BT to Offer TV-on-Demand via Broadband

http://media.guardian.co.uk/city/sto...167284,00.html

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law
(Moore's Law states that CPU speeds double every couple of years), so if
that continues over the next decade (and from what I've read it is
likely to) then TV-on-demand via broadband becomes a feasible
alternative to digital TV. I for one hope it succeeds so that Sky have
some competition in the premium-content arena.

--
Steve - http://www.digitalradiotech.co.uk/ - Digital Radio News & Info

DAB sounds worse than Freeview, digital satellite, cable, broadband
internet and FM

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:15:00 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law

How do you work that one out? The fastest consumer service you could
get two years ago was 2Mbit, and today its still the same, and still
too expensive.
--
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Help make Usenet a better place: English is read downwards,
please don't top post. Trim messages to quote only relevent text.
Check groups.google.com before asking a question.

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:31:34 +0000, Andrew [email protected] wrote:

| On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:15:00 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
| wrote:
|
| Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law
|
| How do you work that one out? The fastest consumer service you could
| get two years ago was 2Mbit, and today its still the same, and still
| too expensive.

In c1970 I worked on a time shared PDP8 half the country away at 300bps,
and paper tape storage.

In c1979 I was at uni and we were given a comunications coursework, with a
choice modems up to 4800bps. I got an A by using a *cutting edge* modem
with 9600bps.

Now ....

Hardly Moores Law but quite a speed improvement.

Dave F

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:49:41 +0000, Dave Fawthrop
wrote:

In c1970 I worked on a time shared PDP8 half the country away at 300bps,
and paper tape storage.

In c1979 I was at uni and we were given a comunications coursework, with a
choice modems up to 4800bps. I got an A by using a *cutting edge* modem
with 9600bps.

But the OP specified broadband which I don't think your acoustic
coupler (those were the days!) or 9600 modem qualifies as.
--
Andrew. To email unscramble & remove spamtrap.
Help make Usenet a better place: English is read downwards,
please don't top post. Trim messages to quote only relevent text.
Check groups.google.com before asking a question.

Andrew wrote:
On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:15:00 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law

How do you work that one out? The fastest consumer service you could
get two years ago was 2Mbit, and today its still the same, and still
too expensive.


Maybe not as quickly as Moore's Law, but historically it's gone up
pretty quickly. The modem connection speeds I've used are as follows:

1995 - 33.6kbps
199? - 56kbps
2003 - 512kbps

so in 8 years it's gone up by a factor of 512/33.6 = 15.23. I've seen
different definitions of Moore's Law, but one definition is doubling
speed every 2 years, and increasing by 15.23 in 8 years is actually very
close to Moore's Law:

33.6 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 = 537.6kbps

For me to keep up with Moore's Law I'd have to get a 2Mbps broadband
connection by 2007, which I'd say is almost a certainty.


--
Steve - http://www.digitalradiotech.co.uk/ - Digital Radio News & Info

DAB sounds worse than Freeview, digital satellite, cable, broadband
internet and FM

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 17:04:31 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Andrew wrote:
On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:15:00 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law

How do you work that one out? The fastest consumer service you could
get two years ago was 2Mbit, and today its still the same, and still
too expensive.


Maybe not as quickly as Moore's Law, but historically it's gone up
pretty quickly. The modem connection speeds I've used are as follows:

1995 - 33.6kbps
199? - 56kbps
2003 - 512kbps

so in 8 years it's gone up by a factor of 512/33.6 = 15.23. I've seen
different definitions of Moore's Law, but one definition is doubling
speed every 2 years, and increasing by 15.23 in 8 years is actually very
close to Moore's Law:

33.6 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 = 537.6kbps

For me to keep up with Moore's Law I'd have to get a 2Mbps broadband
connection by 2007, which I'd say is almost a certainty.

The only problem with your calculation is that you are working it
through based on the speed YOU were using, not the maximum speed which
was available.

