Digital-Lifestyles

Distribution

The new digital ways content was becoming distributed

  • Diagnosis of Patients in Transit via Video Link Trailed in Japan.

    Imagine the advantages of being able to send high-definition video of a patient from an ambulance to a hospital via cell phone. It will happen nation-wide in Japan from next April.

    A collaborative project by the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), the Tsukuba Medical Centre Hospital, and the Tsukuba Fire Headquarters has developed such a system that can do just this. Simply at the flick of a switch, paramedics will activate the system to enable a hospital doctor to examine a patient via remote control video camera using the new technology that has made it possible to compress high-definition image data sufficiently to allow its transmission via cell phone.

    According to national statistics in Japan, it takes an average of 21 minutes to transport an emergency patient to hospital.  These high-definition images though, will make it possible for doctors at the receiving hospital to give critical, timesaving and appropriate advice to paramedics, with obvious positive implications for the survival prospects of the patient. 

    To implement the system, ambulances will need to be modified to carry a video camera, laptop computer and special antenna, and AIST say the system will be tested in the city by the end of the year and will go on sale nation-wide in April.

    This is the first time we have heard of video from a moving vehicle being used for medical diagnosis and treatment. Fixed-location use of video is now becoming common place, in deed a story in News.com this summer highlighted the importance of being able to avail of expert instructions remotely, when cardiac surgery on a patient in Guam was led by physician, Dr. Benjamin Berg in front of a computer screen 3,500 miles away at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu. He dictated the procedure to a less experienced colleague, monitoring every move with a high-resolution video camera.

    AIST already has a track record in using technology to advance medical practice, having developed a therapeutic robot seal called PARO in collaboration with Microjenics. In February 2002, the Guinness Book of Records acknowledged the PARO robot as the most therapeutic robot in the world. AIST has licensed all PARO’s intellectual property rights to its affiliated venture company Intelligent System (ISC), who plan to introduce the robot to nursing homes for the elderly.

    News.com –  Digital Agenda Broadband (24 page PDF)
    JCN – AIST Develops Therapeutic Robot Seal

  • Targeted adverts for P2P

    AlmondNet, Inc. and Intent MediaWorks will separate the appropriate from the irrelevant to exclusively bring you only the good ads.

    Should your browsing habits make you fair game for any advertiser or should you only be subjected to ‘relevant, targeted interactive ads’?  The latter option is obviously a lot more preferable, and if done in the right way, it shouldn’t be too much of a nuisance.

    Two technology companies in New York and Atlanta are trying to achieve the latter option and have consequently signed a deal whereby advertisers can target specific ads to P2P users.

    During the download process users are served ads via the INTENT MediaWorks client, using AlmondNet’s technology, which is cookie based and they say doesn’t collect personally identifiable information, adverts should be targeted.

    The two companies involved are AlmondNet, Inc., a New York-based advertising technology company that offers web publishers targeted ads based on audience attributes, and Intent MediaWorks, an Atlanta-based company that provides a technology platform for secure distribution of content via legal peer-to-peer networks. They have signed a co-operation agreement whereby Intent MediaWorks will use AlmondNet’s patent-pending behavioural targeting technology to target ads to P2P users who use their secure distribution platform.

    Intent MediaWorks already has technology that allows recording artists and music companies to distribute their digital content securely via major P2P systems like Kazaa, Gnutella, and Bit Torrent. INTENT say they already has 600 artists on its books for music distribution.

    Ads come in good, bad and ugly flavours, not to mention irrelevant and downright inappropriate. As usual it is the 18-34 year old that is being targeted in this space, and while one has to be slightly suspicious about users being targeted based on their online behavior and interests, since no ad campaign is altruistic, at least they are being spared the irrelevant and inappropriate.

    We’re not certain that anyone who is downloading via a P2P network will be looking at their screens while the files are coming down, it’s normally a fire-and-fire operation. If this is widely-so, we’re not sure who is going to pay to advertise?

