Cellphone TV May Become A Niche Application

[Mike Temporale]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1745160,00.asp' target='_blank'>http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1745160,00.asp</a><br /><br /></div>PC Magazine has an article talking about 2005 and what it holds. While most of the article is nothing earth shattering, there are some interesting parts. The best one is this small quote on the bottom of <a href="http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1744206,00.asp">page 2.</a><br /><br /><i>"TV could become standard on many phones in 2005, but it will probably not go beyond a niche application. A September study conducted by Lyra Research of 1,361 cell-phone users found that more than half of them are not at all or not very interested in TV on a cell phone. There were "strongly negative survey comments," reports Steve Hoffenberg, Lyra's director of electronic-media research. "Concerns ranged from increasingly inconsiderate cell-phone behavior to questions about the merit of cell-phone–delivered television programming.""</i><br /><br />We've talked about watching live TV on your phone in the past, and it always gets a mixed reaction. Personally, I have no real interest in it, but I know some of you do. However, from the sounds of this survey, if you really want to see TV on your phone you're going to have to start pushing the carriers a little harder. :wink:

[Slacker]

Or check out SmartVideo (http://www.smartvideo.com) which delivers live television content directly to mobile devices including PocketPC and Windows SmartPhone devices. I have a review pending on Mobile Gadget News (http://www.mobilegadgetnews.com) which should be posted tomorrow or Friday concerning the service quality and availability.

[Mike Temporale]

Ya, we've posted about SmartVideo a number of times, and it looks promising, but I'm still not very interested in watching TV on my phone. Maybe that will change as more content becomes available. We'll have to wait and see.

Keep us posted on the review, I'm interested to hear your expereinces. :)

[John Cody]

I think that watching previously recorded tv shows (ala TivoToGo) will be a much more popular activity then watching live TV because you will be able to watch what YOU want to watch when YOU want to watch it.

Think about it, if you are sitting in your daily train commute and want to pass some time, what are the chances that something will be on live TV that you are actually interested in? I'd rather catch up watching a previously recorded episode of 24 instead of watching a repeated news loop.

In addition, watching previously recorded shows from your memory card won't require you to have "phone service" at your location or use any airtime while watching them :wink:

[Jerry Raia]

I can barely stand TV from a regular set let alone my phone.

[Santa Fe]

My phone just isn't an entertainment device. No games. No TV. Very little music. Alone in the wilds on my horse is enough entertainment for me...

[Kris Kumar]

I am hoping that this means that the 3G networks will be here sooner than we thought. And at prices we can afford.

For now, I am happy with listening to CNBC TV audio using my home Windows Media Encoder server. Hopefully some day I will be able to stream video as well.

[Slacker]

My review of SmartVideo is up. You can check it out here (http://www.mobilegadgetnews.com/modules.php?op=modload&amp;name=News&amp;file=article&amp;sid=2808&amp;mode=thread&amp;order=0&amp;thold=0).