More streamed content suggests broadcasters see this new delivery mechanism as an important means to reach viewers, writes Julian Clover.
The survey is a classic way for public relations folks to get their client in the public eye. I didn’t see too much publicity for the Deloitte report issued ahead of last week’s Edinburgh Television Festival but the release, and a later news item from the BBC reported here over the holiday weekend, summed up the dilemma facing the legacy broadcasters at their annual get-together.
For all those that have occupied the first three or four buttons on analogue television sets it would be rather nice for everything to stay exactly as it was. No multichannel TV, no internet, YouTube or Bebo, no lost sports rights and no terrestrial HD land-grab. The problem is that Europe’s public broadcasters, particularly the BBC, but also Sweden’s SVT and the German pairing of ARD and ZDF have historically been innovators in technology.
Deloitte’s survey suggested only 4% of the UK population considered it to be “very important” to receive TV over the internet – tell that to the ISPs bleating about the drain the iPlayer is supposedly having on their networks. Don’t they want us to upgrade?
The key numbers are in the demographics, 25% of 18-24 year olds rate the importance of broadband TV, compared to 8% of the over 55s.
Then came the BBC announcement that it was to add BBC Four, CBBC and CBeebies to the existing streaming of BBC Three and BBC News. Strictly speaking all of the BBC’s national channels are now available as online streams, it’s just that Zattoo hasn’t actually agreed anything with the BBC for its relays.
The line, attributed to Director of BBC Vision (the job was previously the more understandable director of television) Jana Bennett was that “Although still a relatively new phenomenon, watching programmes online is growing”. Data from Ofcom went onto back up the premise, followed by a reminder that we need a licence fee if we are to be able to view without a knock on the door.
One of the arguments of the Deloitte study was that people prefer to have their television scheduled for them. This is exactly what the BBC is doing, but adding in a new layer of convenience. Remember those early mobile TV studies, in the days when people were apparently willing to pay £10 per month, and the accompanying level of in home viewing at times when it was inconvenient to sit down in the front room.
There are no guarantees in this industry, the enthusiasm at the near simultaneous launch of IPTV, mobile TV and HDTV had to be tempered by the prospect that not every technology that comes along will take hold in the way that its creators were expecting. Just go and ask the inventor of Betamax.