    INTENT MediaWorks,LLC
    AlmondNet, Inc

  • BBC Spooks Dares to Combine Drama and Interactivity

    As more people take up digital television, whether through Freeview, Sky or other means, the enhanced viewing experience becomes the norm rather than the exception.  For instance enhanced sport broadcasts, such as BBC coverage of both Wimbledon and the Olympics, offer viewers the opportunity to tailor the broadcast programming to their interests by enabling them to watch events that would not otherwise be available.  Likewise Sky’s fenhanced football allows viewers to choose the commentators and camera angles.  News multi-screen offers similar flexibility in navigating news content. Yet interactive drama programmes are often regarded as the holy grail of enhanced television.  The scripted linear narrative is seen as a barrier to interactivity.  So when producers of the Five soap Family Affairs announced that they planned to broadcast an interactive episode in May 2004, pundits were intrigued.  Theirs was the Big Brother version of interactivity – viewers were asked to vote, by phone,  on the outcome of a love triangle.  The phone vote generated extra income for the broadcaster and new viewers for the programme.  On the record, the producers were delighted to offer a television first.  However, when asked about the interactive episode off the record, a very senior executive involved at all stages of development and production said at the time,  “Never again”.  It turns out that accommodating even such a limited element of uncertainty in the narrative posed great difficulty for future storylining and production schedules.

    BBC Spooks InteractiveMore recently the BBC has claimed to offer yet another enhanced drama first with interactive Spooks.  The third series of this successful spy drama began transmission on BBC1 Monday 11 October.   Unlike Family Affairs’ tentative foray into interactivity, viewers will not be voting on Spooks storylines.  (If they could, they’d most certainly vote to keep Tom Quinn, the main character played by Matthew Macfadyen who exits the show in Episode 3.)  Instead immediately after the programme, digital viewers are invited to find out if they have what it takes to make it as a spy.  Led by Harry Pearce (a crossover character from the television series portrayed by Peter Firth), participants take a series of scored tests that examine essential espionage skills such as memory, reaction and observation.  From Episode 6 viewers will be able to participate in a mission that was written by Steve Bailie, an experienced writer of television drama.  “The aim,” Sophie Walpole BBC’s Head of Interactive Drama & Entertainment told us, “is to offer fans a deeper relationship with both the programme and its characters.”  In addition, Walpole pointed out,  “fans will get something back – they’ll get to know a little about themselves.” 

    According to the BBC, the number of unique users for the Spooks Website during the second series “ran into the hundreds of thousands.”  The decision to develop and produce the interactive platform was taken because the producers had such a strong proposal.  According to Walpole, “ The BBC is always looking at ways to develop its content.  But Spooks was not singled out for development in this way.  The producers had a really good proposition.”  She continued, “ The inspiration and vision of Andrew Whitehouse (the producer of Spooks’ interactive content) was incredible.  We had a great producer with a great idea.”  The enhanced TV elements are intended to complement the revamped Website so that, although the site also offers a spy training academy, the experiences are completely different. “The Spooks superfan who goes to both the Website and the interactive elements will not feel like they’ve had a similar experience,” said Walpole.  Figures for new users of the Website or users of the enhanced television platform after transmission of the first episode are not yet available.

    When asked how technology affected the development of enhanced television in general, Walpole stated that while it is technically possible, the BBC opted not to transmit enhanced Spooks via broadband because they wanted it to be seen by as many viewers as possible.  “Although they continue to grow, broadband audiences are still small.”  Looking to the future Walpole said she was certain that the BBC would make this type of rich content available to broadband users, possibly as soon as next year.

