BBC Begins Experiments With Downloadable TV

from the where's-the-P2P-component? dept

Last year, the BBC generated a lot of excitement by announcing that they were looking into ways to offer their entire archives online for free download. They even admitted they were looking into file sharing as a distribution method, to avoid killing their own bandwidth. Now, comes news that they're about to start a pilot program to offer downloadable shows from the past week. It's unclear if this is an entirely different program than what was talked about earlier. The focus is much more on programs that just went on the air, which will then immediately be available for download - and can be transferred to handheld PDAs. They see it as an alternative to using a PVR device to record shows, and compare it to the way that BBC Radio lets people download shows after they air. It's still stunning that no one else does this with TV shows. It's easy enough to include the advertising, and you pretty much guarantee that the show will be seen by more people than otherwise. The article, though, doesn't mention whether or not it will use any P2P method for distribution. If there ever were a solution that screamed out for broadcatching, this seems like a perfect one.

1 Comments | Leave a Comment..