Fax on the BlackBerry platform, Papyrus and NewsBreak on the Windows Mobile and Quick Office Premiere and IM+ Instant Messenger on the Series 60 platform.
In the Developers of the Year category, hearty back-slapping plaudits went out to Develope One (Pocket PC), Chapura (Palm), Ilium Software (Windows Smartphone), Terratial Software (BlackBerry), Mobile Digital Media (Series 60) and Epocware (Series 60).
Full list of the winners here
29 June, 2005
Wanadoo Turns Orange
Long time customers of Wanadoo (formerly Freeserve) might be forgiven for forgetting who they’re connecting with after the company announced yet another rebranding.
Promising customers a “smooth changeover”, owners France Telecom will be bringing their Wanadoo service under the umbrella of their high-profile brand, Orange.
The move is part of a strategy to make Orange become “the Group’s international commercial brand for mobile, broadband and multiplay offerings”.
The well-recognised Freeserve name was taken over by Wanadoo just 14 months ago, but France Telecom insist that the latest rebrand will better reflect the portfolio of services to be offered.
These include combined mobile and internet access, a broadband telephone that tells with email notification and remote surveillance of your home through a mobile or a computer.
A spokesman for ~~Freeserve~~, ~~Wanadoo~~, Orange said: “The Wanadoo brand has been an enormous success enabling us to become a broadband leader in the UK. But we are now entering the era of convergence where our customers will experience a new generation of high value and exciting converged services.”
“These services will allow our customers to be able to communicate at home, at work or on the go. A single brand representing these integrated services – the Orange brand – is the way forward.”
The spokesman added that customer’s email services will be uninterrupted, with users still contactable whatever their domain name.
As convergence continues to impact in the teleco sector, France Telecom’s move should ensure that customers will get their mobile, broadband, video-on-demand and fixed line services all from the same company, slapped on the same bill.
If they’re not too confused, of course!
Wanadoo
France Telecom
29 June, 2005
VeeStream Enables “i-Pod-Like 3G Music Video Service”
Vidiator Technology has declared a “world first” for their VeeStream mobile music video service, launched in Scandinavia.
There’s currently more than 50 live broadcast channels on offer, letting mobile subscribers “use their phones like i-Pods”, with an unlimited hard-drive housed on the mobile network.
The service enables subscribers to watch and listen to music through mobile streaming on their video-enabled mobile phones. After a free trial from May-Aug 2005, mobile subscribers can shell out a monthly fee under US $7.00 (~€6.00~£4.00) and gorge themselves on unlimited programming.
After launching with an audio service in May 2005, video is scheduled to follow in June with radio coming in July.
“Vidiator is one of the key partners who enable us to be the innovator in the Scandinavian Market,” insisted Shlomo Liran, CEO of 3 Scandinavia. “We are a mobile video company, not just a mobile voice company. Vidiator streaming technology makes it possible for us to deliver new services and to stay ahead of our competitors”.
The service uses VeeStream, a rich media streaming platform, which delivers high quality audio and video streaming content on-demand for 2.5G and 3G network operators, regardless of format player, handset or network.
The clever boffins at VeeStream claim to have solved the problem of network bandwidth availability by using ‘dynamic bandwidth adaptation’ (DBA) a patent-pending, open-standards based technology.
The real-time DBA does its stuff by optimising throughput over scarce radio frequencies, while creating a higher ratio of delivered streams than competing technologies.
With the 3GPP/3GPP2 compliant VeeStream being player-agnostic, mobile streaming can be enabled to a broader range of networks and devices, which should bring costs down for wireless operators.
“Vidiator is a solutions provider, not purely a software company,” said Connie Wong, Vidiator’s CEO.
“VeeStream is the most proven carrier-grade wireless streaming technology in the market due to its robustness, scalability and modularity. Carriers like 3 Scandinavia only have to ‘plug and play’ off their existing Vidiator streaming platform running other applications to add 50 audio and video channels, including live broadcast services like Big Brother.
This scalability enables quick time-to-market for new content, lowers system configuration and operation costs and boosts revenues”.
Personally, I’d rather sit bare bottomed on a bag of angry live crabs than try to watch Big Brother on a squinty little mobile phone screen, but there’s no denying that such pap can help drive network take up and revenues for 3 network providers.
Vidiator VeeStream
28 June, 2005
Geeks Take Over The UK
Long shunned as hobby-obsessed lonely losers living in messy bedrooms with a dreadful taste in music, geeks, computer spods and sci-fi nuts have revealed themselves as a lucrative target for advertisers.
The Sci Fi Geekforce Report, a new study by the Sci-Fi channel service, reveals geeks to be high-spenders with the power to make or break billion-pound brands.
With Borg-like numbers (nearly 7 million in the UK), the collective buying power of geeks is making cappuccino-supping noo meedja types sit up and reach for their mood boards, with the survey estimating the “geek pound” to be worth a staggering £8.2bn (~€12bn ~ US$15~)a year.
The research, undertaken in association with marketing specialists TGI and media agency Rocket, also revealed that the geeks are predominantly ABC1 consumers, with some 33% of their number being female.
The bigwigs of Sci-Fi conducted the research to try and work out the popularity of the multi-billion dollar genre when it was supposedly the province of “solitary, unpopular individuals with niche interests and questionable personal hygiene habits.”
