Geographic

BBC TV Listings Opened Up By Backstage Project
Punters are being invited to get all interactive with the BBC’s TV and radio schedules as part of their Backstage experiment. The call to action was trumpted at the London hosted Open Tech grass roots conference that ran at the weekend.
As we reported in May, BBC’s Backstage project gives coders, computer program writers and graphics types the opportunity to bend and twist BBC digital content into new applications or Web-based prototypes that can be shared with others.
Developers and designers are now being asked to dream up innovative ways of using TV and radio schedules via a BBC competition.
“We want people to innovate and come up with prototypes to demonstrate new ways of exploring the BBC’s TV schedule,” said backstage.bbc.co.uk project leader Ben Metcalfe.
Metcalfe suggested that those taking part might be interested in combining schedules with Web search services, using online social bookmarking managers which let people collect, organise, and share their favourite Web links easily.
He also proposed that developers might like to fiddle about with the TV schedule data mixing it with other social elements, such as recommendation systems for friends and alert systems, or combining schedules with other Web data to serve up genre-based programme searches or listings.
The BBC has already received more than 50 prototype ideas for using BBC feeds and content for non-commercial purposes since the project’s launch in May.
Backstage aims to tap into the resources of the distribution channels and knowledge networks already used by big companies such as Google and Yahoo, who were quick to realise the value of releasing content tool kits for developers to create applications with.
“Companies are waking up and realising that they need to have a conversation with their audience,” explained Mr Metcalf.
“The BBC has a good opportunity to take the lead in that, and others are realising it has its benefits too.”
The competition runs until 5 September, with the winner being invited to take the proposal forward with the BBC.
As we’d reported before, we think that Backstage is a great idea … we just wish they hadn’t used the word Remix – it’s really just a big too much, jumping on the blogging bandwagon. The idea is strong enough with having to resort do that.
BBC Backstage
25 July, 2005
UK Wi-Fi Freeloader Fined £500
A British court has fined a man £500 ($870, €720) for using a residential wireless broadband connection without permission.
In what is believed to be the first conviction of its kind in the UK, a jury at Isleworth, Middlesex court found Gregory Straszkiewicz, 24, guilty of dishonestly obtaining an electronic communications service and possessing equipment for fraudulent use of a communications service.
The case was brought under the Communications Act 2003 with the Crown Prosecution Service saying he was guilty of ‘piggybacking’ a household wireless network.
Police officers nabbed Straszkiewicz after he was spotted by locals wandering around a residential area looking for “free” net connections.
He was reported to have attempted this several times before the Old Bill invited him for a date in the cells.
In addition to the fine, Straszkiewicz was also sentenced to a 12 months conditional discharge and had his laptop confiscated.
We have to say this seems a little harsh as there appears to be no evidence that there was any hostile motive behind his actions.
Earlier this month, we reported on a Florida man being arrested for a similar offence.
It remains unclear whether mobile Wi-Fi users accidentally connecting to another party’s unsecured, unencrypted connection would risk prosecution.
The fact that many cafes and bars now offer free Wi-Fi Web access surely make it difficult to enforce this law, although there’s clearly a different case to answer when individuals are persistently wandering around residential streets with their laptops flipped open.
As ever, the solution is simple, and that’s for people running Wi-Fi connections to use the encryption tools provided.
And if you don’t know how to do that, here’s a tutorial: Wireless Home Networking, Part III – Wi-Fi Security
25 July, 2005
UK Digital TV Trial Results In – It Went Well
The long-awaited results from the Welsh Digital TV trial were published today.
The trial ran in the carefully chosen sites of Ferryside and Llansteffan, two Welsh villages either side of the River Towy (Google map, Geograph photo). The main reasons, it’s cut off as it’s surrounded by mountains and the sea.
The project started back in May 2004 with a roadshow that alerted the local residents to the intentions of the trial and to show them the range of equipment that they could choose.
