Bangalore, Nov 16: After putting a camera on the mobile phone, they've gone one step ahead — and turned it into a tiny TV set. The 2.7 million U.S.-based subscribers of the mobile phone provider Sprint's wireless data service, were today offered a new option: for an extra $10 a month, they can receive a cable television feed on their phones, from stations such as CNBC, ABC News and the Discovery Channel.
Sprint has sourced the service from a small California company, MobiTV, which takes the basic TV feed and converts it into streaming video. The picture is slowed to between 1 and 2 frames per second (unlike normal TV which works at 30 frames), so that most phones with multimedia capability can receive the feed.
The result is rather jerky. But this may not be for long, because the Korean handset-maker, Samsung, is already racing to bring out the world's first full fledged TV-cum-phone, where the mobile phone incorporates a tiny TV tuner chip. When the SCH-M220 is launched early next year, it will allow phone owners to receive TV transmissions in the VHF and UHF band directly — without having to pay for a provider to stream it.
Samsung is emerging as an aggressive player in the mobile handset arena in India with a number of models tailored for the budget buyer. It can be expected to bring its new TV-enabled models here. However, streaming video TV feeds to existing handsets is currently not being explored by any of the Indian mobile players.