Rapid TV News

BBC slams Apple over iPlayer

Chris Forrester ©RapidTVNews | 09-11-2008

The BBC’s iPlayer internet portal might well be dragging ISP and broadband networks to their knees, such are the capacity demands being made. But Eric Huggers, the BBC’s recently-appointed head of new media, gave delegates at a Screen Digest seminar some spectacular numbers on iPlayer’s take-up, saying the BBC is very much “betting on the internet”.

Hinting at the future, Huggers said the BBC is artificially blocking international access “and this is a challenge. But the internet is a global medium”.

I-Player was formally launched on December 25 2007, and Huggers stressed that it has evolved considerably since then with a huge amount of work having gone on behind the scenes. For instance, today’s version offers “series stacking”, where users can automatically download all the episodes of a series.

Huggers said by the end of this year the technology will have been extended to include full support for Linux and other major non-Microsoft operating systems.  Nintendo Wii, Play Station 3 and XBox360 consoles can already access iPlayer.

Huggers supplied some impressive statistics showing how growth had doubled over the past nine months, from a January monthly total downloads of 11.2m to September’s 22.8m (daily growing from 361,000 to 759,000 over the same period).

Huggers explained that he and some of the BBC team recently visited Apple in Cupertino, California, to discuss how to get iPlayer onto the Apple range of devices. “We worked closely with them on the streaming capabilities of the iPod ‘Touch’ and phone. Buy those devices today and hook it up to WiFi and you have access to the full [BBC] service. The volume of traffic that they already generate took us somewhat by surprise. The only function that doesn’t work on iPod ‘Touch’ or phone is the download functionality. This is not because the BBC doesn’t want to. The reason is that Apple doesn’t want to licence its DRM technologies which it calls Fairplay. The only way the BBC – or anyone else for that matter – can get their content onto the Apple ecosystem of devices is by syndicating its content directly into iTunes and then you get stuck into the iTunes world. So, we said ‘that’s interesting but we think downloading is important, especially in the UK where millions use public transport every day’. So we wondered whether our friends in Finland might take a different view.”

Huggers said that Nokia’s Helsinki team were immediately won over by the BBC offering. Nokia’s latest “smart” phone the N96 device, has the ability to both access the BBC site and download content. But an N96 said Huggers and the first thing you’ll see once you have charged it up is the Nokia home screen complete with BBC button. “This is the first time in Nokia’s history that a third party application has actually shipped with the device straight out of the factory.”

The BBC’s iPlayer traffic is coming 85% from Windows-enabled PCs, 10% from Macs, 1% each from Linus and Wii devices, and 3% from iPhone Touch.

IPlayer is also extending the BBC’s prime time well into the late night hours with highest traffic taking place during the 9pm-midnight period. Data also showed that usage was high during office hours. “This represents a fantastic opportunity to hang on to prime time,” said Huggers. There have been more than 250m streams or downloads generated since launch, with 56m taking place on the BBC service offered to Virgin Media users (who can play the system out on their TV sets).

“We believe that on-demand is absolutely in addition to the normal linear transmission,” said Huggers. Usage pattern is highest (43%) in the 35-54 age range, 37% in the 15-34 range, and a still impressive 21% in the 55+ group. Huggers said the BBC’s priorities included “absolutely betting on the internet.”

© Rapid TV News 2008