Following the positive acceptance of the trial, the equipment was selected and installed and setup by residents. They were offered one of five Set Top Boxes and 2 PVR’s as replacements for their video recorders. The big difference between this trial and the full UK rollout, was that the equipment was supplied to them free of charge – something the UK government has refused to consider for the country at large.
The TV transmitter sat on the Ferryside of the River Towy serving the 475 homes and 1,200 residents that lived in both locations. The population was more elderly, retired and ill that the average UK population. Nearly 30% of the population of Ferryside were over 60.
The digital signal was switched on in November 2004, running simultaneously with current analogue for three month.
The big day of tension was on 30 March 2005 when the analogue signal was switched off. Digital-Lifestyles spoke to key members of the team during this time and learnt that it had gone remarkably smoothly, much to everyone’s delight.
The summary of the results from the 64 page document are as follows.
Transmission and Coverage – No one lost their TV service during the trial. Only three homes, which were previously in poor reception areas, could not receive the digital service and these were given a digital satellite service. Broadband was introduced during the trial and is seen as an alternative form of delivery to satellite.
Consumer Experience – Not everyone was able to install the equipment themselves but the majority of those who had trouble were able to fix problems with guidance over the phone.
Remote Control – The elderly hit problems handling additional remotes, especially those with many buttons – their preference being remotes with three functions – on/off, volume and channel change.
Aerials and Connectivity – This is where the majority of problems occurred. Digital TV needs a quality signal to work and nearly a quarter (22%) of the household had problems. Set-Top aerials (Do they still exist?) had problems, which wasn’t really a surprise.
Content – Having an EPG went down well with the residents, particular when they used it to record programs on their PVR. The trialists also enthused about the ability to receive extra TV channels – after all the major benefit to consumer if the expanded choice they will be given.
The total cost of the trial was a little short of 1 million pounds. The UK Government put up £565,000 and the broadcasters the rest, £300,000.
Many organisation worked hard to bring the trial to a successful outcome including Intellect, the trade association for the UK IT, Telecommunications and Electronics industries in the UK.
There’s going to be a lot of people letting out a sign of relief that this trial went well, and not just in the UK. Those involved feel there have been some real lessons learnt here. The harsh reality is that there a world of difference between a controlled trial in two villages in the Wales and a full scale rollout over the UK.
Digital Switchover Technical Trial at Ferryside and Llansteffan Report PDF (1.68mb)
Intellect
21 July, 2005
Champions League Broadcasters To Simulcast Matches On T’Web
Armchair football fans around Europe will soon be able to enjoy live Champion’s League matches over the Internet and mobile phones.
The European Commission has declared its intent to promote the beautiful game over a range of platforms in an attempt to mollify European commission competition authorities who want to see rights owners promoting mobile phone and Internet usage.
A spokesman at football bosses UEFA confirmed that all broadcasters showing games live would be “obliged” to screen them online simultaneously.
By linking live television rights to the Internet package, UEFA hopes to calms the fears of broadcasters who suspect that a separate online deal would cut deeply into their audience figures.
Champions League coverage in the UK is provided by BSkyB and ITV (both of whom look likely to retain their current rights), and the Internet simulcasts could provide a honey pot for new revenue streams with advertising and betting partners.
This may cause some friction with the big clubs like Man Utd and Arsenal who may be planning their own lucrative online propositions.
With media regulator Ofcom reporting that more than 8.1 million UK households now boast broadband connectivity, Internet television on demand is set to become, well, a household name.
BSkyB has already announced its commitment to IPTV – programming delivered over broadband PCs or TV sets – and from later this year, premium package subscribers will be able to access content via a Sky Sports and Sky Movies broadband service.
The service will offer 200 on-demand movies with sports junkies being able to access news, interviews and highlights (like wonderful Cardiff City goals) through the online sports channel
From 2006 the service could be offering Champions League games live, ensuring that only Sky Sports subscribers are able to log on, with non-subscribers having to fork out a pay-per-view premium.
Sky Sports
20 July, 2005
BT Doubles Broadband Entry Speeds
BT has announced that it will be doubling the speed of its entry-level broadband service.
