Airtel Launches Broadband TV

[kesav 127]

Airtel Introduces Broadband TV

Bharti Airtel today announced the launch of ‘airtel broadband TV’ now Airtel Customers can watch TV by simply subscribing to airtel broadband TV plan with attractive monthly subscription packs starting at Rs49.

To avail this service all that airtel broadband customers need to do is visit www.airtellive.com and subscribe to their Monthly Subscription Pack of choice by clicking on the Live TV option.

Currently, customers have the option to watch 28 Live, 19 VOD (Video on demand) channels and 12 movies basis the chosen subscription plan. Watching broadband TV requires standard Macromedia Flash player version 10.2 and no other specific software.

The 28 Live TV channels are across genres, languages and include the likes of UTV Bindass, UTV Movies, Bloomberg UTV , TLC, Animal Planet, all Discovery channels, Sakshi TV, Live India, NE TV, Otv News, Suvarna News and Tarang Music. airtel broadband TV also works on Wi-Fi giving customers the freedom to watch TV anywhere in their homes.

Besides, while watching airtel broadband TV one can multi-task like browsing the net and working on the laptop or computer at the same time.What’s more-bandwidth consumption for watching airtel broadband TV will not add to the customers’ Broadband Plan data usage, except for users in Noida and Punjab.

Details of Monthly Subscription Plans:

Gold Pack– All channels with Voice on Demand and movies for Rs. 99/, per month

Night Pack- All channels with Voice on Demand and movies for Rs. 49/, per month from 9PM – 9AM

My Pack- Any 3 chosen channels for Rs. 49/- per month

Note : Customers will not have to pay extra for data usage charges after the activation of above Broadband TV Packs, except for subscribers in Noida and Punjab.

source :: http://telecomtalk.info/airtel-introduces-broadband-tv/59524/

Website :: https://www.airtelbroadbandtv.com/airtelbroadbandtv/InitialRequestAction.do

It's just in response to raising popularity of TATA's Photon TV

http://www.tataphoton.com/tata-photon-photontv.aspx

http://www.tataphoton.com/download/CHANNEL-INTERNETTV-NOV.xls

It's very important to note that TATA's landline subscriber addition has overtaken Airtel in the month of January 2011.

[kesav 127]

Airtel Launches Broadband TV At Rs 99/Month; Not A Neutral Pipe

Bharti Airtel, in partnership with mobile TV aggregator Apalya, has launched Airtel Broadband TV for its broadband subscribers. As far as we know, this is Apalya’s first wireline broadband deployment, and the first time the company could serve as an alternative to TV (assuming reliable broadband speeds). The service offers 28 live channels, 19 Video-On-Demand channels, and 12 movies.

The service is subscription based, and offers three plans: Gold Pack (all Channels with VOD and movies – Rs 99 per month); Night Pack (All channels with VOD and movies from 9PM to 9AM – Rs 49 per month) and My Pack (Any 3 channels for Rs 49 a month). We’ve published channel details, including information on Video on Demand channels at the end of this post. Note that major entertainment channels like Zee, Sony, Colors and Star are missing, as well as news channels like Aaj Tak, Star News, NDTV and Times Now, among others. The streams will be provided in the browser through Flash 10.2. This means it won’t work on devices such as Apple’s iPad which don’t support Flash.

Neutral Pipe?

Why would users want to pay for TV streaming, when it comes free of any charge on TV network websites, as well as on sites like live.indiatimes.com*? Airtel Broadband TV is getting preferential treatment; according to the Airtel Broadband TV FAQs:

“Yes, you would be able to watch Broadband TV. Your Airtel Broadband connection would be Auto Upgraded for Broadband TV to 1 Mbps to give you a buffer free experience. This feature comes to you completely free of charge.” Additionally, “The bandwidth consumption for watching Broadband TV will not add to your Broadband Plan data usage.”

So while Airtel is giving preferential bandwidth allocation to its subscription based Broadband TV service, and not counting bandwidth consumption (remember that Airtel doesn’t have unlimited broadband – there’s a “fair usage policy” applicable). In comparison, other online live streaming services don’t have that luxury. What we’re not sure of, is whether Broadband TV will get preferential treatment in terms of lower latency as well.

