Mobile Digital TV Introduced At Last Month’s CES Conference
Mobile Digital TV
A free local mobile TV service featured on several new devices made its appearance at the CES Conference last month. There are currently 30 broadcasters in the US carrying free digital mobile television signals.
As part of a trial, between 200 and 300 people in Washington, D.C., will be carrying Samsung cell phones with Sprint service that includes free mobile digital television in the first quarter of 2010. This phone has an added telescoping antenna for TV reception and a screen with organic light-emitting diodes.
A new LG DVD player has an antenna connected to it that will carry free live digital television. You will be able to purchase it for $249.00 once it hits store shelves.
The standard was adopted in October of 2009 and test broadcasting is currently happening in several different markets. Backers of the technology are saying there are advantages to this service over previous streaming services on other devices.
AT&T Mobility and Verizon Wireless use a subscription-based service called FLO TV that delivers live broadcasts from several cable channels including MTV, ESPN, and Comedy Central. Subscriptions start as low as $15.00 a month.
Mobile DTV is different from FLO TV in that it provides local channels with traffic, weather, and sports content at no cost to the consumer. A major goal of the Washington, D.C. consumer trial is to figure out how much people are willing to spend on a device that carries TV service.
One advantage to mobile digital television is that it originates with local broadcasters, thus making the channels free to watch on your own personal device. An availability of local news could also give the mobile TV service industry a leg-up with its competitors when it becomes available to more markets later this year. CBS, NBC, PBS, Ion, and Fox have already started broadcasting on mobile devices late last summer.