The move was announced just hours after Wanadoo UK revealed its intention to tempt new punters with a two meg connection for just £17.99 (~€26 ~US$32) a month.
From tomorrow, all new and existing BT subscribers should be able to get 2 meg as standard, with no upgrade charges.
BT group managing director Gavin Patterson said: “Today’s announcement creates a standard of a minimum broadband speed of 2Mb for all our retail broadband services – these higher speeds open up a wealth of new possibilities for the use of broadband.”
BT’s generosity knows some bounds though, with its no frills package retaining its monthly usage limit at 1 gig.
As competition in the broadband sector heats up, customers should be able to take advantage of lower prices and faster connectivity.
This is the second free upgrade that BT has introduced, with the telecoms giant upping the speed for all of its retail broadband customers back in February.
Broadband users can calculate their current connection speeds with the handy app at ADSLguide.org.uk and check to see if their broadband speed matches their provider’s claims.
A recent informal survey on urban75.com asked over 60 subscribers to compare their broadband connection speeds using the ADSLguide Website.
I quickly learnt that not only was I paying more than most, but my BT connection was as swift as a sleepy sloth on a hot day compared to the rocket-like speeds quoted by others.
Seeing as BT has declared that the “battleground in broadband will be in differentiating services rather than price and speed as it is today”, I’ll be monitoring this upgrade very, very carefully indeed.
BT Broadband
20 July, 2005
PC Sales Soars, Apple Hits 4.7% US Market Share
The doomsayers were predicting a slow year for PC shipments, but a continuing shift to notebooks and falling PC prices have made it a bumper second quarter for the worldwide PC market, according to research companies IDC and Gartner.
IDC’s figures reveal that PC vendors have shifted 46.6 million units in the second quarter, up from 39.9 million units last year, while Gartner claims that 48.9 million PCs were shipped during the quarter, up from 42.6 million units last year.
The disparity in the figures is due to the different ways in which the companies record “white-box” shipments (lesser brand PCs sold by local distributors or resellers).
Both analysts have confirmed Apple’s zippy growth in the US market, where it has risen to become the fourth biggest PC manufacturer in the land of Budweiser.
Dell still sits proud as King Of The PC Hill in the US, with shipments growing 23.7 per cent from last year, while the company now holds 19.3 per cent of the worldwide market according to IDC.
Gartner’s figures differ again, showing Dell with 17.9 per cent of the global market.
HP remained in second place with 15.6 per cent of the market (IDC) – 14.6 per cent according to Gartner.
The company enjoyed big sales outside the US and remains the market share leader in many countries throughout Europe.
The new Lenovo-owned IBM business ranked third in worldwide shipments with 7.6 per cent of the market, while Acer impressed with a shipment growth of 62 per cent compared to last year.
Gateway and Apple grew much faster than Dell or HP in the States, coming in at third and fourth place respectively in the US market.
Boosted by their success with iPod and iTunes, Apple’s US market share reached 4.5 per cent, up from 3.7 per cent at the same time last year.
Overall, Apple’s shipments grew 37 per cent year-on-year quarter, against a worldwide industry growth of 16.6 per cent, according to IDC (14.8 per cent by Gartner’s figures).
Laptops Out Sell Desktops In US
MacWorld
19 July, 2005
Children’s GPRS Tracking Service On Sale In The UK
KidsOK, a tracking service that lets parents locate their child using a mobile phone, has gone on sale in the UK today,
Created by mTrack Services, the firm claim that they can establish the location of a mobile phone within 60 seconds.
Concerned/nosey parents can ‘ping’ their child’s mobile by sending a text message to 60777 including the child’s name (e.g. texting “ping johnny” will instruct KidsOK to identify the position of the child’s phone).
Parents will then receive a text description and map of the location where there little Johnny’s phone currently resides, accurate to within 500m in built up areas using GSM location-based technology..
Richard Jelbert, CEO and co-founder of mTrack Services, says the service will offer parents an alternative to sending “embarrassing” calls or text messages to their children while they’re out playing with their mates.
