As the name suggests, the concept of “interactive television” assumes the existence of interaction between the viewer and the broadcaster. This is possible when digital television is enriched with a return channel, for example in the form of a telephone modem.
We will watch Gołota’s fall
The viewer will be able to order current programs on video that were not broadcast, or archival programs, watch additional live broadcasts, and also pause a live program at any time to resume it later. This last service will be possible thanks to a personal video recorder (PVR). We will no longer miss the moment Andrzej Gołota is knocked out just because we went to get warm slippers at the beginning of the boxing match. We will watch Gołota’s fall calmly, already in warm slippers and with a glass of hot tea in hand. The technical novelty will be available to users of computers connected to the Internet, primarily with broadband access to the global network, but also to television sets equipped with a special set-top box.
Interactive Poland
Interactive television in Poland is being created by a team led by Leszek Bogdanowicz, a thirty-eight-year-old computer scientist, previously the creator of, among others, the popular Wirtualna Polska portal. Bogdanowicz has been working on the project since August 2004. The team leader assumes that we would use interactive television via various technical devices. People like variety; therefore, the thesis about the creation of one super-device combining the functions of many others can be put aside. And so, for example, a viewer will be able to watch a movie trailer and place an order via a mobile phone. Then watch the movie itself on the screen of a traditional television. And then discuss it with other viewers via a computer. Viewers of interactive television will indeed form an active community, similar to participants in Internet discussion forums.
Featured cities
– As a pilot, interactive television will first appear in Krakow, Poznan, and Warsaw – said Leszek Bogdanowicz. – This should happen in the last quarter of this year. Owners of computers with broadband Internet access will be able to use interactive television without any additional investments. Television owners could obtain a connection via IP. In that case, both the transmission and reception of feedback are carried out using the same technology – via the Internet Protocol (IP). If the results of observations and analyses are successful, which I hope they will be, interactive television will appear throughout Poland. When that will be, it is hard to say for now.
The article comes from the magazine “e-Fakty” 5/2005.