Japan
Why Japan and Korea Dominate in Mobile TV
Government incentives in Japan and Korea boost mobile TV penetration, but also distort the market, according an article in the latest issue of The Asia Media Journal.
Japan: Regulation decreeing that broadcasts to mobile must be the same as those on TV, a measure that helped keep rival services from telcos at bay, was just lifted two months ago. A quirk in the Japanese law stops people recording programs on their home but allows them to do so on their mobile phones. While broadcasters transmit their channels live, many people are watching TV on their mobiles in a non-linear way.
Korea: Broadcasters offering free mobile TV services are governed by the same rules restricting advertising on free-to-air TV, leaving little scope to develop an advertising medium in its infancy. Advertising revenues on free mobile TV are tiny – just 0.38% of TV advertising overall as of December last year according to Korean TV sales house Kobaco – leaving little money to invest in areas such as original content that might extend the medium’s appeal.
Content Helps: One key driver for new media platforms is exclusive content that people can’t get anywhere else, one of the reason why video sites have become so popular online. Companies are looking at bespoke content for mobile TV too – Korea’s TU Media for example commissioned its own comic action movie, Once Upon A Time in Korea, to help energize flagging subscriptions. Such initiatives remain the exception rather than the norm. Creating bespoke content costs money, and with little proof people would be willing to pay for it and currently limited advertising prospects, few companies are taking a punt.
- Above from The Asia Media Journal
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Bespoke content for mobile broadcasting is not the only possibility. When a given content is braodcasted linearly by jumping from one platform to the next, say from a tv broadcast to an immediately after broadcast on mobile or web, this has been a huge audience driver. Imagine a tv series that right after the broadcast, deliver extra materials onto mobile subscribers to the programme. How cool is that? Some documentaries have kept chat rooms going immediately after a given controversial documentary was broadcasted, creating additional ad revenues for the channel.
Today in the UK, for example, tv commissioners are pressured to finance the making of programmes or series that can clearly contribute to the broadcast with an online expansion of the asset, via a website or a mobile proposition. TV commissioners want to fund film assets (tv programmes) that can expand onto other mediums not just tv sets.
Creating new content is cumbersome, but knowing how to create a wholesome experience around a given programme by developing certain of its aspects for this or that platform is what I believe will make the sector take off.
In Japan, at least from what i know is that Softbank is discontinued their 2G service and everything is moving shifting towards 3G and data. from the prospective, the other carries the same strategy as each other, you should see data is only a way of the light years.