The service has been endorsed by children’s charity Kidscape and all mobile numbers are encrypted by the KidsOK servers to ensure privacy.
Parents also have to go through Home Office approved security checks during registration before they are able to use the service.
The bit that may strike fear into parents trying to foist these phones on their offspring is that fact that kids have to opt in to the KidsOK service and they can turn off the service any time they like.
Like when they want to have fun.
The KidsOK pack, retailing for £39.95 (~US$70, ~€58), will include the first year’s subscription, three handsets enabled and the first ten pings.
Parents can purchase the packs throughout the UK from outlets such as Arcadia Outfit, Comet Destination, BHS, Boots, Millets, Blacks and The Link.
Larger families can enable further handsets on payment of £4.95 p.a. per handset (~US$8.75, ~€7.25). Further ‘pings’ are purchased in bundles of 20 from KidsOK for £9.95 (~US$17.5, ~€14.5).
So far, O2, Orange, T-Mobile and Vodafone have enabled the service but presently children’s phones on Virgin and 3 cannot be located.
The service doesn’t require a PC or extra software, but parents using the service need their mobile phones to be enabled for WAP (GPRS).
mTrack Services have stated that each pack sold generates £1 towards the KidsOK Charitable Trust, providing donations to a variety of children’s charities and good causes.
KidsOK
19 July, 2005
UK Is Wi-fi Hotspot Hotshot Of Europe
A report from consultancy firm BroadGroup has revealed that the deployment of wireless hotspots in Europe have soared by 67 percent in the six months up to May 2005.
BroadGroup’s research surveyed 122 service providers in 29 countries with the UK triumphing as the hotshot hotspot of Europe, impressively boasting 34 percent of all Wi-Fi hotspots in Europe.
Wi-Fi growth has been spurred on by steadily falling access charges – albeit slowly.
Weekly subscription packages have plummeted at the fastest rate, falling over 62 percent in the first half of this year.
The study discovered that the vast majority of Wi-Fi access is bought on a pay-as-you-go basis rather than via a regular contract, with only a measly 10 percent of all access being through pre-pay deals.
As many a disgruntled transatlantic traveller may tell you, Wi-Fi access in Europe still remains considerably more pricey than the US market, although the report suggests that “price declines are continuing to trend downwards” (I think this means, “prices are going down”).
As the wireless revolution continues, other services designed for mobile workforces are also set to increase.
Industry analysts Berg Insight have predicted that mobile location-based services (LBS) will be worth € 274 million (~US$331 ~ £189) this year, with sales set for super soar-away growth as operators pile on more data-based services.
Some operators are already keen to exploit the burgeoning LBS market, with Vodafone recently introducing their Vodafone Navigator service, turning mobiles into GPS location devices with mapping technology.
A growing demand for fleet management and monitoring dispersed workforces is also expected to boost global LBS take-up.
BroadGroup
18 July, 2005
Vodafone: Women Can Use Mobile Phones Shock
With a survey that could be described as pointless fluff at best and patronising drivel at worst, Vodafone D2 have trotted out the details of their ‘Women and Mobile Phones’ market research survey.
After interviewing 1,044 female mobile phone users aged between 14 and 49, Vodafone produced the astonishing conclusion that women are informed mobile phone users who know what they want.
Gosh! Whatever next? Women like food too?
The April 2005 survey, undertaken by GfK, apparently confirmed that women are confident mobile phone users with a “sound knowledge and overview of mobile communications when buying mobile phones, using handsets and services and in many daily mobile communication applications.”
In other words, they can use mobile phones just like everyone else.
After wading through pages of the depressing minutiae contained in the report, I can reveal that one-third of women trust their own judgment when buying a phone, with the rest asking their husband, boyfriend, or a sales assistant (lesbians don’t seem to exist in this survey).
Vodafone’s survey tells us that women – just like the other half of the human race – are price conscious, with the operator’s tariff being ranked as the most important criteria (71 percent) for purchase, followed by the handset price (66 percent)
The report claimed to be “surprised” that the ‘typical female’ criterion of colour was only accorded a priority ranking of eleven out of a total of sixteen criteria.
