[LINK] IPTv

Chris Edwards chris at chris-edwards.org
Fri Apr 16 00:53:39 AEST 2010


Hey Avi,

On 15/04/10 19:18, Avi Miller wrote:
> Here are a few screenshots I took of QI playing back at 1280x1024 on my
> Mac: http://www.flickr.com/photos/djelibeybi_au/tags/iview/

I think I'm starting to wander a little off-topic here, oops. But 
quickly, for comparison, here's a similar frame as broadcast on ABC1 
here in Melbourne, with no deinterlacing/filtering applied.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/caedwa/4522849277/

Also worth noting is that iView suffers hugely when there's any 
significant movement. I can't imagine I'd be the only one calling up to 
complain if the ABC's broadcast signal looked like the shows on iView.

iView is definitely a useful service, but it's no replacement for 
recording the original broadcast IMHO. There must be a huge number of 
50" plasma there are out there now, presumably in the target households 
for these services. SD quality barely cuts it these days..

I'm fairly sure this new FetchTV service will be much higher quality 
though. From what I"ve read, it's at least of couple of megabits a 
second per channel. The linear channels are being multicast, so there's 
no great reason not to use a decent bitrate from what I can tell.

I think the biggest problem for these services is that the government 
appears determined to do everything it can to support the existing 
networks, even if their business models are no longer viable. Just look 
at the rebates that were announced, and the anti-siphoning list. Is 
broadcasting via IP (with the help of ISPs) really more expensive than 
the licence fees for spectrum?

Chris



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