    From what I’ve seen so far, the BBC has reason to be proud of interactive Spooks.  By recognising that interactive drama doesn’t necessarily infer gimmicky phone votes (aka viewer extortion) or ceding control of the narrative to the audience, they deftly avoided the traps that frustrated at least one Family Affairs executive.  The production values on Spooks are really very high indeed.  And the spy training modules transmitted after Episode 1 were good fun.  Most importantly, they lend themselves quite nicely to a shared experience – an element of the interactive experience that  is essential for television audiences.  The aim of providing a way for fans to develop a closer relationship with the programme is definitely achieved.  If the enhanced Spooks disappoints at all, it is that the enhancements are extremely limited.  The spy training takes approximately 30 minutes to complete – that’s a bit too long.  Unfortunately, there’s no way to navigate through the game; participants must start at the beginning and move through to the end to get scores.  Also, the training modules will be repeated after Episodes 2 through 5 and the narrative mission transmitted after Episode 6 will be repeated after Episodes 7 through 10.  While this offers viewers the opportunity to practice their skills it means that, in effect, there are only 2 unique enhancements throughout the 10-week run.  That’s a great shame because they’ve done such a good job of creating enhanced Spooks that I really would have liked more!


    In the UK, Episodes 3 – 10 of Spooks will be broadcast Mondays at 21.00 on BBC1.  Episodes are repeated on Saturdays at 21.10 on BBC3 followed by an advance transmission of the next episode at 22.10.  The interactive elements are broadcast immediately after transmission on both channels.

    BBC Sppoks site

  • TI to put DVB-H in Single Chip

    Texas Instruments have just announced they will be building a single chip that will that will allow cell phones to receive digital television broadcasts over a wireless network.

    Currently if a mobile phone manufacturer wanted to do this they would have to include three separate chips – a TV tuner, a signal demodulator and a channel decoder, but the TI chip, codenamed “Hollywood”, includes all this functionality already.  “Hollywood” will support two emerging digital and open TV standards for the wireless industry – the European, DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcasting – Handheld); and the Japanese Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting – Terrestrial (ISDB-T).

    Texas Instruments say that the chip will be able to receive a live TV broadcast at up to 30 frames per second, twice the rate that some of today’s top notch phones display video clips.

    While the chip is already being trialled, manufacturers probably won’t receive samples until 2006, pushing commercial deployment to 2007.

    It’s unclear if users will watch TV on a tiny mobile screen.  Furthermore, it is not yet known which mobile phone manufacturers will provide the phones, although Nokia, who announced last year that they are going to put television tuners into all their cellphones, (having already done so with the 7700) could be a contender.

    A time might come when we forget what the mobile phone is really for.  We’ll be so busy playing music and video games, taking photographs, or watching TV that receiving a call will become an irritating nuisance.

    Texas Instruments

  • WiFi – it’s Everywhere … and Now With Voice

    My local coffee shop and corporate America have one thing in common – they are adopting wireless. WLAN hotspots today are as exciting as the record store of the 1950’s. 

    There are lots of players in the market and already some of them are joining forces to increase their chances of success, small operators needing the resources of bigger players.  The enterprise community needs wireless for its notebook wielding road warriors, and consultants Frost & Sullivan expects total subscription revenues in the European WLAN hotspots market to rise from around € 18 million (~$22,664,522) in 2002 to in excess of € 1 billion by the end of 2006.

    Frost & Sullivan’s study indicates that the key to success lies in selecting the locations most frequented by business travellers, and it would seem that a marriage of convenience between WiFi and VoIP would be very beneficial.

    Boingo Wireless, a CA-based Wi-Fi hot spot operator and aggregator, have just done deals with KPN HotSpots in The Netherlands and The Public Network (TPN) in Switzerland, adding 290 Wi-Fi hot spots in key travel locations in these countries to the Boingo Roaming System. With these new additions, Boingo’s worldwide network includes more than 11,000 hot spots with 5,600 locations in Europe.

    Boingo have also set up shop with Vonage Holdings Corp., a leading broadband telephony (VoIP) provider in North America, in an effort to simplify voice over Wi-Fi services and make them more accessible to customers. This move is the first phase of their VoIP strategy, whereby mobile travellers using the Xpro from Xten, can access the Vonage service from almost any Internet connected personal computer.

    Boingo and Vonage will conduct a trial before the end of the year and the proposed bundle will include a Xpro SoftPhone from Xten and a headset that will allow the user to communicate over the Internet from any of the Boingo hot spots.