Predictably, the most used functions were text messages (92 percent), alarm clock function (72 percent), calendar (56 percent) and ring tones (50 percent).
Neatly half of women use the camera on their phone with 37 percent of respondents citing the provision of Bluetooth for wireless data transfer as important.
In another startlingly obvious conclusion, the survey reveals that games are used most frequently by the 14-19 years age group, and that camera, video and music functions are becoming “increasingly popular.”
Wow. I bet you didn’t know that.
The report seems almost disappointed that the ladies weren’t lining up to register their approval of pretty pink phones with sparkly bits on, with half of all respondents stating that mobile phone accessories are unnecessary ‘fashion gimmicks.’
Plumbing the absolute depths of irrelevant detail, the survey found that more than half of the women said that their favourite place for making mobile calls is a comfortable sofa, with 43 percent sitting on the patio or balcony and 31 percent preferring to make calls in bed. Fascinating stuff!
There’s even a bit at the end where the report tries to link the impact of mobiles on relationships between men and women, but we’d just about lost the will to live by then.
And so the report drones on in a never-ending stream of dreary stats of little consequence to anyone – and with no comparative stats for men’s mobile phone usage, this survey is not only one of the dullest we’ve ever read (and boy, we’ve seen some corkers!), it’s completely meaningless too.
Vodafone survey
15 July, 2005
SMS Usage Rises In The US
Us in UK-land have long been fans of SMS messaging, with button-pushing Brits banging out 3 million text messages every hour, with 2.5 billions text being sent in January 2005 alone.
In the States, it’s a different story, where network inoperability has held back the medium, but new figures show that SMS is finally make an impact in the USA, as messaging soared 59% last year.
The figures emerged in the June 2005 edition of Informa Telecoms & Media’s World Cellular Data Metrics, which pointed out that the value of the US mobile data market has increased by around 80 percent.
Total revenues from non-voice services for the four biggest US mobile operators roared up to more than USD 1.2 billion in Q1 2005, compared to a comparatively miserly USD 689 million in the same period of 2004.
Kester Mann, Senior Research Analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media has the answers: “Interoperability is fundamental to the success of messaging and has been the key limiting factor to SMS usage in the States in the past.”
“The near 60% increase in traffic last year would not have been possible if subscribers could have sent SMS only within their own networks”, he added, sagely.
GSM operator T-Mobile was particularly chuffed with its performance as its customers belted out a total of 3.6 billion messages during Q1 2005 – that works out at around 67 texts per subscription per month.
This total is more than double last year’s volume, and SMS traffic looks set to rise as operators like T-Mobile roll out attractively priced “unlimited texting” tariffs.
Just like in Europe, texting in the US has also been boosted by cheesy TV shows offering interaction via SMS.
“Thanks largely to SMS, data now typically contributes 6-10% of mobile operators’ total revenues in the States,” mulled Mr Mann, manfully.
“While this still remains some way below the industry average, it marks a significant increase from the 4% recorded this time last year and less than 2% at the beginning of 2003,” he added.
US text traffic still has a long way to go until it matches Western European levels – where non-voice services form an average of 15-16% of mobile operators’ revenues – and is unlikely to top the 48% of revenue generated by SMS-smitten Filipinos.
And while we’re in the mood to throw around some SMS-related facts, get a load of this UK selection, courtesy of text.it:
On New Year’s Day 2003, the number of text messages sent in one day topped one hundred million for the first time, and on New Year ‘s Day 2004, the daily total reached 111 million messages
On New Year’s Day 2005, the highest daily total ever recorded by the Mobile Data Association was reached, when 133 million messages were sent
UK text message figures for January 2005 topped 2.5 billion, with 2.4 billion sent in December 2004 and 2.2 billion for November 2004
92 million text messages were sent by Britons on Valentine’s Day 2005, compared to the estimated 12 million cards sent.
15 July, 2005