Industry thought leaders shaping the next steps of IPTV
Background
Back in 2002 some people got together in what was light-heartedly called DwA ("Dances with Alps"), a think tank around the key issues of IPTV: the acquisition and monetization of relevant content.
A lot has happened since. IPTV has become mainstream. Content acquisition still needs to be done with care but is no longer the issue.
No reason for complacency though. There are new challenges.
The infamous "bandwidth threshold" that historically prohibited network-agnostic video services has steadily come down for broadband IP. This has fostered the development of many new broadband entertainment services alongside IPTV. Community services, user-generated content, electronic-sell-through, targeted advertising,...
Broadband operators can not afford to close their eyes as to how to embrace and monetize these new waves.... Hence "time for IPTV 2.0...back to the Alps!" ...
Objective & form factor
It is not the intent to reinvent the existing forums or to initiate parallel standardization. However, history has proven there is huge value in the right individuals incubating the highly due next steps.
Meetings
March 21-22 2007 senior representatives of broadband service providers, content aggregators, network infrastructure providers, consumer electronics providers, application integrators and UI developers kicked off the work on the following topics:
- How is "IPTV1.0" not living up to business expectations in terms of openness, flexibility and reliability?
- How to leverage over-the-top delivery models as IPTV operator
- How to rapidly implement new business models and service ergonomics across horizontal consumer devices
- How to monetize communities, user-generated content and targeted advertising
- How to generate revenue from an open B2B platform alongside an IPTV walled garden
The resulting workshop material is available to the participating companies in the members section.
Next Steps
The following streams will be further explored in the coming months with an objective to provide concrete and action-oriented guidance to the IPTV industry:
- Best practices for UI and service ergonomics
- Recommending long-tail content in a sellable way
- Interactivity: quick win service templating for IPTV
- Client architectures to drive a horizontal market approach to customer premises devices
- Over-the-top delivery: how to leverage and monetize as an IPTV service provider
The next workshop is planned early June.
Joining the initiative
While it is obviously the easiest to create vision and direction in a confined group, the objective is not a closed club and companies are definitely encouraged to apply for membership.
