Philips Launching TV on Cellular in the US

An anonymous reader writes "News.com is reporting that Philips plans to soon bring the TV-on-cellular chipset to the US. TV enabled phones should be hitting the stores sometime in 2006 and to ensure that they meet their goal, Philips has partnered with Crown Castle Mobile Media to help make it happen. From the article: 'The company announced a similar chipset--which consists of a TV tuner, a decoder and peripheral components--for the European market earlier in the year. Three out of the six largest handset makers are currently building phones containing the chip for trials that will likely start soon. [...] The U.S. chipset is essentially the same product. "It is a small shift in the frequency band. The rest is all the same," Kaat said.'"

Comments

Product Placement

[elronxenu]

So does this mean the directors will now be instructed to zoom in more on the product (coke can, etc) since the screen is so tiny?

Why a TV Tuner?

[Vivek Jishtu]

Its like going a step backwards. When its possible to send Audio/Video using IP based technology what's the point of stepping backwards.

Re:Detail levels

[leonmergen]

As a matter of fact, these types of mobiles with TV on them are already quite popular over here (in .nl) and I must say, for things like the news and such, it works pretty well... good sound, a good quality video stream and well, yeah, the screen might be a bit tiny but you sure as hell can see what's going on (a friend of mine owns such a mobile)...

The only bad side about this is the cost - it's simply not worth the money (yet) to watch the news over your mobile. You can just as well call your auntie, ask what was on the news, ask her how she's doing, have a good discussion and then hangup and you'll still be off cheaper than watching the news for a few minutes...