    Frost & Sullivan
    Boingo
    Vonage

  • London Schoolchildren to get Broadband Learning at Home

    Soon, too soon for some, there will be no excuse for not having your homework done as London education authorities are planning to install broadband in the homes of London schoolchildren. , This initiative by the London Education authorities is timely in the light of a recent OECD report that identified “Disappointing” the use of ICT (computer & technology) in upper secondary schools, even in the most advanced countries, despite major investment outlays over the past 20 years.

    With broadband already in more than 80 per cent of London classrooms, the plan now is to extend the initiative and allow pupils at primary and secondary schools, access to high-speed Internet services at home. That means a portal that supports a million people, who will have a personal log-on, 25MB of space, their own email and of course, access to a cornucopia of online learning materials.

    As we’ve previously reported extending learning to the home has been very successful in trials in Kingston Upon Hull in the UK where, using the KIT TVIP service, pupils are able to work on the school’s servers using a keyboard, a Set Top Box and their television.

    It looks like there will be very few excuses left for not attending class either, unless you are at death’s door, since the London Grid for Learning (LGfL) has created an education network that shares IT resources through classes held via video-conferencing, virtual field trips and personalised pupil programmes. Virtual field tripe, eh?  Looks like you won’t even be able to say the damp brings on an asthma attack when the tree identification trip can be done from the comfort of that lovely classroom. The personalised learning feature will facilitate a managed learning environment, through online facilities.

    When you put the words children and Internet together the result sparks fear in the hearts of many parents, so readers will be relieved to learn that the content filtering and managed access in place on the machines in schools is being extended to the children’s homes.  In fact a service called ‘LGfL at Home’ will filter the home broadband service.  Parents can have a password to circumvent the filtering while children can access the online learning resources.


    Last April Digital Lifestyles looked at Kingston Communication’s collaboration with an East Yorkshire school that has led to an exciting project to engage pupils in interactive learning, both at home and in the classroom. (story link)

    London Grid for Learning

  • TV-B-Gone – Rid your world of unwanted TV

    Think of all the waiting rooms where you have had to endure mindless soaps, the bars where you have been silenced into submission by a cocktail of football or MTV – depending on which end you sit.  If you have ever wished for a gizmo that would quell the cacophony then your wish has been granted.

    A gadget cunningly disguised as a car alarm remote clandestinely switches off television sets by the simple press of a button now exists.  Get your hands on one of these and going for a pint could yet again become the social event that it was fifty years ago – before the art of conversation was subsumed by wide-eyed silence punctuated by disjointed roars.

    The gadget with the moral dimension has a name with a biblical ring – TV-B-Gone, and like the parting of the Red Sea it will silence the attention sapping scourge in any public area. When activated, the universal remote control with a mission will spend about a minute flashing out 209 different codes to turn off televisions, attacking the most popular brands first. There is an American-Asian model and a European one, using different codes.

    TV-B-Gone’s inventor Mitch Altman, who was recently interviewed by Steven Bodzin for Wired, already has a pretty impressive track record.  He wrote an Apple video game in 1977, which became a military training module, worked on virtual reality systems in VPL in the 1980’s, and more recently patented hard-drive controllers developed in his Silicon Valley data-storage maker company, 3Ware.

    TV-B-Gone has just gone on sale so perhaps unwanted ambient TV may become a thing of the past, a social pariah we will tell our grandchildren about.  Question is are the TV manufacturers going to fight back?  Or, will it be the start of a whole new battle of wits like that between the computer security industry and the hackers, spammers and virus writers?

    TV-B-Gone

  • MegaSIM could give phone SIM’s a boost

    Not so much a case of minor to major but more a case of meagre to mega, M-Systems, an Israeli company have given the humble SIM card (the 128Kb card that comes with all GSM phones, holding numbers and contacts) a serious memory boost. Exchanging the SIM for the M-Systems MegaSIM, which can be used by all 2G and 3G GSM service providers for user identification and authentication, and storing phone settings and numbers, is somewhat akin to giving Popeye a can of spinach.

