Television in the palm of your hands

Czech Television (ČT) is proving to be a popular hands-on viewing experience with more than 250,000 downloads of the network's 12 applications by smartphone and tablet users.

In February, the company jumped on the new media bandwagon by first offering its news channel ČT24 as an application for smartphones running iOS, Android, Symbian 3 or Bada operating systems. It also added the company's popular sports channel ČT4 as a mobile download. On the strength of this popularity, it introduced ČT24 and ČT4 to tablets like iPad Sept. 5. The applications have an alphabetical directory for people to search for shows by title or by genre.

"A quarter of a million downloaded apps is a number that shows the power of smartphones and tablets in the field of TV broadcasting and supplementary services," said Milan Fridrich, director of Czech Television New Media. "Also, what is encouraging is the fact that ČT apps are used daily by tens of thousands of people."

However, not all mobile platforms work well with the applications, said Štěpán Janda from the ČT press department. Nearly 147,000 of the downloads for ČT24 and ČT4 have been for iPhones and iPads, and about 89,000 have been for Google's Android. He added that about 47 percent of the Czech population uses Apple.

The New Media division has been working with and developing its mobile applications in conjunction with Erika a.s., Nokia ČR, Samsung, Inmite, Motion Media, Kit Digital and Mediaworks.

"Half a million downloaded apps this year is a real number for Czech Television," Fridrich said. "Now we are dealing with developing and improving to make our service as effective as possible and the image as stable as possible."

In addition to the applications and live streaming, the television company launched a new video archive named iVysílání, It will offer programs previously broadcast on Czech Television over the past seven years. People can build their own playlists and programs based on their downloads. It will be available on the iOS devices, but according to Janda, the company is currently working on the video archive as an application for Nokia phones, Android devices and the Samsung Galaxy tablet.

The network is currently testing the use of Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV (HbbTV). HbbTV is mixed multimedia that enables a person to access high-definition or digital television and Internet television on a TV using a single remote or cable box with an interactive screen. According to Fridrich, because of the success of mobile applications, the network has looked into possibly offering the HbbTV to viewers within the next year.

- Filip Šenk contributed to this report.

Megan Battista can be reached at
features@praguepost.com