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Television on your Phone
zxnos writes "Television on mobile is all geared up to be the next big thing as UK provider Orange, rolls out a mobile handset service, which will offer customers top TV shows and channels.
Channels such as Cartoon Network and CNN will be made available for a monthly subscription of £10. This will be UK's first TV-on-the-mobile service, which will allow customers to watch news, sport and entertainment programmes on their phone."
Why can't I get a TV which is just a TV?
You can, so stop moaning. Nobody is forcing you to use this phone.
I see all these new mobile technologies develop. Mobile web access, 3G networks, multimedia content, picture mail.... these are all well and good.
What I question is why there isn't more urgency on working on the increasingly insufficient battery life of the modern mobile device. This is not restricted to cell phones, either, but is particularly relevant in this case. The more features we jam-pack into these phones, the more and more our talk time (which is why we call these devices cellular telephones and not something else: they should make phone calls) tanks. Granted, much technological innovation and research is being done globally with hydrogen fuel cells, increasing efficiency of solar technologies, etc.... but the effort spent adding another gimmick (or feature, whichever is less offensive to you) is wasted when this mobile power problem for these devices seems ever the more relevant....
Though the possibility of watching Scrubs at work to make my bosses that much madder at me seems enticing....
Seriously, we should dedicate more energy to the mobile power problem.
The Crimson Dragon
-a good strong signal that won't drop calls
-a long battery life
-the ability to survive repeatedly being dropped onto a hard surface from a height of about 5 feet
-waterproofing might be nice
Maybe once I can get all that, I'll be interested in a phone that can deliver TV shows, play Beethoven ring tones, take grainy pictures, and allow me to play simply video games. Honestly, what do these companies think that people buy phones for?
DING DING DING! Yes you got it. I can't describe how little I give a shit about watching tv on my cell phone, just like I didnt give a shit about taking pictures with my phone, using my phone as an organizer, or any of the other fucktarded things they've tried to get me to buy. I will admit text messaging is marginally useful, however, sprint (whose the devil) charges *$10 month* for unlimited text messaging ... HOLY SHIT!
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
I'm curious about how monochrome video would look as opposed to color on such a small screen. Although it seems common enough now for phones to have small color screens, and resolution is not the problem it used to be, might B&W be simply easier on the eyes? Might old movies now have a new niche market? Unfortunately I don't have the spare $ to find out for myself!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_bloc
I see this as the broadcast television industry attempting to prolong their outmoded form of linear content delivery. I don't want content delivered to me at a corporation's convenience. I want on-demand. I think that by offering this service they are trying to keep people from remembering that they will simply be able to download any content whenever they want before too long. So I can't see a service like this having any legs at all.
I have a hard time accepting that people are actually getting paid more than I am to conceive and implement ideas such as this. Paying serious money ($20/month) for the opportunity to watch a limited number of television shows on a 3-cm square handheld screen.
Every technological innovation goes through several stages:
1) First there is the long hard expensive period of research and development of the basic underlying engineering.
2) Then comes the conceptualizing of a possible product and/or application.
3) Then comes the stage when large amounts of resources are put into making a truly stupid product.
4) Then, the nadir. The point of absolute and total despair where the developers realize that they have spent all this time and effort into making something that is truly stupid, unbelievably expensive, and does nothing more than duplicate the function of a simple, common widely-used device that costs a tiny fraction of the new product.
5) Finally, the phoenix. The price of the new technology falls to the point where its secondary benefits make it worth as much and more than the simple common ordinary device that it is replacing. It then becomes the new simple, common ordinary way of doing a task.
This is seen over and over. The word processor replacing the typewriter. Steven Levy in Hackers writes of the despair of the guy who invented the word processor when he realized that he was using a $20000 minicomputer to duplicate the function of a $20 typewriter. Word processors started to make sense when minicomputers started to cost $2. The CD replacing the vinyl phonograph, the energy saver light bulb, the music synthesizer, the television infra-red remote, the list goes on and on. It's a process.
These guys are at the point where they have invested a ton of money to make a truly stupid product but haven't realized it yet. Let's all hope that they survive the coming crash. Yes, guys, you actually did spend millions on the idea that people would give you money to watch a inch-square TV in a television picture on their cell phone. But, cheer up! It's not the end of the world and eventually something really wonderful will come directly from it.
Someday.
$10 UK to access the channels.
$0.5 UK/minute to watch the show.
If they didn't do it then it would be tantamount to saying that a full month of constant connection to someone else costs them *at most* $10 UK which would make the rest of their pricing policies seem all the more outrageous in comparison. You can't be to obvious about how you grift people - if you want to squeeze blood from a stone you gotta squeeze *slowly*.
I can't describe how little we give a shit about you describing how little you give a shit about watching tv on you cell phone.
If you don't want one, don't buy one. Move along. There's a PC with 640K ram with your name on it over there...
Awesome! It even has a built-in flashlight. Now, that strikes me as a useful feature that wouldn't have to be crippled by virtue of it having to fit on a cellphone. It would even replace a device on my keychain.
I actually own a three-year-old Nokia phone that is basically the same deal as that one, except without the flashlight.
Fun with Anagarams! LADS HOST, SHALT DOS. HAS DOLTS. AD SLOTHS, HATS SOLD. ASS HO, LTD.
I just wish Orange would spend less on crap cinema adverts and TV and more on getting their cell coverage right which, at the moment, is crap.
Personally, the mobile providers, at least in the UK, are overpriced rip-off merchants - the sooner we go fully VoIP and say bye bye to the cellular providers, the better as far as I am concerned...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I suppose that really, the true call to the phone manufacturers should be to not lose sight of the original purpose of the device, rather than cut out features.
:)
I guess I was just unlucky with the phone I chose. It also hits home again, that the control is with the end-user: try before you buy, and pick one that suits your needs. But those key shortcuts sound like a damn good idea to me.