Television risks entering a disordered state where the technology is expiring before the warranties on the devices used to view the content, the chief executive of the DTG has warned.
Speaking at the organisation’s annual summit, Richard Lindsay-Davis said to date television had been something consumers expected to work for a long time, but that state was beginning to change.
“Connected TVs that were once an add on are now essential through demand for the iPlayer and other such services,” Lindsay-Davis told delegates at Kings Place in London.
“But the MHEG iPlayer will stop working from this year. What we are seeing is TV which has moved from the 40 to 50 years it started of with down to a couple of years and just 8.”
Having initially adopted the UK-specific MHEG, the new FreeviewPlay has begun to deploy the European HbbTV.
“We’re getting perilously close to the warranty period that manufacturers put in their TVs or set top boxes,” he warned.
Lindsay-Davis said there was a danger the industry could lose the critical mass that was at the centre of the launch of the DTG itself back in 1995.