BSkyB/Pace boxes now availible. Better pictures, better sounds, and a whole lot more to come......................................
Connected: Service at the touch of an 'i' button Interactive TV On the day that digital television is launched, Penelope Ody explains how viewers will become shoppers, with on-screen ads tailor-made for them
The Daily Telegraph London
With BSkyB's digital broadcasts and offerings like BBC Choice now a reality, television is no longer a passive medium for the couch potato - it's interactive and your remote television controller will never be the same again.
The boffins have tried hard. Even those of us who have trouble programming the video should cope with a button on the television hand-set labelled "interactive" and most of us will, with luck, be able to press numbered keys in the right order. Digital television, launched today, is not just about better sound and pictures, it's about interaction - about accessing a bewildering array of goods and services from the comfort of the domestic sofa with user-friendly systems that demand absolutely no computer skills whatever.
Those new set-top boxes, now on sale for pounds 199, not only decode the digital television broadcasts, they contain a modem which will connect viewers (via a standard telephone connection) directly to the DTV network to log brochure requests, book holidays, or make an appointment to test-drive cars.
As the system develops, it will also allow shoppers to visit electronic stores, buy goods seen on soap operas, holidays featured in travel documentaries, or move directly from a television programme to the sponsor's or advertiser's website using the television network's built-in Internet link.
Eventually there'll be online banking and you'll be able to download electronic cash via the television set.
Over the next few weeks adverts will be the first to get the interactive treatment. A whirling icon in a corner will tell the viewer that there's more to this one than meets the eye, and pressing a three-digit code or the interactive button will take the viewer to a menu of options - for example, 1 for a free brochure; 2 to "bookmark" the page to return to later; 3 for a screen full of text information about the product, or perhaps 4 to arrange that test drive or a follow-up telephone call from a sales rep.
"Initially the scheme will only involve advertisers," says Sam Eaton, spokeswoman for British Interactive Broadcasting, which is handling all interactive options for BSkyB, "but there's no reason why it couldn't also apply to programme sponsors as well."
BIB will start full operations early next year with its own dedicated channel offering a mix of shopping, banking, horoscopes, sports and entertainment information, all accessed via the keypad. Although partly owned by BSkyB, the company hopes to be able to broadcast via terrestrial and cable DTV networks as well as the Sky satellite. Over the next few weeks BIB will start to release the names of those retailers who will be involved in the first teleshopping programmes. Around 20 to 25 high street brands are expected to join. Companies that have already created prototype and well-publicised presentations for BIB include Sainsbury's, Comet, HMV, and GUS (as Shoppers' Universe).
With more than 95 per cent of the country's 22 million homes possessing at least one television set, compared with around two million with PC access, the electronic-marketeers can barely contain their excitement at the prospect of electronic shopping going mass market.
It may not be quite so simple. Television is, after all, a passive medium and is treated by many as little more than background noise. "The big challenge will be to stimulate the viewers," says Philip Blackwell, ecommerce director at consultant Cap Gemini, "and reach targeted consumers. The upside of being able to press a button for more information is a better response to ads, the downside is that some people will simply order everything in sight as a novelty."
But while interactive ads or dedicated shopping channels are hardly revolutionary, the longer-term possibilities for interactive television, as the technology matures and expands, are endless. Already there is talk of shopping offers related to programme content where viewers will not only be able to call up details of items on the screen, but will also be able to place orders - you're watching the broadcast gig, then simply press "interactive" for details of the band's recordings or to order a t-shirt.
BIB's marketing director, Nick Mercer, also talks of "day parting" with retail offers varied through the day to reflect the changing viewing audience.
In the longer term he predicts such developments as a sports channel which might allow viewers to move between watching a real match, participating in a "fantasy football" game, visiting the club shop to make purchases, or simply requesting more information about players, records and techniques. "Viewers," says Mercer, "will be able to drift between all these activities as they choose."
DTV marketing consultant Ian Johnson believes that spin-off sales from long-established soap operas will be another boom area - "TV programmes could use iTV to sell related products associated with a TV show," he says.
However, the ability to order a Teletubby or similar toddler's "must-have" direct from the screen during the programme is a prospect which not every parent will relish.
With viewers' responses monitored via the central network, it will also be possible to match advertising broadcasts to consumer preferences very precisely, so that instead of beaming the standard commercial to millions of homes, the ad could simply be sent to those viewers most likely to be interested.
Delivering such prime prospects would obviously provide the television broadcasters with a profitable revenue stream - although data protection bodies and anyone worried about privacy issues may be less enthusiastic.
With programme sponsorship already greying the boundaries between "advertising" and "editorial" the vexed question of "product placement" could also become an issue in future. How long before we simply have to click "interactive" as Inspector Morse downs his pint to head straight to the programme sponsor's website, ready order a home-delivery six-pack.
(Copyright 1998 (c) The Telegraph plc, London)
|
