Tag: BBC

Article

UK to launch a free-to-air TV service that can be delivered by Internet in addition to terrestrial and satellite RF means

Britain’s Broadcasters Prep New Free Live TV Service via Broadband – ISPreview UK

From the horse’s mouth

Everyone TV (formerly Digital UK)

New service from UK public service broadcasters will deliver live free TV via IP (Press Release)

My Comments

The United Kingdom, a country associated with a long tradition of free-to-air broadcast TV, is now working towards an Internet-based free-to-air TV service.

This service, to be known as Freely, is a follow-on from the Freeview digital terrestrial TV and Freesat digital satellite TV platform and is to extend the traditional free-to-air TV service to IP (Internet Protocol) bearers like your Internet service and home network. It is being facilitated by Everyone TV, formerly known as Digital UK and behind Freeview and Freesat, who represents the established UK free-to-air TV broadcasters i.e. BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5.

The intention is to have this support both linear and on-demand content services for FTA TV, as well as maintaining the traditional TV viewing experience as we have known it. The articles talked more of Freely being offered via fixed-line broadband Internet but mentioned that they could be offered by mobile broadband.

It could even be about watching BBC1 on a convertible laptop like this Dell Inspiron 2-in-1 convertible laptop without the need of a TV tuner dongle

A question that can easily come up is what will be provided for as the “best case” scenario for picture and sound quality? This could be HD, Full HD, 4K UHD or HDR, but there wasn’t any talk about a “best case” soundmix like stereo, 5.1 surround or object-based Dolby Atmos surround that will be used for TV-content sound.

Another question that will come up is whether the Freely setup will be about an Internet-only setup or to combine the Freeview terrestrial / Freesat satellite RF-delivery platforms. This is even though 15% of UK TV households use Internet-only means for receiving their TV content and, most likely nowadays, the Internet is used as a means to bring TV to secondary locations. But there is a desire in the UK to preserve the terrestrial TV service delivered via the aerial as something accessible for all.

The Freely service is expected to be launched in 2024 and there is a desire to integrate this functionality in to the next generation of smart TVs sold in to the UK market. There will also be the issue of whether apps that work with connected TV, games console, mobile or desktop operating systems will be created for Freely. This is because these platforms like Chromecasts, Apple TVs, iPads or laptops are being used for online TV consumption.

I also see this as something that Australia and New Zealand could be observing due to their free-to-air TV culture, with a brand that could be used for Internet-delivered FTA TV. This could even be used as a brand for a pure Internet-delivered free-to-air TV service by any of these companies.

But I am also pleased about the proposed Freely service being the first effort towards Internet-delivered free-to-air TV in English-speaking countries who have a strong free-to-air TV and public-service broadcasting culture.

Articles

The news services that appear on the “screen of respect” that is main TV screen like the ABC are often seen as being “of respect” and all the screen text is part of their identity

TNI steps up fight against disinformation  | Advanced Television

News outlets will digitally watermark content to limit misinformation | Engadget

News Organizations Will Start Using Digital Watermarks To Combat Fake News |Ubergizmo

My Comments

The Trusted New Initiative are a recently formed group of global news and tech organisations, mostly household names in these fields, who are working together to stop the spread of disinformation where it poses a risk of real-world harm. It also includes flagging misinformation that undermines trust the the TNI’s partner news providers like the BBC. Here, the online platforms can review the content that comes in, perhaps red-flagging questionable content, and newsrooms avoid blindly republishing it.

.. as well as their online presence – they will benefit from having their imagery authenticated by a TNI watermark

One of their efforts is to agree on and establish an early-warning system to combat the spread of fake news and disinformation. It is being established in the months leading up to the polling day for the US Presidential Election 2020 and is flagging disinformation were there is an immediate threat to life or election integrity.

It is based on efforts to tackle disinformation associated with the 2019 UK general election, the Taiwan 2020 general election, and the COVID-19 coronavirus plague.

Another tactic is Project Origin, which this article is primarily about.

An issue often associated with fake news and disinformation is the use of imagery and graphics to make the news look credible and from a trusted source.

Typically this involves altered or synthesised images and vision that is overlaid with the logos and other trade dress associated with BBC, CNN or another newsroom of respect. This conveys to people who view this online or on TV that the news is for real and is from a respected source.

Project Origin is about creating a watermark for imagery and vision that comes from a particular authentic content creator. This will degrade whenever the content is manipulated. It will be based around open standards overseen by TNI that relate to authenticating visual content thus avoiding the need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to developing any software for this to work.

One question I would have is whether it is only readable by computer equipment or if there is a human-visible element like the so-called logo “bug” that appears in the corner of video content you see on TV. If this is machine-readable only, will there be the ability for a news publisher or broadcaster to overlay a graphic or message that states the authenticity at the point of publication. Similarly, would a Web browser or native client for an online service have extra logic to indicate the authenticity of an image or video footage.

I would also like to see the ability to indicate the date of the actual image or footage being part of the watermark. This is because some fake news tends to be corroborated with older lookalike imagery like crowd footage from a similar but prior event to convince the viewer. Some of us may also look at the idea of embedding the actual or approximate location of the image or footage in the watermark.

