Orange UK's (France Telecom) director of Digital TV, Tim Pearson, has confirmed that its Internet TV service is still on the cards for a launch sometime this year. The service had initially been expected to go live before the end of 2007 but failed to materialise.

It's understood that doubts over the attractiveness of IPTV in the UK market, as indicated by the less than impressive results from Tiscali and other providers, caused Orange to rethink its plans until it could develop something more unique.

The result is a service that, while based on France Telecoms own implementation, will offer consumers more flexibility to create personalized schedules and playlists. It sounds like an intriguing hybrid of social networking and IPTV, although precisely what the end product will look like is difficult to know.

Meanwhile no firm release date is known, only that the service has been under trial since November 2007 in London and the northern city of Leeds.