Dan Winter, head of press at Sci-Fi, declared himself “blown away” by the survey, which challenged many of the stereotypes.
For example, far from being long-term bedroom dwellers with only a death metal collection for company, the survey revealed geeks to be sociable animals, 52% more likely than the average person to have had four holidays in the last 12 months and 125% more likely to visit pubs, clubs and bars.
Nearly 40% of geeks believed their special interests make them attractive to the opposite sex, although we’re not convinced that, “Hi! Have you seen the latest Asus motherboard?” is a winning chat up line.
The bit that will get the advertisers moist in their strap lines is the fact that geeks are 90% more likely to be the first among their chums to invest in new products.
Martin Heaton Cooper, advertising sales director for Sci Fi, commented: “It’s clear that in a time of advertising overload and scepticism, the mainstream is turning to their new geek counterparts to help them make product decisions.”
The Sci Fi Geekforce Report is due to be released in July.
Sci-Fi
28 June, 2005
BT Project Nevis Selects Microsoft IPTV For UK TV Over Broadband
In a cornucopia of convergence, BT has announced their intention to use the Microsoft TV Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) Edition software platform to deliver TV over broadband in the UK. Internally within BT, the project is referred to as Project Nevis.
The Microsoft TV IPTV Edition software platform lets broadband network operators whizz high-quality video content and services down the wire to their customers using existing and next-gen broadband networks.
The platform delivers cost-effective and security-enhanced delivery of a whole gamut of pay-TV service offerings, including standard- and high-definition channels, on-demand programming, digital video recording, and interactive program guides.
There are extra consumer-pleasing gizmos in the package too, with features like instant channel-changing and picture-in-picture functionality using multiple video streams.
Unlike most consumer pay-TV delivery systems, the Microsoft TV platform allows network operators to integrate the delivery of pay-TV services with other networked broadband services in the home such as PCs, telephones, game consoles, mobile devices and other gadgets.
Gavin Patterson, Group Managing Director of BT Retail slipped on his buzzword moccasins and danced a soft shoe shuffle to his Big Vision:
“BT and Microsoft share a common vision for converged entertainment in the home. TV over broadband services will play an important role in BT’s triple-play offering for consumers. Our approach of over-the-air broadcast and broadband-delivered video-on-demand, interactivity and enhanced support is the perfect solution and complements existing TV propositions already in the UK market. The combination of Microsoft’s best-in-class technology with BT’s 21st-century network will result in an incredibly exciting set of next-generation entertainment and communication services available to consumers across the UK.”
As the sound of mutual backslapping threatened to reach ASBO-generating levels, Moshe Lichtman, corporate VP of the Microsoft TV division gushed:
“BT is a great example of one of the world’s leading network operators choosing Microsoft TV as the software platform for its digital TV and converged entertainment services.”
“We are very pleased to be working with such a well-respected and innovative operator as BT. Microsoft TV IPTV Edition will enable a full suite of integrated entertainment and communication services that will set the bar for what consumers will expect,” he added.
BT plan to start trials of the TV over broadband service in early 2006, with a commercial service expected to start in the summer of 2006.
Microsoft TV
BT
28 June, 2005
BB Mobile Demo Seamless 3G/Wi-Fi Roaming With Nortel
Nortel NT and BB Mobile are chuffed to bits to have achieved what they claim is the world’s “first seamless handoff of voice and data services between a third generation (3G) cellular network operating on the 1.7 GHz radio frequency band and a wireless local area network (LAN)”.
What this means in English is that in the future users will be able roam securely between 3G wireless networks and Wi-Fi networks or wireless LANs while checking out websites, blasting out emails, downloading files and doing all the other things that connected cats get up to on a high-speed wireless broadband voice and data service.
The triumphant test calls were made on a live Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) 3G cellular network and an 802.11 wireless LAN, with Nortel’s smarty pants software making it all happen.
This latest test follows on from successful wireless data transmission trials by Nortel and BB Mobile earlier this month.
In those trials, boffins were able to notch up Japan’s first 14.4 million bits per second (Mbps) wireless data transmission via the 1.7 GHz radio frequency band for mobile communications and Nortel’s high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) technology.
This managed to ratchet up speeds 30 times faster than commercially deployed networks using UMTS.
Peter MacKinnon, president GSM/UMTS, Nortel, throbbed: “This second demonstration with BB Mobile is an important step in meeting the demand for ubiquitous wireless broadband voice and data services regardless of network or device”.
“The results of these tests with BB Mobile also highlight the level of technological innovation we will continue to bring to Japan’s wireless industry to help drive network convergence and bridge the gap between wireline and wireless 3G networks,” added Nick Vreugdenhil, country manager, Japan, Nortel.
As an aside, we have to commend Nortel on producing the longest disclaimer message we’ve ever seen.
A note at the end of the press announcement: “Certain information included in this press release is forward-looking and is subject to important risks and uncertainties. The results or events predicted in these statements may differ materially from actual results or events….”
Nortel then went on to cover every possible eventuality including – probably – an invasion of bug eye monsters, in a 700 word yawn-a-thon guaranteed to be ignored by anyone who sees it.
Oy! Company spokesperson! Shut it!
Nortel
Softbank
22 June, 2005