Broadcasters to Make TV Mobile

In a nation with more than 225 million mobile subscribers, only 1.8 million of them watch broadcast television on their cell phones, according to September data from comScore (SCOR). But a group of more than 800 broadcasters hopes to change that—by making mobile TV shows both free and available at the same time they're shown on regular TV. To that end, in April 2007 those broadcasters formed the Open Mobile Video Coalition, aimed at establishing a standard for the delivery of mobile TV in the soon-to-be-available digital television spectrum.

On Nov. 25, members of the OMVC got one step closer to making their dream a reality. The group, in conjunction with the Advanced Television Standards Committee, which was responsible for creating the standard that governs how your TV set receives a high-definition signal, approved a candidate standard for mobile digital television. In the bureaucratic world of standards setting, this means the ATSC mobile DTV standard will be the accepted way to deliver mobile broadcast television going forward, although it's subject to a few additional tweaks. In the real world, this means devices capable of delivering free, mobile TV will come as early as 2010.