--


Moldy

"Then you have the low-carb dieters. This involves the active avoidance of
life-giving antioxidants while scarfing massive amounts of known carcinogens
until someone punches you to death for bragging about how much weight you
lost." - Scott Adams

Moldy wrote:
On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 17:04:31 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Andrew wrote:
On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 16:15:00 -0000, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
wrote:

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law

How do you work that one out? The fastest consumer service you could
get two years ago was 2Mbit, and today its still the same, and still
too expensive.


Maybe not as quickly as Moore's Law, but historically it's gone up
pretty quickly. The modem connection speeds I've used are as follows:

1995 - 33.6kbps
199? - 56kbps
2003 - 512kbps

so in 8 years it's gone up by a factor of 512/33.6 = 15.23. I've seen
different definitions of Moore's Law, but one definition is doubling
speed every 2 years, and increasing by 15.23 in 8 years is actually
very close to Moore's Law:

33.6 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 = 537.6kbps

For me to keep up with Moore's Law I'd have to get a 2Mbps broadband
connection by 2007, which I'd say is almost a certainty.

The only problem with your calculation is that you are working it
through based on the speed YOU were using, not the maximum speed which
was available.


If you use the maximum speed available then where do you draw the line
with cost? I'm sure that if someone had the money they could have had
some stupidly expensive link installed just for surfing the net at home
even in 1995, although if you remember back to 1995 then the web was so
frigging slow that it would have been a bit of a waste of time.

So using relatively inexpensive, widely available possibilities then
back in 1995 ISDN at 128kbps would probably have been the state of the
art above which things would become unfeasibly expensive. In 2003, I
dunno, would you say 2 Mbps would be state of the art broadband speed
while still being affordable? That makes the increase in speed by a
factor of 2000/128 = 15.623, which almost exactly the same as
512k/33.6k.

Anyway, if you want to prove me wrong then provide some figures. It's
far too easy just to criticise people without providing any figures to
back up your claims.


--
Steve - http://www.digitalradiotech.co.uk/ - Digital Radio News & Info

DAB sounds worse than Freeview, digital satellite, cable, broadband
internet and FM

http://media.guardian.co.uk/city/sto...167284,00.html

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law
(Moore's Law states that CPU speeds double every couple of years), so
if that continues over the next decade (and from what I've read it is
likely to) then TV-on-demand via broadband becomes a feasible
alternative to digital TV. I for one hope it succeeds so that Sky have
some competition in the premium-content arena.

BT years behind as usaul.
homechoice already offer this service in some areas. almost 1000 films on
demand, similar amount of music videos etc etc.

DAB sounds worse than FM wrote:
http://media.guardian.co.uk/city/sto...167284,00.html

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law
(Moore's Law states that CPU speeds double every couple of years), so if
that continues over the next decade (and from what I've read it is
likely to) then TV-on-demand via broadband becomes a feasible
alternative to digital TV. I for one hope it succeeds so that Sky have
some competition in the premium-content arena.


Any chance of posting the article, I can't see it (something about
needing a subscription).

I guess if they can get away with 4Mbps MPEG-2 on freeview, then with
something like VC-9 or H.264 the same sort of quality should be possible
over 2 or even 1 Mbps ADSL

Ben wrote:
DAB sounds worse than FM wrote:
http://media.guardian.co.uk/city/sto...167284,00.html

Broadband bandwidth is going up at a similar rate to Moore's Law
(Moore's Law states that CPU speeds double every couple of years),
so if that continues over the next decade (and from what I've read
it is likely to) then TV-on-demand via broadband becomes a feasible
alternative to digital TV. I for one hope it succeeds so that Sky
have some competition in the premium-content arena.


Any chance of posting the article, I can't see it (something about
needing a subscription).

I guess if they can get away with 4Mbps MPEG-2 on freeview, then with
something like VC-9 or H.264 the same sort of quality should be
possible over 2 or even 1 Mbps ADSL


They mention DVD-quality, and so using one of the newer codecs I assume
that'll be about 3 Mbps?

