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Session 4 - Discussion
Session 4 - Discussion
KIM ANDERSON, Nine: The FACTS Strategy Group is trying to determine how we might get to MHP in a way that won't create a legacy. We need to be able to author now in a way that we will continue authoring in when MHP is delivered (because DVB-HTML is a component of MHP). This means that if I buy a box that can run something like DVB-HTML, the applications I've written today will continue to be deployed and viewed once I have deployed MHP.
So there are other solutions other than the proprietary solutions, such as migration paths to MHP. I would have thought that HTML is a very good one to look at, given that some of the proprietary platforms in the UK, such as BSkyB, are already now deploying in both XML, WML and OpenTV. The reason BSkyB have used WML, as opposed to HTML, is because they don't have enough resources in the box to deploy a full HTML solution.
So I think we need to be very careful about suggesting that there is only one open platform and that is MHP. We are reluctant to do that unless we have agreement with all the other free-to-air broadcasters to do that. Obviously that decision hasn't yet been made, as we haven't yet fully explored it. Though that is in fact something we would like to happen.
CHRIS WINTER, ABC: I would just like to add a little bit to what Ian Carroll was saying. I would argue that we shouldn't get too distracted by the middleware. I suppose Liberate is worth talking about, because it provided a very economical opportunity for the ABC to learn some important lessons. However I don't think the ABC has got any intention to acquire massive skills in each of those different middlewares. What the ABC did learn from working with Optus, for example, were very important design issues, designing for the platform.
The ABC is starting to learn about making those difficult editorial decisions about what content is in fact going to work. It is also learning about what I consider the most important and most difficult of issues for all the broadcasters, that being the ability to manage content in such a way that it can be delivered easily, across whatever platform you choose, without it costing a fortune. In the end it doesn't really matter whether it is OpenTV, Liberate, or HTML that you are doing this on.
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