Freeview - UK

URL: www.freeview.co.uk
Platform: DTT (DVB-T, MPEG-2, SD)
 

This UK free-to-air DTT service has been a phenomenal success and was the first deployment of MHEG-5 with over 30 million receivers now sold into the market since launch back in 2002 (Ofcom, Digital TV Report, Q1 2008). Freeview offers core interactive services that viewers – using the time-honoured lean-back approach to the television – take advantage of on a regular basis. It uses MHEG-5 to provide multiple services ranging from interactive advertising, digital teletext, healthcare information, multi-screen video selection, as well as various other “red button” enhanced TV services.

The result of this standards-based approach to interactivity is three-fold. Firstly viewers, perhaps without even truly realising it, have built interactivity into their daily TV usage patterns. Even as early as 2004, some 53 per cent of the Freeview audience used BBCi (interactive) “always-on” services.

Secondly, by using a widely supported (and hence low-cost) open standard, market forces have led to a vibrant Freeview consumer model for both set-top boxes and receivers integrated into TV sets. Boxes can now be bought for as little as £25 (approx US$50). Lastly, this means that broadcasters – the BBC is a prime example – can be confident of near 100 per cent audience reach for their value-added interactive services.