Technology is enhancing the TV experience and some people are already living in TV’s future – equipped with connected or 3D TVs and with a smartphone or tablet at hand.

But, despite the technological advances, the main TV set in the sitting room remains the magnetic core of the TV experience; people continue to prefer to watch TV as it is broadcast, sitting on their sofa, in the company of others, looking at a beautiful TV set whose average screen size has been increasing by an inch a year. This preference is unlikely to change whatever new technologies emerge.

How we watch TV

Linear TV
Linear TV has a very strong future. It is what we want to watch the vast majority of time, as proven by record linear viewing figures (see p. 9). At the root of this are basic human needs: we want to share, to belong, and we don’t want to miss out. Social media are enhancing this and increasing the desire to watch TV ‘live’, as it is broadcast – or as close to broadcast as possible. Miss the moment and you risk being left out of the conversation – and a friend on Facebook or Twitter might spoil the ending anyway.

Digital switchover – or analogue switch off – is due to be complete in 2012 and large parts of the UK have already switched off analogue. According to Ofcom, 93% of UK homes have now converted to digital TV in one the three forms of broadcast TV. These are:

• Digital terrestrial TV (DTT), dominated by Freeview;
• Digital satellite TV (DSat), mostly from Sky via subscription but also from Freesat;
• Digital cable TV, primarily from Virgin Media but with TalkTalk as a smaller player.

Homes now rarely have only one TV set and, according to Ofcom, there are 35 million secondary sets in the UK, 74% of which have also been converted to digital. DTT is the most widely used digital platform, with 58% of secondary sets connected to this platform. Sky Multiroom accounts for approximately 13%.

It is also possible to watch linear TV streamed via the web as simulcasts. These are available online for the following channels: ITV1, ITV Wales, Channel 4, Channel 5, BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Three, BBC Four, BBC News, BBC Parliament, CBBC and CBeebies.

On-demand TV (TVoD)
People have always wanted the ability to decide when they watch and, increasingly, where they watch TV. On-demand TV technologies, which began with VHS recorders, are meeting this need. The many different forms of on-demand TV are experiencing rapid growth and can boast some very big numbers. However it is important to keep this in context. Figures from BARB and IPA Touchpoints both indicate that this form of TV currently accounts for between 1 and 2% of total TV viewing.

TVoD is overwhelmingly about catch-up TV. There are other ways to catch up of course; a +1 channel is a basic form of on-demand, digital TV recorders offer pre-meditated on-demand, and even DVDs serve this need. But there are three main technologies now that deliver TVoD:

• Web TV (such as ITV Player or 4oD);
• Internet Protocol TV (IPTV, such as Virgin Media);
• Local storage (such as Sky Anytime).

Web TV
Web TV is the provision of TV services (simulcast, streamed or downloaded) through the open web. Any device that connects to the internet, including mobile devices such as games consoles or 3G phones, can access web TV.

People are watching web-delivered TV in increasing amounts, primarily to catch up with shows they have missed. And, although TV viewing on the web is growing in popularity and accessibility, it is still a relatively small amount of total TV viewing, some 6.3% according to IPA Touchpoints 3.

Most UK broadcasters have free web TVoD services; Sky Player requires you to be a Sky subscriber. Many of these services are also available on IPTV services (like Virgin or BT Vision), gaming consoles (like PS3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii) or through new online platforms such as MSN Player and YouTube.

The TV broadcasters’ web TV services have experienced rapid growth recently:

• ITV Player had 234 million views in 2010, a growth of 9% on 2009;
• BBC iPlayer had 1.5 billion requests in 2010, up from 1 billion in 2009;
• Sky Player had 258 million views from May to December 2010 (from when they started reporting);
• Channel4.com had 270 million views in 2010 up 113% on 2009.

Internet Protocol TV (IPTV)
IPTV is delivered through a phone line or broadband connection and a proprietary IP operating system. Major providers in the UK are Sky, Virgin Media, TalkTalk (formerly Tiscali) and BT Vision. Although it uses internet technology, IPTV is not delivered via the World Wide Web and is therefore a ‘walled garden’ technology.