There is also the issue of newsrooms importing images and footage from other sources whose equipment they don’t have control over. For example, an increasing amount of amateur and videosurveillance imagery is used in the news usually because the amateur photographer or the videosurveillance setup has the “first images” of the news event. Then there is reliance on stock-image libraries and image archives for extra or historical footage; along with newsrooms and news / PR agencies sharing imagery with each other. Let’s not forget media companies who engage “stringers” (freelance photographers and videographers) who supply images and vision taken with their own equipment.

The question with all this, especially with amateur / videosurveillance / stringer footage taken with equipment that media organisations don’t have control over is how such imagery can be authenticated by a newsroom. This is more so where the image just came off a source like someone’s smartphone or the DVR equipment within a premises’ security room. There is also the factor that one source could tender the same imagery to multiple media outlets, whether through a media-relations team or simply offering it around.

At least Project Origin will be useful as a method to allow the audience to know the authenticity and provenance of imagery that is purported to corroborate a newsworthy event.

Article

Amazon Echo and similar voice-driven assistants will end up being able to provide voice-driven interactive storytelling

BBC launches interactive voice drama for Amazon Alexa devices | CNet News

My Comments

Any of you who have lived in the UK or other British Commonwealth countries will be familiar with the BBC’s long-time expertise with radio plays. Examples of these include the unforgettable humour of the Goons or the long-evolving countryside drama that is the Archers. If you didn’t hear it on the BBC, you may have heard one of these dramas via a resource available through the Internet or a local public radio station syndicated one or more of the BBC radio plays, making it available to hear through your trusty radio. These are essentially comedy and drama that is delivered through an audio-only medium.

But the BBC are combining this old-time craft of theirs and the concept of the “Choose Your Own Adventure” books to provide an interactive audio drama that you effectively participate in using, at the moment, the Amazon Alexa platform.  “The Inspection Chamber” is a science fiction comedy where you effectively are playing the “extra character” in the show to steer its plot.

It will also be very similar to those text-based adventure games made available through mainframe computers and early home-computer platforms but this effort will be about having a wider vocabulary and natural-language handling.

But I see this as a way to take voice-driven assistants further in the direction of providing entertainment in the form of “Choose Your Own Adventure” interactive storytelling. This could lead to other radio-drama houses and, to some extent, education / training environments taking this concept further to provide voice-driven interactive stories, such as to provide scenario-driven training or language learning.

Article

A laptop of the Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming class could end up as today’s equivalent of an outside-broadcast link truck if the BBC has its way

BBC livestreaming Edinburgh festival from a laptop | CNet

From the horse’s mouth

BBC

IP Studio whitepaper

My Comments

If you watch news, sports, live concerts or similar content on TV, you will be seeing location broadcasting at work as they bring that footage to your screen.

Typically, a location broadcast that any TV studio does either required the use of video recordings that were transported to the studio before broadcast. Or they relied on a “link truck” which is a vehicle equipped with an antenna that beamed the location signal back to the studio using a microwave link if the idea is to allow the studio access to real-time vision. Some regular venues that are regular sources of content may implement a wired connection facilitated by a leased line between that venue and the studio.

Such setups have been limited by the amount of time required to locate the link truck and establish these radio links. This can also be limited through factors like weather or making sure of a line-of-sight connection to the studio’s link tower.

But the Internet and the size of computer technology has opened up the possibility of a laptop of the same or better calibre as the Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming I recently reviewed connected to a high-bandwidth Internet connection as an alternative to the traditional location broadcast setup, especially for shows directly streamed to the Internet. The technology which is called IP Studio is part of an effort that Auntie Beeb is taking towards implementing IP technology for TV-show production. In this context, it is about being able to use a mobile wireless network to interconnect the cameras to the laptops for location broadcasting.

Here, they are using the Edinburgh Festival and Edinburgh Fringe Festival to prove a setup based around laptops that are uplinking to the Internet via the same kind of technology used for Internet service. The editing software that is being used is primarily a Web-app which works in the browser rather than a standalone app. But it could allow for the link-van approach where a laptop is used to upload the edited vision to the broadcaster’s studio to be inserted in to the program.

Once it is proven, the BBC’s IP Studio technology which is based primarily on open-source tools, could be seen as beneficial for all sorts of broadcasters who want to save money and set-up / tear-down time on and see increased flexibility with their location work. For example, news-gathering teams could be able to set up and “go live” on that breaking event or press conference with a very short lead-time.

The same technology could open up affordable location-broadcasting technology to community broadcasters and specific-event Webcasters who place importance on cost-effective setups. Even organisations who have video-editing talent in their staff or volunteer collection could see this technology appeal to them.

What this is showing is that the Internet and cost-effective computer design is making big-time broadcasting and production technology more affordable.

This year, the UK election has become a “cliffhanger” election with all the sagas concerning government “sleaze” and expenses rorts. There is even a lot of speculation about a “hung parliament” existing in Westminster. It is now easy to monitor this count from wherever you are in the world with your computer and / or your Internet radio.

The BBC offer the best resources for this information. Their news.bbc.co.uk Web site is running an always-updated “dashboard” view with bar graphs for each party and a voting map for the whole of the country. You can delve further to monitor your electorate or an electorate that is critical to the election.

If you tune your Internet radio to BBC Radio 4 or find this station using vTuner, Reciva or RadioTime to play through your computer, you can hear a running commentary on the count with interviews from past and present MPs as well as declared counts as they come through.

The main newspapers like the Telegraph or Times also will offer a ticker or “dashboard” view of the election count through their Internet sites as well