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Virgin Media Attacks Open UK Broadband TV Standard Project Canvas

Posted: 14th Jun, 2010 By: MarkJ
online video - project canvas ukThe boss of Virgin Media UK, Neil Berkett, has today said that he does support Project Canvas after all.. or at least its original aims. Project Canvas is an open UK standard that will deliver subscription-free broadband TV services directly into homes via your ISP and special IPTV set-top-boxes.

The project is part of a Joint Venture (JV) between TV broadcasters and Internet Service Providers (ISP), most prominently including the BBC , ITV , BT , TalkTalk , Channel 4 , Arqiva and Channel Five. Both Sky ( Sky Broadband ) and Virgin Media have historically raised some opposition to the system.

Berkett wrote in The Guardian today:

"Virgin Media's opposition to Canvas has been widely – but not always accurately – reported: we stand squarely behind the project's aims as they were originally presented; we question whether, in practice, it's evolving in a way that matches the joint venture partners' rhetoric."

Project Canvas was given a boost at the end of last month when the UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT) threw out its investigation, which was voluntarily put forward by the Joint Venture itself, because it did not have jurisdiction to review Canvas under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act 2002 (here).

However Virgin Media claims that its efforts to work commercially with Canvas, such as to explore mutually beneficial ways in which the standards could be incorporate as a "self-contained service" into the next generation of Virgin Media set-top boxes, have come to a dead end.

Berkett continued:

"The Canvas consortium has rejected the opportunity to incorporate Canvas into the Virgin Media customer experience, insisting that if we want to use their standards we must also accept that the entire Virgin Media entertainment service be accessed by our subscribers via a Canvas-imposed interface, including the Canvas channel listing and search facility.

This "shop window" to services would be entirely controlled by the joint venture partners and would allow the Canvas partners to give preference and prominence to their own channel content above that of any other content provider."

Based on that description it is easy to see why Sky and Virgin might have some problems with the service, which as an open standard should perhaps not be trying to impose itself so completely over establish platforms. However we only have one side of the story and Canvas itself is usually quite coy about discussing such concerns.

In any case the BBC Trust's final decision on the project is expected soon and most predict that it will receive the green light to proceed. So far neither Sky nor Virgin have been terribly clear about what, if any, action they might take when that decision comes.

Earlier this year the Digital TV Group (DTG), which represents everybody from set-top-box manufacturers (Sony, Pace etc.) to media companies like Sky and Virgin Media UK, expressed "widespread concern" at the last moment and accused Canvas of developing its own standard away from the wider industry (here). Since then the DTG's tone has softened and recently said they "[look] forward to working with [canvas]".
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