Freeview owners rule out full return path for service

net1

The operators of Freeview have dealt a blow to the iTV industry by ruling out launching a full iTV return path for the platform, which would have enabled broadcasters and entertainment firms to roll-out advanced iTV services.

Freeview is Europe's fastest growing digital terrestrial platform and has built up a customer-base of over 1.7m viewers in less than a year since the collapse of ITV Digital.

However despite hopes from the iTV sector that the BBC and Crown Castle may develop a full return-path for Freeview, NMA has learned that this is now very unlikely.

Instead the two are looking at encouraging interactivity via SMS, something that the BBC has already done successfully for a number of shows, including Fame Academy and the Six O'Clock News.

Although there have been interactive services launched on Freeview by the BBC and others, these have been fairly basic and not enhanced like those on Sky. The key reason for this has been the lack of return-path, as well as the lack of capacity within the set-top boxes.

Phil Fearnley, commercial director of BBC Technology, which is responsible for operating Freeview, said there had been internal talks on how to address the lack of interactivity and at present he felt SMS looked like a more favourable option.

'I'm not convinced this is a major problem because there are other ways of us developing a return-path and using mobile phones is a big one that we're now looking at,' he said.

Richard Adams, creative director of Yoomedia, which runs the MIE TV games channel on Freeview, said the lack of a return-path was an issue, adding that although SMS may be a temporary solution, it wouldn't totally solve the problem.

'It won't solve every issue,' he said. 'It's a proven revenue generator but it has to be used sparingly as I'm not convinced that all Freeview users want a return-path.'

rolfw

I would say that is probably the understatement of the week.

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