Interactive TV is commonly regarded as interacting with the TV. Already in 2004 the Norwegian Newspaper Verdens Gang (VG) published an article on SMT-TV, poiting out that using SMS services does not only create income for the TV company, but also reduces churn (switching to other channels) and provides good feedback on user behaviour. The new trends in interactive TV, starting in 2008, are the trends of building a community of users watching TV and using community services on the TV.
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The primary goal of these initiatives was to keep the user in front of the TV, as more and more set-top boxes had the capabilities of record TV streams. This primary goal was extended by adding the joint experience to the TV viewing, where viewing together might even happen at separate places. Several research projects were launched at that time, and the WellCom project is one example of such a project dealing with Interactive TV. What is in common in all these projects is the involvement of users in the TV, which thus turns into an interactive device rather than a broadcast device.
The WellCom project
The Eureka ITEA 2 WellCom was a collaborative research project running under the ITEA2 programme within the EUREKA framework. It was launched in April 2007 and ended in October 2009. The WellCom consortium was composed of 15 European organizations including Large companies, SMEs, research institutes and universities. The research effort is supported in part by the different European Public Authorities involved in the project.
Main Outcome
The main outcome of the WellCom project was a set of demonstrators, showing
Trials were performed in France, Spain, Luxembourg, and Norway to show the capabilities of Interactive TV, using the mobile phone as an extra channel for interacting with the TV.
The rapid advances in mobile technologies have turned the development into another direction. TV consumers have not changed their habits, and the majority of them still join TV at the time it is shown. Interactive TV is thus still dominated through SMS and phone calls, but mobile devices have contributed that the viewing of TV is independent of sitting in front of a TV.
WellCom Partners
Conference papers
- S. Alam, J. Noll and D. Roman, "Semantic Policies for Service Access in Mobile supported Sensor Networks",Int. Conf. on Advances in Human-oriented and Personalized Mechanisms, Technologies, and Services, I-CENTRIC 2008, October 26–31, 2008 - Sliema, Malta
- E. Lehtihet, Z. Iqbal, N. Agoulmine, J. Noll, and T. Sund, "Integrating Internet Services in a Converged Home Environment", Proc. of Wireless World Research Forum, WWRF #21, 13-15 Oct 2008, Stockholm
- M. M. R. Chowdhury, S. Alam and J. Noll, "Policy Based Access for Home Contents and Services, Fifth International Conference on Soft Computing as Transdisciplinary Science and Technology, IEEE/ACM CSTST'08, October 26–30, 2008 - Cergy-Pontoise/Paris
- M. M. R. Chowdhury, N. Elahi, S. Alam, J. Noll, "A Framework for Privacy in Social Communities", Special Issue of International Journal of Web Based Communities (IJWBC), Inderscience Publishers, ISSN(online): 1741-8216 ISSN(print): 1477-8394.
- J. Noll, S. Alam, and M. M. R. Chowdhury, "Integrating Mobile Devices into Semantic Services Environments" Fourth International Conference on Wireless and Mobile Communications, ICWMC 2008, July/August 2008, Athens, Greece
- N. Elahi, M.M.R. Chowdhury, and J. Noll, "Relation-based Access Control through Semantic Rules", Proceedings of WWRF #20, April 2008, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
- Najeeb Elahi, Mohammad M. R. Chowdhury, Josef Noll, "Semantic Access Control in Web Based Communities", In the proceedings of 3rd International Multi-Conference on Computing in the Global Information Technology ICCGI July/August, 2008 - Athens, Greece Published by IEEE CS press (IEEE Explore), ISBN 978-0-7695-3275-2
- Gondi, Vamsi Krishna; Lehtihet, Elyes; Agoulmine, Nazim, "Ontology-Based Network Management in Seamless Roaming Architectures" In Network Operations and Management Symposium Workshops, 2008. NOMS Workshops 2008. IEEE7-11 April 2008 Page(s):60 - 65
- Lehtihet, Elyes; Agoulmine, Nazim, "Towards Integrating Network Management Interfaces" In Network Operations and Management Symposium, 2008. NOMS 2008. 11th IEEE/IFIP 7–11 April 2008 Page(s):1–4
- Nguyen-Vuong, Quoc-Thinh; Agoulmine, Nazim; Ghamri-Doudane, Yacine, "Novel Approach for Load Balancing in Heterogeneous Wireless Packet Networks" In Network Operations and Management Symposium Workshops, 2008. NOMS Workshops 2008. IEEE 7–11 April 2008 Page(s):26 - 31
- L. Trappeniers, M. Godon, L. Claeys, O. Martinot, E. Marilly, "Cross-Media Experiences: Ambient Community Interactions in the Cit", published in the Bell Labs Technical Journal, v13-2–Summer 2008