PVR Wire

Following almost two years of constant updates about a product which never looked like materialising, BT has finally launched it's Vision service (previously codenamed 'Nevis').

The service promises a Freeview unit, with an 80-hour capacity PVR, along with the capability to watch/stream/download movies and TV shows on-demand via BT's proprietary IPTV service.

As I've said before, I'm completely underwhelmed by BT's efforts thus far in this arena, and I'm no-where near convinced that this will make any kind of impact on the market. It's a bit like Microsoft's Zune; if they chuck enough money at the advertising, people might go for it - but they'll probably regret it later when the product is upgraded and reduced significantly to draw in more suckers.

However, despite what the service is supposed to offer, you can currently pick up a 'V-Box' for free. Unfortunately, you still need to have BT's Total Broadband service in order to sign up for Vision, plus there's a £60 installation fee and a £30 connection fee just for Vision alone.

Movies start at £1.99, with TV shows and music more moderately priced -- or you can sign up to one of the monthly subscription packages, starting at £6.00 per month.

It's still not clear if the PVR will record off-air content for later viewing, or if it only stores downloaded, paid-for content.

You also need BT Home Hub to use Vision (which will cost you £50 over the phone, or £30 to purchase online) -- which, combined with the 2MB Total Broadband service, you're already looking at £9.99 for the first six months, then £17.99 per month thereafter (that's for an minimum of 18-months) just for Broadband.

So, you're looking at a minimum of £120 to get set up with BT Vision and BT Hub, plus at least £9.99 per month for Total Broadband.

That, my friends, is what's known in the real world as a joke -- and if you're prepared to part with all that money for what is essentially a pony, then you deserve everything you get.

After almost two years of harping on about their iPTV/download/Freeview service BT Vision, BT has announced that the product will launch on 4 December -- just in time for the Christmas market, eh?

Well, not quite.

For a start, it's still a soft-launch -- or a "measured roll-out of the new service that would pick up momentum in the spring", as a BT spokesman described it.

Which is basically spin for "we've made a right hash of this one, and we're just going to release it three weeks before Christmas in the vain hope that a few deluded individuals might be struggling to buy a present for their partner and might see this as a way out."

With the product still largely unproven, and competitors like BSkyB, NTL/Telewest and dozens of other Freeview PVR manufacturers already several months (if not years) into the UK PVR/iPTV market, BT Vision looks likely to be a certain turkey.

More analysis:

The Guardian: Paul Richards, a media analyst at Numis Securities, does not believe that BT Vision will pose a serious threat to BSkyB's business. "There's a big gap between the Freeview offering and something like Sky, but if BT can find a niche in there to give Freeview customers a bit more, that's probably enough to give them a viable model."

The Register: Few expect BT to wrest a very large portion of the pay TV market away from Sky and cable monopoly NTL (soon to be rebranded as Virgin Media). The rationale backing Vision surrounds customer retention and adding value to its position in the broadband market.

I haven't been the kindest to BT's forthcoming Vision IPTV/PVR service, partly because they've been banging on about it for over a year, and we haven't even been given a release date yet.

Web User Magazine has managed to get a sneak preview of the service, and seemed fairly impressed with what BT has to offer, even if it'll still struggle to compete with Sky+ on a few levels.

It's got the 160 GB drive, as promoted, and twin tuners for recording one show while watching another -- and it even includes an HDMI output on the back. As a Freeview/IPTV/PVR unit, it will be hard for most manufacturers of Digital TV boxes to compete with, but there's still no release date, and it's estimated to cost £100 just for the box itself, with no clear indication on the monthly rental fees or VOD charges.

Oh, and not only will BT be monitoring usage for their own nefarious purposes, but they'll be able to bombard users with ads whenever they like.

In a deal announced with BSkyB, BT has negotiated on-demand rights to Premiership soccer in the U.K. for its forthcoming BT Vision IPTV/PVR/Freeview service.

From 2007 to 2010,  the three-year deal will allow BSkyB and BT to broadcast 242 matches after 10pm on any match day, with BT offering the near-live games to subscribers.

However, reports seem to conflict on whether BT will offer the matches on a pay-per-view basis, while Sky will make the matches available to Sky Sports subscribers at no extra cost.

All BT needs to do now is actually launch BT Vision.

In yet another article propounding a television revolution here in the U.K., BT looks headed for the blame game over the delayed release of its BT Vision product (originally codenamed BT Nevis).

The product, which aims to combine a Philips-built Freeview box with a PVR and a video-on-demand service delivered over an ADSL-enabled telephone line, was being touted for a summer 2006 release, which has now been put back to Q4, and, in all likelihood will probably not hit the shelves in time for Christmas.

Sure, it sounds great on paper, but rivals are starting to suggest that BT and Microsoft (the software partner on the project) are struggling to get Vision to work reliably ahead of a public release.

If/when BT's new iPTV/PVR tv on-demand service eventually launches, users who sign up will receive a combined Freeview box, VoIP phone and a 160 GB PVR for just £100 and no further obligations (other than running the service on a BT Broadband internet connection).

The PVR will allow users to perform all of the standard PVR functions whilst viewing the 32 available Freeview channels, with other content available on a pay-per-view basis.

The fact that BT are taking so long to get their product on to the market, despite numerous announcements and press releases, doesn't bode too well for the potential for their iPTV product to get out of the starting blocks. As a BT spokesman has already commented 'Some details have to be worked out.'

Indeed.

I missed this one last week, but it seems BT has announced content partnerships for its forthcoming IPTV service with the BBC, Paramount and Warner Music Group.

Codenamed "Nevis", the service is scheduled to start around Q4 2006, offering on-demand film, music and television content on a Freeview-enabled set-top box.

The BBC will offer a range of content, including drama, comedy and archived material, while Paramount will offer pay-per-view movies.

More: Computer Business Review.

There's been a lot of news over the past two days about a confirmed £817m takeover approach for Richard Branson's Virgin Mobile company (U.K.) by cable telco NTL (who are also in the process of a £6bn merger with rival cable firm Telewest).

Reports suggest that Branson is aiming for the "quadruple play" market, offering users an all-encompassing TV, broadband, fixed-line and mobile service -- possibly including exclusive sport content and on-demand/movie download services -- but as Tim Weber of BBC News suggests, we've been here before; Vizzavi, the ill-fated alliance of Vodafone, Canal plus and Vivendi Universal and the AOL/Time Warner merger being the best two examples.

 
As we've been saying here on PVR Wire since BT announced the launch of a new IPTV service (scheduled for late 2006), the U.K. telecom giant is facing a tough challenge to successfully (and belatedly) enter the British PVR marketplace.

Media Week has taken a closer look at BT's plans, and reports that an unnamed media analyst believes that BT's entry into the market "has come too late" and that Rupert Murdoch's empire is now "unassailable".

The problem lies in the already steady market in the U.K. -- 7.5 million customers already own SkyTV, 2.5 million users currently subscribe to cable and five million have Freeview -- and the difference between technology providers and content providers; BT is merely a technology provider, while BSkyB is both.