House of Lords calls for all channels to go online
17 replies, posted
[quote]If you have only just managed to switch your TV to digital, bad news - you may soon have to buy yet another box. A parliamentary inquiry today forecast a second wave of switchover as TV moves online.
The House of Lords says the government should begin planning for every channel to be available online to free up spectrum for services like high speed mobile phone services. 'Eventually the case for transferring the carriage of broadcast content, including public service broadcasting, from spectrum to the internet altogether will become overwhelming,' the Lords communications committee said in its report on internet infrastructure.
It comes as gadget makers around the world are turning their attention to the living room. Last week YouView boxes, which combine freeview digital TV services with on demand internet services such as iPlayer, went on sale in the UK. Apple is also rumoured to be developing a fully integrated TV, while Google already sells its own Google TV box.
For consumers, however, the choices can be overwhelming, especially just months after the country's 26m television households had to retune their sets from analogue to digital, a process that started in Cumbria over four years ago and reached London in April.
The Olympics has also seen a big increase in the number of people watching TV online. However, the report also warned that broadband would need to be improved in rural areas. 'If broadcast services move to be delivered via the internet,' said committee chair Lord Inglewood, 'then key moments in national life such as the Olympics could be inaccessible to communities lacking a better communications infrastructure.' Services such as YouView require a connection of at least 3 megabits per second. With an estimated 14% of UK homes unable to get even 2Mbps, according to telecoms watchdog Ofcom, large swathes of the population could be left out of the next phase of the TV revolution. Government targets promise only that everyone will be able to get 2Mbps by 2015, with 90% getting 24Mbps. Ed Vaizey defended the government's plans to improve speed. 'We have set ourselves a target that 90% of the country will have superfast broadband by 2015,' he told the Today programme. 'We spend more money and more time online and have a big marketplace between BT and Virgin covering two thirds of the country. 'Government intervention is needed to reach the rest. 50million will support this. 'We don't just want high speeds but a competitive market and Europe look to us as leaders in this.'
[/quote]
Read more: [url]http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2181481/House-Lords-calls-channels-online-youll-buy-box-watch-them.html#ixzz22Dvc0xNb[/url]
Good call, but they really need to update the state of the communications infrastructure first, otherwise there will be people left out. Also ISPs will need to drop those bandwidth limits which prevent you from downloading after you go over 50GB a month or something silly
They are essentially replacing TV signals with a wired service
Sounds like a backwards step to me
[QUOTE=Arsonist;37020659]They are essentially replacing TV signals with a wired service
Sounds like a backwards step to me[/QUOTE]
I think they mean use both
[QUOTE=Arsonist;37020659]They are essentially replacing TV signals with a wired service
Sounds like a backwards step to me[/QUOTE]
You never use TV signals when you're out, so what's the point in having it wireless? When there is a limited amount of spectrum available, it's better to have it used for things like mobile phone networks
fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;37021306]fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens[/QUOTE]
What about smoke signals?
There'll be plenty of smoke around to communicate with.
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;37021306]fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens[/QUOTE]
There's always carrier pigeons.
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;37021306]fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens[/QUOTE]
Mutant: "Hey guys did you hear there was a nuclear war!??"
Diseased Scraptrader: "Yup"
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;37021306]fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens[/QUOTE]
this thread is going back in time, to the cold war
fuck is this bullshit, my family crowds round the wireless every night to listen to Churchill's latest speech and you want to take that away from us
I live in the back of beyond and I'm barely able to browse the Internet let alone stream live tv at a decent quality during daylight hours. I would gladly welcome this change provided that the Internet in my area improves drastically.
I also don't understand the argument of 'freeing up' the spectrum as there are large portions of the VHF and UHF spectrum which are left without any allocation, however saying that, digital tv signals have a bandwidth of around 12 MHz which is quite substantial.
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;37021306]fun fact, non-analogue radio/television channels means we have no way of communicating if a nuclear war happens[/QUOTE]
CB radio? Even if no owns one.
[QUOTE=Hizan;37022216]I live in the back of beyond and I'm barely able to browse the Internet let alone stream live tv at a decent quality during daylight hours. I would gladly welcome this change provided that the Internet in my area improves drastically.
I also don't understand the argument of 'freeing up' the spectrum as there are large portions of the VHF and UHF spectrum which are left without any allocation, however saying that, digital tv signals have a bandwidth of around 12 MHz which is quite substantial.[/QUOTE]
I think what they're getting at is the focus on mobile networks for the future. Your TV stays in your house, it doesn't make sense to have it wireless. Instead, we can give this frequency to faster mobile networks
No thank you, I like over the air television because it uses no internet bandwidth. Also internet tv makes my connection slow down to a crawl, and the picture quality is not as good.
[QUOTE=Genericenemy;37025277]No thank you, I like over the air television because it uses no internet bandwidth. Also internet tv makes my connection slow down to a crawl, and the picture quality is not as good.[/QUOTE]
Most youtube videos I watch are in 1080p now but almost all my TV still isn't
This is excellent for us not in the UK who want to watch your shows. Just a proxy away from good tv.
[QUOTE=Genericenemy;37025277]No thank you, I like over the air television because it uses no internet bandwidth. Also internet tv makes my connection slow down to a crawl, and the picture quality is not as good.[/QUOTE]
What do you think they're asking for? 400x600 video streams down a 1mbps ADSL line?
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.