Sky's Go app has now gone live for Android users (free, Android Market), letting users of some Android phones with a Sky TV subscription access 22 live TV channels from the provider. The app can only be used in the UK or Ireland and will stream content over a 3G or Wi-Fi connection. Users can register up to two devices and watch TV simultaneously on both.
British residents will soon be getting the 3D experience broadcast into their homes. The BBC has announced that it will offer limited coverage of the upcoming 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London in 3D. Sky, another British content provider, has disclosed that it may show some of the auto races covered by its new Formula One channel using the technology.
In sync with the fall Xbox 360 Dashboard update, Microsoft has provided a listing of TV providers that will be ready to go this week. Along with existing access to ESPN, Hulu, and Netflix, the December 6 update will also bring EPIX authenticated video in the US, Lovefilm in the UK, MediaSet's Premium Play in Italy, Sky Go in Austria and Germany, Telefonica España's Movistar Imagenio, and MSNBC's Today in the US.
In its latest attempts to curb online pornography, the UK government has worked with four of the country's biggest ISPs to develop an opt-in program. Under this measure, those who wish to access sexually explicit websites will have to let those ISPs know, The Guardian explained. The official announcement from Prime Minister David Cameron takes place Tuesday during the tenth meeting with the Mothers' Union.
HP has provided firm pricing and availability for its launch of its 9.7-inch TouchPad tablet in the UK. The price for the 16GB model is £399 ($640) and rises to £479 ($770) for the 32GB version. Both will be available online or from UK retailers on July 15.
UK telecommunications industry regulator Ofcom has revised the rates that Openreach, manager of BT's network, is able to charge other providers for using its services. This wholesale price could be reduced by over 10 percent per year. Companies that use Openreach, like TalkTalk and Sky, will benefit, but it won't help those such as Virgin Media that use their own cable network.
UK-based cable provider Sky will be the first to launch a 3D TV channel with its Sky 3D in April. The first live sport event shown in 3D will be the soccer match between Arsenal and Manchester United. Only nine pubs in London, Manchester, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Dublin will be equipped with the hardware needed to play the 3D broadcast, however. One Sky Sports broadcast will be devoted to 3D live coverage of the event, with eight 3D camera setups.
Microsoft is hoping to gain an edge in networked media hubs by offering live sports through the Xbox 360, a leak on Monday maintains. The console's originator is reportedly in significant talks with Disney to stream ESPN's feeds of live TV shows through the system. Users would pay for a subscription and get access to many if not most events through Internet feeds.
Microsoft today launched a range of changes to the Xbox 360's video features. Now rebranded as a Zune service, the former Xbox Video Marketplace will now provide videos in full 1080p and promises an "instant-on" feature that starts streaming videos almost immediately on faster connections. The extension will be available in all countries and should come along with an expansion of video rentals and purchases to 18 countries from the current 8.
The British music and film industries finally received the cooperation they have been seeking from Internet Service Providers in helping them fight illegal file downloading. A report on Thursday has six of the country's largest Internet providers sending warning letters to subscribers suspected of illegal file downloading and sharing. The decision to do so is commonly believed to be spurred by the British government, which announced earlier this year that it would impose its own laws forcing them to police how their services are used had they failed to cooperate voluntarily.
Americans browse the web on their cellphones almost twice as often as their British counterparts even without the help of web-friendly devices like the iPhone, according to a new study by M:Metrics. Despite the reputation of Europeans as more openly embracing smartphones, Americans in March were known to spend an average of four hours and 38 minutes per month on websites using their phones versus almost exactly two and a half hours for British users. The difference is largely attributed to the prevalence of flat-rate data plans in the US, which give customers either a block of data or unlimited access instead of the metering that more often exists in Europe.
Sky's upcoming on-demand TV service (now dubbed Go!View) for Sony's PSP will be available this summer, the British TV network said today. The service lets owners of the handheld game system use the Wi-Fi connection to watch shows offered on Sky independently of the satellite connection. Viewers will have the option of either paying per view or else paying a flat-rate subscription fee for watching many more shows. Shows can be downloaded first to the PC for transfer to the PSP later.