Sky has recently launched their ‘pull’ on-demand service, Sky Anytime+ which provides a wide array of movies and programmes. Available to Sky Broadband subscribers, the service connects the Sky+ box to the internet and makes available over 500 movies and thousands of hours of content that consumers can download to their boxes.

Virgin Media provides catch up access to BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 content. It had 878 million on-demand views in 2010 and over 64 per cent of their 3.78 million TV customers are now regularly using the service.

YouView, the joint partnership between the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, BT and TalkTalk, intends to launch in 2012 and will combine linear and on-demand content delivered to TV sets via a broadband connected set-top box with no monthly subscription. It will be an open standard, meaning any company can develop services and boxes as long as the minimum requirements are met.

Local storage via DTRs
Sky Anytime is Sky’s ‘push’ on-demand service to TVs. Accessed via the Sky EPG (Electronic Programme Guide) it delivers selected programming over satellite to a partitioned section of the Sky+ DTR hard-drive. It provides up to 40 hours of content each week from popular TV series on Sky channels, movie premieres and HD programmes. Sky Anytime is available in the 6.5 million Sky+ and Sky+ HD homes.

Use of the partitioned hard drive is the means by which Sky intends to introduce tailored or ‘addressable’ TV advertising in 2012. Sky AdSmart will allow Sky viewers to receive advertisements and promotions which are even more relevant and tailored to their interests some of the time, based only on information knowingly volunteered by households or in the public domain.

New TV Technologies

Digital TV Recorders (DTRs)
It’s estimated that 48% of UK households now own a digital TV recorder, such as Sky+ or Freeview+. However BARB data shows that total time-shifted viewing represents just 7.6% of total UK viewing.

The early assumption that DTRs would threaten the future of TV ad breaks has now been proven unfounded. Research by Thinkbox and others has shown that viewers with a DTR invest in the technology because of their love of watching TV, not because they militantly want to skip ads.

The main DTR services (and their household take-up) are:

BARB’s figures also show that over 82% of all time-shifted viewing is watched within 7 days of recording; the remaining 18% is not included in BARB figures and is therefore totally free to advertisers. 48% of the encoded playback happens on the same day as it is broadcast, again proving that people want to catch-up fast.

Connected TVs
7% of UK households now have an internet-connected TV set, according to Thinkbox’s Tellyporting research (see p. 31). This enables viewers to have more choice of on-demand TV delivered by the internet as well as a new functionality on the TV screen more akin to a computer.

Our research found that people who were given smartphones that ‘talked’ to connected TVs were keen to respond directly to TV ads on an internet-connected companion device (such as a smartphone, laptop or tablet). This included placing ads directly on their online shopping list.

For advertisers, one of the main benefits of connected TVs is the return path they offer. This could eventually lead to a new economic model for TV based more on the transactional model found in e-commerce.

Of course, you don’t need a connected TV to respond immediately to an ad, as the growing amount of two-screening (watching TV with an internet-connected device to hand, such as a smartphone or laptop) shows.

High Definition TV (HDTV)
HDTV is becoming increasingly popular for viewers who want to have a cinematic experience in their own homes and has helped further magnetise viewing to the living room.

The UK currently has 54 specialist HDTV channels and Screen Digest estimates that 69% of households now have HD ready TV sets with 13% of households subscribing to the Sky HD service (35% of Sky homes) and a further 1.2m enjoying free HD via Freeview.

Currently ads cannot be routinely broadcast in HD. However it is possible by special prior arrangement with the broadcaster.

3DTV
3DTV is here. Sky launched the first 3D channel in the world on 1 October 2010 with live coverage of the Ryder Cup. The content on the channel is mostly films, live sport and documentaries. David Attenborough launched Flying Monsters on Christmas Day, and ballet and opera have both been broadcast on the channel.

The service is broadcast across Sky’s existing HD infrastructure and is available via the current generation of Sky+ HD set-top boxes. Most importantly, it is also compatible with all 3D Ready TVs in the UK and Ireland, including all models from Sony, Samsung, LG and Panasonic. Sky 3D is currently an opt-in service at no extra cost to the consumer – provided you have one of the new boxes and are a Sky World subscriber with the HD pack.