Here's the article:


BT to offer TV and movie hits online

Owen Gibson
Thursday March 11, 2004

Telecoms giant BT today unveiled ambitious plans to boost subscriptions
to high-speed broadband services, including taking on pay-TV companies
with 'video on demand' television shows, including hit ITV series The
Bill.
Under the proposals, broadcasters and movie studios will be able to
deliver a huge library of television shows and films to broadband users
at a quality equivalent to digital TV or DVD.

Although BT again insisted it would never become a content provider to
rival the BBC or BSkyB, it claimed its new BT Rich Media suite of
products would make it much easier for broadcasters to offer
pay-per-view services to its subscribers.

It has already sealed a deal with Fremantle to show episodes of The Bill
on a pay-per-view basis and said it had 31 other major deals in the
pipeline with UK and US broadcasters in the pipeline.

For a monthly fee, BT will handle the distribution of the content and,
through its Click & Buy service, charge customers subscription fees or
one-off payments to their credit card or BT bill. It said it could also
boost the speed of the network when showing paid-for broadcast content
so the picture is equivalent to DVD quality.

The chief executive of BT Retail, Pierre Danon, said the monthly charge
could be as little as £100 in an effort to persuade community channels,
regional services, special interest groups and even local football teams
to broadcast over the internet.

He insisted broadband lines would eventually deliver video on demand
directly to subscribers' television sets. "It is technologically already
possible, so I don't see why we wouldn't do it," said Mr Danon.

Andrew Burke, the director of online services at BT Retail, said the
move would make broadband complementary rather than competitive with
pay-TV services from cable and Sky.

"If you want video on demand you'll be broadband and if you want
broadcast TV you'll go to pay-TV," he said.

The move ties in with another BT initiative unveiled today, allowing its
broadband subscribers to upgrade the speed of their service at any time
and, if they subscribe to the basic £19.99 a month product, purchase
extra chunks of access.

Rather than charging a high fixed monthly fee, BT anticipates slowly
migrating its customers to a pay-as-you-go model, where they will pay a
low fixed fee plus extra occasional charges to boost the speed of the
service to watch films or download software.

The flexible bandwidth service is due to begin trials next month and is
expected to launch before the end of the year.

The move is also a response to increased competition from other internet
service providers. Unlike other European markets, where the incumbent
telco dominates, BT has around four in 10 connections in the UK, with
the rest split between 350 other ISPs.

This is fuelling downward pressure on prices and an explosion in
services. Tiscali announced yesterday it planned to undercut BT's
premium 1Mb service by £8 and offer high-speed broadband access for
£29.99 a month. It also launched a new service to match BT's £19.99
offer.

BT, which has 2 million broadband subscribers over its lines, has
promised shareholders that it will have 5 million by 2006 and said
today's announcements were designed to appeal to those who saw no reason
to upgrade. Including cable subscribers, there are now more than 3.5
million broadband connections in the UK.

"This is the second stage of the broadband revolution in the UK and we
aim to drive it forward. Today's announcement underlines our
determination to continue innovating to ensure broadband develops a
'must-have' appeal for millions more households throughout the UK," said
Mr Danon.

In partnership with US internet giant Yahoo!, with whom it last year
launched the BT Yahoo Broadband ISP, it is also launching a new service
called BT Communicator that will integrate instant messaging, email,
text messaging and the ability to make phone calls over the internet to
any fixed line or mobile phone through a PC.

If the call is made to another PC with BT Communicator then it will be
free, but calls to fixed line phones and mobiles will be charged at the
standard national rate. The service will also allow users to make video
calls.

Gavin Patterson, the former managing director of Telewest's consumer
division who joined BT earlier this year as managing director of BT's
consumer and ventures division, said the new innovations would allow
consumers to have more choice and flexibility in mixing the broadband
services they wanted.

"In a marketplace with more than 80 million customers you need more than
one front to fight on and compete in. There are several dimensions you
can combine and in doing so you can provide more focused and targeted
solutions to customers," he said.



--
Steve - http://www.digitalradiotech.co.uk/ - Digital Radio News & Info

DAB sounds worse than Freeview, digital satellite, cable, broadband
internet and FM