Note that, for some reason, Airtel Broadband customers in Noida and Punjab don’t get the bandwidth upgrade, and data consumption for them will be counted.

*

Live TV Channels :

- Entertainment : UTV Bindass, Ne HiFi

- Movie: UTV Movies

- News: Bloomberg UTV, Focus TV, HY TV, India News, Live India

- Infotainment: Discovery, Discovery Science, Discovery Turbo, TLC, Animal Planet

- Devotional: GOD, Dharm

- Regional: Ne TV, Ne Bangla, Sakshi TV, OTV, Tarang, Tarang Music, JAi Hind, Jeevan, Suvarna News, Hamar TV, Vasanth TV, Sri Sankara TV

VOD Services:

- Entertainment: Mobile Multiplex, Oolala, Chillout, Darpan, Bollywood Backstage, BollywoodJoint, Big Digital Bhakti, Big Digital Celeb, Big Digital Jokes, Mumbai Masala, Zapper TV

- Infotainment: Bhavishvani, Nat Geo Adventure, Nat Geo Crime, Nat Geo Science, Nat Geo Wildfire

- Kids: Bambam Girpadehum, Cartoon Netwok’s Fruit Basket

- Devotional: Bhakti Sangeeth

Movies:

Bachelors, Blood Stained Romance, Bruce Lee Secret, CIA Vengeance, Dear Mr Waldman, Futile Attraction, Love Philosophy, No Body Knows Anything, Pool Party, Texas Taliban, Zombie Wars, Big Guns

source :: http://www.medianama.com/2011/03/223-airtel-launches-broadband-tv-at-rs-99month-not-a-neutral-pipe/

[commonman 228]

so does this mean death bells for airtel's IPTV service

[kesav 127]

No....No....

IPTV is different from Internet TV. This one(also Photon TV) is internet TV.

Internet TV is targeted for the people who are willing to watch TV on desktops/laptops.

IPTV is much different and superior which is targeted for viewing on Television sets.

IPTV operator has to guarantee specified QoS to compete with other platforms like DTH, Digital Cable etc.,

In IPTV, certain bandwidth for each customer is reserved for TV streams exclusive of Data & Voice.

IPTV requires server installations at city-level and consumers require set-top boxes.

IPTV delivers exceptional quality and transforms TV viewing as an interactive service.

Internet TV is just a TV stream on a website.

In Internet TV, stream is just treated as part of the data and there's no guaranteed bandwidth.

Internet TV is not bound by regulator's QoS requirement.

IPTV is an intra-operator service while Internet TV is an inter-operator service meaning you can access Airtel's Internet TV in BSNL broadband.

[rajanmehta 4,056]

Airtel has cleverly not specified anywhere what will be the native resolution of the stream for this service..

Most likely this will be a small size window stream... Something similar to what ESPN is streaming world cup live on the internet now...

In that case it will be meaningless and does not excite one bit...

Even otherwise, don't get the rational for this product...

If one is Airtel ADSL Wireline Broadband Customer which will be most likely at your home... Why on earth you need to subscribe to this... You have access to TV at home..

For Mobile TV viewing while on the road... Most operators are offering the same service from Apalya..

[ipkonfig 10]

According to airtel broadband customer care, the default resolution is 320x240px (QVGA).

[amitnsonu 72]

I got mail on 2 march regarding this service

but Airtel ko laalten (lantern) leke ghumne k baad bhi koi customer nahi milega is service ka...

most importantly they are not having any sport channel in this service.

[starnet 7]

For some people this is a good enough service. For example those who trade stocks online have trading software open on their screens all time. They can subscribe to this service and have a small window of Bloomberg UTV running in a corner of their monitor. Some people who trade stocks all day long have TV with cable or DTH installed in their offices and they keep one eye on any market moving news like the earthquake in Japan that moved the markets down within seconds of the news hitting the wires. This kind of setup is a good replacement of a TV for some but I don't see large number of people going for this service unless the selection of channels is wider.