    MegaSIM is a fully compatible (U)SIM (Universal Subscriber Identity Module) that will give you up to 256MB extra storage space (with higher capacities to follow) by simply changing SIM cards, making things easier for users switching devices since all data can be transferred onto a new phone in a now standard way.

    It’s only in development stage right now and will not be commercially available until the second half of 2005. It’s a first in the cellular market – a SIM card that combines high-capacity flash-based storage, with densities up to 256 Megabytes, and advanced security storage capacity to enable a variety of mobile applications.

    MegaSIM will enable mobile operators to bundle software, applications, and games on one simple secure single-chip solution. Furthermore, it will free mobile network operators and handset vendors from the need to bundle the memory cards that are used in ‘many feature’ and smart phones.

    The mobile landscape is changing as mobile handsets increase their multimedia capabilities and network speeds towards broadband. Service providers will respond to the trend by providing secure, scalable and configurable high-capacity storage. The MegaSIM card module will enable SIM card vendors to provide their mobile operator customers with a (U)SIM card enabling a variety of advanced mobile services such as MMS, MP3 and video clips downloading, full PIM functionality, and high-resolution picture storage. 

    M-Systems

  • Philips’ Connecting the Community Project

    Philips have kicked off a new project in Singapore to bring together content and service providers to equip a sample of households with broadband and connectivity products. Under the auspices of Singapore’s Infocomm Development Authority, the project will run for six months and residents will will participate in various ‘e’ services, including, Philips say, e-health, e-learning and e-security.

    Philips are particularly interested in healthcare and the company are looking at options for providing services within the consumer’s home via a broadband connection. Applications include pop-up reminders for mediation appearing on TV screens, and the company currently delivers the service through SMS.

    “We believe e-health services over broadband is one of the driving forces for establishing connected communities where patients are empowered to manage their health more effectively, and in the process help healthcare providers control costs,” said Andreas Wente, President and CEO of Philips Electronics Asia. “These personalized healthcare services would not only aim to help people with chronic conditions such as congestive heart failure manage their health more effectively, but ultimately help in maintaining a healthy digital lifestyle – for example, delivering weight management or employer health programs via a broadband enabled TV.”

    The Connecting Community project is supported by Philips’ own InnoHub test bed facility, which crates a linked environment of communication and home entertainment devices that speak to one another. The InnoHub also will function as an ‘idea management facility’ for exploring the feasibility and commercial potential of innovations.

    “This collaboration in Singapore embodies our vision of an emerging Connected Planet since it observes the daily habits and routines of normal families and, more importantly, identifies how their natural behavior responds to the latest state-of-the-art connectivity solutions,” said Cesar Vohringer, Chief Technology Officer, Philips Consumer Electronics. “Through an understanding of how these families interact not only virtually within the home but now through their communities, Philips can further realize its new brand promise by applying these discoveries in the creation of products that are advanced, easy to experience and designed around these consumers.”

    Singapore’s IDA

  • Motorola to Try Out PassPay

    Digital wallets have come a step closer with the news that Motorola will be trialling Mastercard’s PassPay service in some areas of the US by the end of the year.

    The trial will involve two new Motorola handsets, but the company has not yet announced which ones they will be. The phones will use Near Field Communications technology to enable contactless purchases with new Motorola handsets.

    Electronic purchases typically enhanced by NFC include buying travel tickets, a service already enjoyed by users in Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore.

    McDonalds and Loews Cinemas are amongst businesses that already offer PayPass services, in this case in Orlando, but the Motorola trial is expected to reach to states beyond Florida.

    Ron Hamma, vice president and director of enterprise business development at Motorola said ian a statement: “Motorola is excited to be working with MasterCard to create a phone that has the potential to be lifestyle changing, and offers a convenient, fast, and secure method of payment. In essence your phone will become your wallet, key chain and your ID. Fully integrating MasterCard PayPass technology in our phones is a natural fit and major benefit to the consumer.”

    PayPass