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An Olympic Push for Mobile TV

An Olympic Push for Mobile TVAuthor: Eric Everson, Founder MyMobiSafe.comTonight is the big night as the Opening Ceremonies kick-off in Vancouver; what is equally interesting however is that millions of viewers will have access to the best of the Olympic Games via their mobile phones.
Written by MobileTech , Contributor

An Olympic Push for Mobile TV Author: Eric Everson, Founder MyMobiSafe.com Tonight is the big night as the Opening Ceremonies kick-off in Vancouver; what is equally interesting however is that millions of viewers will have access to the best of the Olympic Games via their mobile phones.

In fact, NBC has setup an entire website (http://www.nbcolympics.com/mobile/) to push the Olympics into a new mobile frontier. Just last week mobile TV got a Super Bowl boost as FLO TV dished out some primetime bucks to tell the world about their mobile TV. Could 2010 become the year that mobile TV actually gains traction?

I do not even consider myself to be a couch potato, but even I see the value in being able to stay tuned in to live television from my mobile handset from anywhere in the world. From sporting events to breaking news coverage, there are a multitude of reasons to celebrate the prospect of mobile TV. As many of us working professionals are seemingly always on the go, tuning into mobile TV might just be our only hope of staying in sync with the channels that champion our lives.

I cannot speak for everyone riding the train to work, but I would personally rather tune in to CNBC on the mobile tube then wrestle with the gargantuan pages of the latest issue of The Wall Street Journal. Increasingly, we are living in a mobile world, so why has mobile TV had such a difficult time gaining traction? Bandwidth at the operator level is certainly an issue, but the mobile operators are certain to improve revenues as the demand for data and media bandwidth pushes us all to pay a little extra per month. This leaves only those at “The Networks” that are being perhaps too cautious in establishing live mobile channels and extensive distribution models.

I see no reason that the local coverage or broadcast model should be displaced simply because the content has gone mobile. I’m certainly glad to see NBC opening the door to this new frontier with the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. We may still not get coverage in real-time, but it is certain to be a momentous step forward in gaining traction with mobile TV. Perhaps one day we will all look back and wonder what took so long? But for now with my mobile in-hand, I guess all I can say is, Go Team USA!

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