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Internet
Television
To Watch TV Online
Internet
Television (or Internet TV) is defined as television distributed
through the Internet.
In other words, using the internet to
send programs to your TV.
Viewers are offered a
library of shows from which to choose.
The basic model is the
streaming Internet TV or selectable video on an Internet location,
which is generally a website.
Watching television
via the Internet uses services based on two different models
as described below.
Free Model
To
enhance viewership, and in turn add revenue, as well as protect market
share, a majority of programmers have started
streaming content live on the Internet.
- This
model is very efficient as the multicasting protocol and is relatively
less costly.
- The model is in use for "over the air"
broadcasting for a long period of time.
- Those who
have a broadband connection and the right free media player can view
television from all around the world.
- Programs are viewed through an Internet
television "portal". These portals have links to
live feeds and built-in viewers.
- The live television streams are free.
- It
is still a work in progress.
A majority of portals
are supported by ad revenue. Those who created
interesting video products have the chance to distribute these to a
very large audience.
This was unimaginable with the
earlier television
distributing models as they had closed software, hardware and network.
The free model is used all throughout the world by local and
independent television channels.
The objective is to create a platform
for citizens media or build a collaborative environment for media
production or to target particular audiences.
Subscription
Model
This
model is funded and supported by huge telecom providers.
It
has considerable competition from cable providers and broadcast
networks.
- It is based on a subscription
fee.
- It continues the cable,
satellite or terrestrial pay per view system.
- New
features like digital
video recording, video on demand and high definition TV are added in
this model.
The
leader in implementing the Internet TV services has been Europe
and Asia. In the United States, this technology has not been
well
received.
The reason is that most of the popular programmers are owned
by major cable providers. These cable companies have a
monopoly in owning and selling
programs.
Internet television is a good substitute, however, to cable TV in
nations which have a poor cable infrastructure such as in India and
China.
Currently Internet Television relies on a direct link
between the server and the client. For this, the more
expensive unicast model has to be used to provide paid television.
In
the United States, several companies are in the process of creating and
providing a “cafeteria style” Internet television service.
Users
would be able to subscribe to channels on an individual basis. Thus,
there would be no need to buy an expensive entertainment package.
The
content reaches the end user through the unicast method. This model has
the
challenge of collecting an enough number of programs to the
portal. After this is done it becomes possible to buy a large
number of
streaming services (bandwidth) at practical prices.
For
additional broadband tv
related issues, such as the Internet
television section here, please check out the
following topics: broadband
technology,
live news video,
streaming
stock quotes and streaming
television.
And
for more streaming media
info, don't
forget to visit the streaming
media hosting, streaming
server,
online
video sharing, video
teleconference, video
webcasting and digital
media sections.
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