How do you take your TV?
BT this week announced the pre-Christmas launch of BT Vision, their combined digital broadcast and broadband TV offering. The service will be available via a set top box 
which will combine a Freeview digital receiver with video-on-demand delivered by broadband.
Consumers will pay only for their internet and telephone connections – costs for TV content will be covered by an optional subscription or will be charged on-demand.
The news is important for a few reasons: it means Homechoice is no longer the only company in the UK providing TV via broadband; and it is a further step towards a TV-on-demand model.
Finally it suggests that as the TV content market fragments consumers may be less willing to pay a subscription to a single aggregator. This means there will have to be a role for advertising. The question no one has an answer to at the moment is what this role will be…
Posted by: Sam at croissant time on Thursday, 7th December 2006
